1840.] 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 



373 



CANDIDUS'S NOTE-BOOK. 

 FASCICULUS XX. 



I must Iiave liberiy 

 Withal, as large a cliarter as tlic winns, 



To blow on whom I please/' 



I. It is somewhat odd that those who profess so greatly to admire 

 St. Paul's, Covent Garden, should not have cared to aim at the same 

 kind of effect, as regards one peculiarity in it. It is almost doubtful, 

 however, whether the circumstance alluded to has been taken into 

 account at all, since it has never been especially pointed out, as de- 

 serving to be noted and studied. What I mean is, the projection of 

 the pediment as seen in profile, and the bold shadows — or rather depth 

 of shadow in the tympanum of the pediment. Perhaps I shall be told 

 that this is a circumstance attending the peculiar kind of entablature 

 and cornice there employed, and (hat consequently the same effect cannot 

 be obtained in the pediment of a portico whose columns are of the Gre- 

 cian Doric, or Ionic order. Most \mdoubtedly not, if we ai-e deter- 

 mined merely to copy Grecian authorities, yet not only so slavishly, 

 but so blindly, as not to study such modifications of the originals as 

 shall in some degree give us a tolerable equivalent for what is un- 

 scrupulously abandoned in the professed copy, however essential it 

 may be to resemblance. There is no occasion whatever for impover- 

 ishing Grecian architecture, yet we do so continually without the 

 slightest compunction, making naked entablatures and pediments, with 

 scanty cornices, absolutely slarving our buildings, yet congratulating 

 ourselves all the while on the classicality and purity of our taste, and 

 fancying that we are perfectly Grecian, whereas we are no better than 

 architectural paupers, dressed up in old finery of which the trimmings 

 and embroidery have been cut away. 



II. Should future generations form their ideas of Grecian architec- 

 ture from our modern English imitations, prodigious will be their 

 wonder at the praises bestowed upon it; for they will be greatly 

 puzzled to discover in them any of its spirit, or any adherence to its 

 principles — aught of refined taste and artistical feeling. In his recent 

 work on Kannt-Sinnhilder, Menzel makes some remarks on the ancient 

 orders and the modern versions of them, that architects would do well 

 to take into consideration. He condemns the recipes and prescriptions 

 for making Doric, Ionic, &c., given by Vignola, Palladio, Serlio, 

 Scamozzi and others, as leading only to the most servile and blind 

 imitation of the patterns so set, and which are certainly not the very 

 best in themselves. Of even the very best examples, too, the con- 

 tinual repetition not only becomes wearisome in itself, but also tends 

 to check all invention in design, — at least as regards detail, and so far 

 degrades the architect from an artist to a mere parrot or automaton. 

 Yet in this as in other matters over-strictness is apt to lead to the 

 opposite extreme of licentiousness : and those who would be shocked 

 at the idea of any innovation in Greek detail, even though it were 

 perfectly in accordance with Greek feeling, feel no scruple whatever 

 in reverting for the sake of variety, to such deformities as the Italian 

 Ionic, — which would be reckoned positively detestable after Greek, 

 were it not, that tliere is precedent for it, and it is not an invention of 

 our own. Out upon the sii'Vitm ptcias of pedants, whose dislike to 

 originality arises from their own incapacity to originate any thing 

 whatever, and who therefore bolster up their own imbecillity by a 

 most convenient veneration for precedent. — In the grounds of Mr. 

 Anderson's villa in the Regent's Park, there has lately been executed 

 a small building, the capitals of whose columns would scandalize such 

 pseudo-Zegitimatts, for the very reason that they must charm every one 

 whose taste is any thing better than mere prejudice. Ionic in charac- 

 ter, though unlike any existing exam|)le, they display genuine artisti- 

 cal feeling, and a perfect knowledge of arcliitectural principles with a 

 thorough contempt for ready-made architectural patterns, and for those 

 who make use of them. By all means, let the Institute procure a cast 

 of that capital ; and were the two Professors of Architecture to do so 

 likewise, they might get from it something they now seem to be terri- 

 bly in lack of. 



III. In an article on Modern Churches, British Critic, No. LII, there 

 are many remarks worth attending to, and among others what is there 

 said in regard to the excessive quantity of light admitted into churches 

 generally, in consequence of painted glass having been destroyed or 

 removed from the windows of the older buildings, and its not being in- 

 troduced into those of modern ones, notwithstanding that the apertures 

 are made as large, and the spaces between them as narrow, as if it were 

 intended to damp the light, and hinder the effect of rawness generally, 

 by glazing the windows with rich material. " Nearly all our ancient 



churches," says the writer, " from the cathedral to the smallest oratory 

 are now considerably overllghted. They are not now seen in their 

 proper dress; but arc like the face of nature in winter without leaves 

 or flowers. Thus the interior of Salisbury Cathedral is as light as the 

 open air ; nay, in a sense, it is lighter ; for out of doors, there, is an in- 

 finite variety of light and shade, and still greater variety of hue ; but 

 in that building, as reformers and puritans have left it, there is no 

 relief, no repose : with inconsiderable exception, all is one equally 

 monotonous, shadowless, colourless medium : nothing recedes, nothing 

 stands out. The proportions suffer ; for neither height nor length are 

 felt in the glaring mass of day-light. — The cathedral is reduced to one 

 great airy room. The aisles are no longer depths of shade ; the lofty 

 pillars and arches no longer stand out in bold relief, bathed in copious 

 streams of light and colour from the high clerestory windows, every 

 stone from the vaults above to the pavement under our feet seeming 

 instinct with life." — "Our churches having been nearly all built or 

 altered with a view to paiuted glass, as soon as this essential part of 

 their plan was destroyed, there was immediately found to be double 

 or treble the quantity of aperture sufficient for light. In spite of bad 

 glass, windows wholly or partially blocked up, curtains, galleries, and 

 staircases, lofty screens, and all the other numberless accretions of the 

 last three centuries, they are still greatly too light. The restorations 

 of the present age, by opening windows, substituting larger panes of 

 clear white glass, clearing away heavy screens and partitions, and 

 lowering pew-walls, have in fact accidentally increased the evil, and 

 rendered the glare of our churches, especially those of the later styles, 

 quite intolerable, not only to the mental feeling, but to the bodily 

 eye." 



IV. In speaking of Vestries, the writer just quoted is of opinion 

 there is little occasion for them in country churches. Such a place 

 "is useful of course to the crack preachers of the metropolis, some of 

 whom sit there and comfoii themselves during the service, that they 

 may come forth fresh as giants to the event of the day — the sermon." 

 It is said also that Dr. Parr used to illustrate his attachment to rural 

 psalmody, by "smoking in Me «s/ry during the performance of the 

 choir"! Considering the character of the publication in which the 

 article appears, these remarks are somewhat freely satirical, though 

 certainly not without foundation ; for I myself have been in an exceed- 

 ingly snug vestry, where there was a delightful blazing fire, and every 

 thing vastly coiiifortable indeed, so much so that I should have mis- 

 taken it for the parson's own parlour, had not the sash windows been 

 much higher up from the floor than they are in modern houses; which 

 certainly did not diminish the appearance of comfort, inasmuch as it 

 aftbrded comfortable assurance that there was no danger of any one's 

 accidentally peeping in. 



V. Whether I be censured or not for my last comment, the passage 

 which I shall now quote from the same writer, is so excellent, that I 

 shall be thanked for here introducing it. — " Mere novelty is not origin- 



■ ality. Many things have never been done ; some things have never 

 been thought of, simply because they are unnatural and out of the way. 

 True origmality is a power of invention or discovery ; but whether 

 employed in the regions of science or of poetry," for of art) " it only 

 discovers or invents what is, in some sense, natural and true. It does 

 not so much make new ideas, asjiiid what have escaped the minds of 

 others. It conceives ideas which strike us at once as having a sort of 

 self-evident propriety and beauty. Its creations are at the same time 

 like and unlike what we know already, — like, in that they accord with 

 our existent taste and notions ; — unlike, in that they seem each to have 

 an individual essence." — This last expression, indeed, is not altogether 

 a happy one : perhaps it would be better to say — unlike, in that some 

 new modification is presented to us, for which there is no actual pre- 

 cedent, but which recommends itself so strongly, and withal appears 

 so obvious that we wonder no one should have hit upon it before. 



VI. Shall I venture to quote another observation from the same 

 source? Yes; for what the writer says in regard to the notion of 

 Grecian architecture requiring greater attention to study and rules 

 than Gothic does, is well worthy of attention. " There cannot be a 

 greater mistake. Gothic architecture appears less formal and less re- 

 gular than its ancient rival, only because it embraces more elements of 

 calculation, — because it has more forms and rules of art." True, most 

 true ! A person may go through the whole of Grecian architecture — 

 may learn all the Five Orders, secundum artem, in less time than he 

 can make himself acquainted with the varieties of Gothic doors or 

 windows, or any other single feature belonging to that style. Car- 

 penter's Gothic indeed, — or even the Jemmy-Wyatt Gothic is a dif- 

 ferent matter ; — that is regular enough, all done by rule without any 

 study, and therefore regularly bad, or at least insipid. 



3 E 



