1848.] 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECTS JOURNAL. 



165 



rather have founrl here something that would have enahlefl us to 

 judire of the interior. By not doing so, we perhaps miss very little, 

 for, from what has been said of it, the plan appears to be excessively 

 comnion-]>lace. There are about half-a-dozen other designs for 

 the same Club-house; therefore, instead of being scattered about on 

 the walls, and some of them put where they are scarcely visible, it 

 would have been lietter to have collected them into a group. We 

 should have preferred seeing here the respective sections, for 

 those drawings were not exhibited at LichKeld House, although 

 some of the plans convinced us that the sections belonging to them 

 must have been more than usually interesting. Sections, however, 

 are not at all in fa\-our with the Academy ; — are things by far too 

 prosaic to be admitted into their Architectural Room. Isometri- 

 cal perspectives of prisons are in their opinion more artistic draw- 

 ings and dignified subjects than sections of even palatial club- 

 houses. Such doggrel mode of drawing as isometrical perspective 

 tolerated on the walls of a Royal Academy ! 



Designs for Railway Stations are quite as numerous, perhaps 

 even more numerous, than those for the Club-house ; and they may 

 be allowed to show a good deal of variety, with a good deal of 

 sameness, — variety, inasmuch as they conform to no generic cha- 

 racter, but assume all sorts of masquerade, from the costume of 

 almshouses to that of aristocratic mansions ; — and sameness, inas- 

 much as they nearly all affect to look prodigiously " olden-time-ish" 

 — a very great projiriety, no doubt, when we consider how many 

 centuries ago it is since railways were first established. A herald 

 would trace them back to the Conquest, at least, and make out 

 that they came over with the Normans. Sameness, too, there is with 

 respect to ))aucity of ideas, and poverty of invention. If we con- 

 sider them merely as drawings, showing imitations of the respective 

 styles and classes of buildings, some there are well enough en- 

 titled to approbation, but hardly so as designs for a specific and 

 wholly nn-precedentcd purp(jse, and accordingly demanding to be 

 invested with some sort of specific character. 



CTo be continued. ) 



ON ARCHITECTURE AND PAINTING, 



ESPECIALLY IN RELATION TO THE EKECTION OF PROTESTANT CHIRCHES. 



Letters written from Italy, by W. M. L. De Wette, D.D., Professor 



at Basle. — [Abridged from the German.] 



If one, who like myself, is merely an amateur of art, and quite 

 a stranger to techincism, — ventures to lay down principles and 

 give advice, he may be sure of encountering the prejudices of 

 artists and critics by profession. If he, moreover, steps forth, witli 

 a certain independenceof judgment, on an area where tradition and 

 custom sway all miruls — fearless of touching at some of the ex- 

 istmg prejudices, his giving offence is unavoidable. Still, I shall 

 make the venture, and my ignorance of technicism deters me the 

 less, as I have found that technicists veryoften mistake the true scope 

 of art, on account of their predilection for that sort of mastership — 

 a prejudice, from which I, at least, am free. I may possibly be 

 taunted with other prejudices and with one-sidedness ; still, I 

 hope to give some useful hints. 



I begin with a few remarks on painting ; and, without wishing 

 to enter into a definition of what it is, or ouyht to be, it is certain 

 that its destination is to convey representations and feelings to 

 the mind. But all representations, be they what they may — either 

 intuitions of the senses, or images of the fancy, or conceptions 

 of the reason, or ideas of the mind, — consist of two elements ; one 

 suggested by experience, and another appertaining to the activity 

 of the mind : one real-sensual, and one real -spiritual and primordial. 

 In the intuition of senses, the first element preponderates so much, 

 that we may be tempted to consider it the onlij one ; but the more 

 accurate observer will soon perceive that the mind has also its 

 share in it. It is it, which impresses form to the matter of the 

 senses — receiving- that which it has viewed, within the pale of his 

 other observations, and converting it into an intuition. The pro- 

 ducts of imagination may appear to a superficial observer as some- 

 thing produced by the mind, but the substance of it appertains 

 entirely to the experience of senses ; imagination having merely 

 decomposed it, and combined it in another shape and way. Even 

 the ideas of the mind (be it in art or otherwise) are no absolute 

 produce of our thinking faculties ; being merely deduced from 

 experience. 



Undoubtedly, the arts have risen from the imitation of nature, 

 from the representation of the really existing — and even their 



present process and progress are the same. Thus, while conced- 

 ing, that in any art-object so much of the real be existing, we may 

 be induced to doubt how far ideality may enter therein at all. But 

 if we take the dift'erence between a picture and a daguerreotype, 

 the case «ill become perfectly clear. In the former, that which 

 occurs to the external eye piecemeal, must be seized by the mind 

 and intellect as a whole — and put forward as a self-existing, inde- 

 pendent object. For the fir^t, besides nature, models, antiques, 

 anatomy, &c., are used, all which will yield materials on which the 

 artist can and may dwell ; but imagination will supplant many of 

 these helps, as we see in Raffaelle, who, after ha\ing devoted 

 nearly his whole talent to painting, became the conijileter of the 

 finest modern edifice in the world ; we mean the dome of St. Peter 

 — which will lead us to a more detailed inquiry on the art of the 

 builder. 



Architecture may be called the most diflScult of arts, as it is a 

 fact that its products have experienced the most opposite and most 

 severe criticism. The reason for this might be found in architecture 

 being not sufficiently free— heins:, as no other branch of art, tied u]> 

 to a certain scope; and only after this is accomplished, the de- 

 mands of the beautiful may and can be attended to. On the 

 other hand, the freedom accorded to the architect is something very 

 vague, as lie cannot follow any prototypes, but (as in music) has only 

 to be guided by the internal measure of mathematical intuition, or 

 the judgment of proporti(ui and a?sthetics. This, however, can 

 never aiford such certain and stable rules as the other arts have 

 deduced from the observation of nature, iS:c. Amongst the many 

 styles of architecture are the Egyptian, the Greek, the Byzantine, 

 the Moresque, and Gothic ; and in every one of them architectural 

 beauty can be achieved. In this incertitude of leyi.slation, if we 

 may so call it, the chance of falling into the arbitrary, burlesque, 

 or absurd, is greater than in most other arts. 



The surest way is — to start in architecture from the scope giren, 

 as the other fine arts start from observation of nature, which with 

 all of them constitutes their store of reality ( Boden der RealitiitJ, 

 and by which, after all, the character of the architectural style is 

 deterinined. Because it is easy to conceive, that, for instance, the 

 Grecian temple and the mediwval church are mostly shaped after 

 the circumstances of climate and their respective scope and usage. 

 To choose a style, not adapted to our wants, is an imitation bare 

 of character — which, however, is frequently to be met with now- 

 a-days. A similar tendency of imitation and dangling with the 

 antique and the foreign, and a want of originality, pervades much 

 of modern art, but nowhere more than in architecture, where it 

 seems that all traceof inventiveness has exploded; still, this cannot 

 be the case, as our most modern times must have and have wants 

 of their own. This, most assuredly, is tlie case with Protestant 

 (evangelic) church architecture, to which the particular character 

 of our worship prescribes especial rules, which, however, have not 

 yet been attended to. If we refer the word " Church" to the 

 original Ecclesia — a congregation, the importance of the sermon 

 becomes with us paramount ; far more so than it ever had been 

 with the old (Papal) church. Taking the sermon as the chief 

 feature of our worship — the scope and aim of a Protestant church can 

 easily be explained. For the sake that the aim of a sermon (like 

 any other speech) be accomplished, the orator must not only be 

 heard, but .seen by all. This applies with equal force to the orator 

 himself, as he requires to have all his hearers within the reach of 

 his eye, to enter with them into a liviny contact, which some may 

 call mesmeric. For this aim, the churches, as they have come 

 down to us from Cathtdicism, are not appropriate. In a Basilica or 

 Gothic church, with one or two lateral naves and a choir, the 

 pulpit cannot be conveniently placed, nor the orator heard ; which 

 is the reason, that in Italy a large cover or caiiiet is spread over the 

 pulpit and main' nave on festival occasions. The new spirit of 

 Christianity could not re-model everything at once, and especially 

 in the department of architecture : it adapted itself to the already 

 existing. Roman Basilicas were converted into Christian churches, 

 and retained by custom their mis-appropriate form. 



That which serves the purpose of the sermon is also in accord- 

 ance with the spirit of a truly evangelic worship — which is, that 

 the congregation be conscious of their communion and community 

 during the time of divine service ; and for this aim, not only the 

 preacher, but every one attending ought to see all, for the sake of 

 arriving at the conviction that they are a community ! But the 

 life of community, which existed in such eminence amongst the first 

 Christians, exploded gradually, as priesthood became paramount, 

 until all idea of a consregation (community) degenerated into that 

 of a complete priest-hierarchy. In Catholic churches, such things 

 as congregations, properly speaking, never exist ; but one 

 portion attends to the mass, others pray at the several altars. 



