13 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 



[Ja.nvarv, 



The effect of scrambling reading was confusion of views. Tliis 

 Mr. Ferffusson soon found out, and he set liimself to order and 

 arrange his stores of knowledge. Tliis led liim to his first sketch 

 of the classification of the arts and sciences. 



From the counting-house his way took him to an indigo 

 factory in the East; of all places in the world the one he 

 thinks least suited for a cultivation of any knowledge of the fine 

 arts. lie then became an acting and active partner in a large mer- 

 cantile establisliment, from the trammels of which, in spite of every 

 endeavour, he has never been able to free himself; and during the 

 time this book was in hand, he wrote more about the state of the 

 money-market, indigo, sugar, silk, and sucli like articles, than lie 

 did regarding architecture, painting, or sculpture. The last 

 eigliteen months Mr. Fergusson complains of as times of anxiety 

 and distress to every one connected with mercantile pursuits, and 

 more es])ecially to those connected with the East, and as having 

 drawn himself into its whirlpool. 



His mercantile pursuits, he laments, have shut him out from the 

 best class of intellectual or artistic society for years ; and even his 

 writings have not given him that introduction which might have 

 been of use. Thus he lias been cut off from counsel and advice in 

 a task of no mean weight ; and he has not had all that help from 

 books which he would so much have wished. He has, neverthe- 

 less, made the most of his time and means, and has spent as much 

 of his time latterly in the study of his subject as most men Iiave 

 been able to do ; and to this we can bear witness from the fruits. 



He has, moreover, had the good fortune to spend the best years 

 of his life in the East ; and in travelling he always travelled alone, 

 with only one end in view. Thus he has seen much of art, and has 

 had plenty of time to think over what he saw. For months to- 

 gether he lived among buildings and the works of art they con- 

 tained, and looked on them long and steadfastly; following, even 

 to the chisel-marks, the thought and bent of the artist and the 

 workman. AVhatever schoolmen may think, this is no mean train- 

 ing in art ; and such a man is more truly an artist than nine-tenths 

 of those who draw, carve, and build. 



Our readers will rememlier that Mr. Fergusson has written of 

 late years, " Illustrations of the Rock-Cut Temples of India," " An 

 Essay on the Ancient Topography of Jerusalem," and " Pictu- 

 resque Illustrations of Ancient Architecture in Hindostan," The 

 work now before us is of higher bearing. The first part only is 

 published ; other two are to follow, and one is ready. This is to 

 be on Eastern, Asiatic, Mahommedan, Byzantine, Gothic, and 

 Mexican art. The third part is to hold what the writer calls " A 

 History of the Monkey Styles of Modern Europe, from the time 

 when men fii'st began to copy instead of thinking, till the present 

 time, when they have ceased to think, and can only copy." It 

 will be seen that there is no wavering as to the ovei'bearing evil 

 of modern art. The two latter parts wiU be as thick as the first, 

 which holds above five hundred large octavo pages, with many 

 drawings. 



None of the common writers or readers on art will be ready to 

 believe, or pleased to hear, that the beginning of a book on archi- 

 tecture is a treatise on what Lord liacon has named Pliilosojjliia 

 Prima. Yet so it is ; and there are few works of this day — not 

 even those of Whewell, Hcrschel, and Brougham — of a higher 

 philosophical bearing. Shall we go where Mr. Fergusson has 

 thought it right to lead — shall we follow him round the wide fields 

 of knowledge, afar from art — or shall we pen ourselves up in what 

 is held to be strictly architectural .'' By doing the latter, we shall 

 please the mass of our readers; by doing the former, we sliall 

 awaken the anger of many, and meet with the apjilause of but 

 few. We shall do the latter; first, as we think Mr. Fergusson has 

 set a noble example by writing a work to be read and be thought 

 about, and therefore ought to be upheld ; next, inasmuch as the 

 Journal has heretofore done the same things that he has done, and 

 said the same words, and, as we believe, has in scmie way strength- 

 ened and encouraged him in the task he has fulfilled. \Ve believe 

 Mr. Fergusson to be right, and ourselves to be right, and we ought 

 not to lose tliis opportunity of enforcing the truth. If we are 

 merely to be flatterers of the crowd, to tell our readers not what is 

 true, but what is pleasing to them, we may as well at once cut off 

 the architectural portions of our Joiirna/, and leave them to the 

 dry chroniclers of news, and the namby-pamby praise of publishers 

 of tours and illustrated guide-books. There is something of more 

 weiglit to be done in these days, than giving details of styles and 

 orders. We have to bring art to life, and not to rest till this is done. 

 We are upheld by the trust that the Journnl has already done some 

 good in unsettling wrong feelings, and awakening right ones; and 

 this is a good ground for going on. 



We may say further, that we have often shown that architecture 



and engineering have many common ties, and a wide bearing on 

 each other — and in nothing more than in right trainini; and e(iuca- 

 tion ; and therefore, whenever anything of couinioii interest comes 

 before us, we are hound to lay it lief'ore our readers of both ])ro- 

 fessions. We have too many readers who are not ]iractising mem- 

 bers of either jirofession. We shall therefore follow Air. Fer- 

 gusson tliroughout. 



We must own we were never more struck than bv the begin- 

 ning of this work ; and so unlike is it to wliat would be looked for 

 in a book on art, and what we have always had from writers on art, 

 that we read with the greatest distrust. The great body of them are 

 so wanting in real learning, so narrow in their minds, and in their 

 sight — so little of artists, and still less of philosophers, that we 

 are too ready to think that no other kind of writers have ever 

 given their time to high art. The world is to be forgiven for this; 

 for those who call themselves artists have most of all forgotten 

 that Aristotle, Plato, Cicero, Bacon, Burke, and Brougham, not 

 to name many otliers of great name and great mind, have written 

 more or less upon art and its principles. After all, this is what 

 should not be forgotten, that art as much belongs to the kingdom of 

 philosophy as anything w hich is more commonly allowed to be under 

 its sway ; and it is from having broken loose, that art alone has gone 

 back, while everything else in these days has gone forward, till we 

 speak with pride and joy of what has been seen and done in our 

 days, with only one blot — that we have done nought in art. 



Mr. Fergusson treats art as the offspring of mind — its physical 

 expression or representation ; bearing in its shape, as do the chil- 

 dren of men, the impress of the youth or eld, the strength or 

 weakness, the soberness or riot, which marked the parent at the 

 time of birth. Art cannot be upheld by one man, or by a score, 

 nor can it be made in a day ; but the minds of nations, and the 

 thoughts of years, can alone give it the breath of life. He brings 

 it into immediate connection with the great social system, and 

 treats it as under the same influences as any other human insti- 

 tution. The way in which Mr. Fergusson does this, and the sys- 

 tem of philosophy to B-hich it leads him, are in every way remark- 

 able. They are another comment on the signs of the times, which 

 so many now look upon with wonder. The struggle as to art is but a 

 single fight on a wide battle-field, which, end as it may, will not 

 sink the beam either way. One side may win, but many of its 

 best men be slain by those whose flag has lost the day. Thus has 

 it been before with art — nay, the freedom of others has been the 

 contemporary and signal of its own downfall. In this day, every- 

 thing shows one of those epochs in history which stand forth to 

 all times for good or for evil. It is not alone that war is let loose, 

 that kingdoms and commonwealths are unsettled, the bounds of 

 the mighty taken away, and those of the weak set wider off ; but 

 the mind of man is everywhere, and in everything at work — driven on 

 to some great and mighty end. If the wielders of piditical theo- 

 ries are emboldened by seeing their way to power, how much more 

 are those who look forward to the application of the resources of 

 science ? It is a great thing to have driven the steam-horse or 

 the steam-ship faster — to have stretched afar the tongue of the 

 telegraph — and to have drawn with the beams of the sun : but 

 these are no more than the handsel of the inventor ; the first 

 fruits, it is true, but the earnest of greater bearing. If speed has 

 been got, it is only to show us that more may be done. If we have 

 made lightning our messenger, why not our carrier ; if we have 

 brought the jieople of the wide Atlantic nearer, why not hand to 

 hand, or rather, nuuith to mouth ? Steam is a servant with a ready 

 and a mighty arm ; but we know not yet that we have called fortli 

 the greatest genii of the hidden world. The lamp may have been 

 rubbed, and the steam wreathed from the jar ; we may have 

 workers of wonders before us : hut these arc only among the low- 

 liest of those doing the bidding of an Almighty Master. The seav 

 of the ring is at our beck ; and yet he is only one of a numberless 

 fellowship. The field of knowledge is known to be wide; there 

 are those gone forth to search it : and whatever may be brought 

 back, so much are we on the stretch for something new, that 

 nothing can raise our wonder. 



Everything betokens a gre.it action on mankind — greater than 

 anything which has been before, inasmuch as the physical condi- 

 tions of time and space no longer narrow the field to its former 

 bounds. Europe may have been the field before ; but now the 

 wide world is open, and the blow stricken at Paris is felt in Poly- 

 nesia or Hindostan. It is not that there is any settled way before 

 us; it is that we are ill at ease as to those we are now in. Dis- 

 content as to the past, mistrust as to the future ; a restless long- 

 ing for something better, without shaping what it is, mark the 

 politician, the economist, the socialist, and the religionist. This, 

 too, is felt in the world of art. It has not sprung up with the 



