178 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECTS JOURNAL. 



[1VL 



REVIEWS. 



MR. PUGIN'S NEW WORK. 



<dn Apology for the Revival of Christian Architecture in England. 

 By A. Welby Pugin, Architect, Professor of Ecclesiastical Anti- 

 quities at St. Marie's College, Oscott. Small 4to., Ten Plates. 

 London, 1843. Weale. 



To recommend this production to the notice of our readers, would 

 be almost superfluous, since it is one which can hardly by any possi- 

 bility escape notice, or fail to obtain greater attention than usually falls 

 to the lot of architectural publications in general, or even of such as 

 have more than ordinary merit to recommend them. Any thing pro- 

 ceeding from the author of the " Contrasts " and " True Principles,'' 

 is certain of being taken up with curiosity, and with not the least 

 degree of it by those in whom that feeling may be more or less mixed 

 with apprehension, and who are therefore anxious to discover whether 

 they themselves come in for any remarks from a pen that is not 

 always exercised very gently. In one respect, Mr. Pugin is quite 

 alone, not only from all other architectural writers, but from nearly all 

 other writers whatever ; lie is no respecter of persons, but speaks as 

 one having authority — openly, boldly, without any observance of the 

 saaviter in inodo, without attempting to conciliate any one, and with- 

 out caring what individuals he may offend. Mawkish liberality and 

 excessive "good nature" are not among Mr. Pugin's foibles; so far is 

 he from excusing himself upon grounds of "delicacy," and saying as 

 little as possible in regard to living architects and their productions, 

 that in speaking both of the one and the other, he goes to an extent 

 quite unprecedented, except it be either in anonymous criticism, or 

 hostile literary controversy. Neither is there any thing apologetic in 

 his tone ; he does not offer his opinions as merely those of an indi- 

 vidual, but as positive and unquestionable dogmas, no less implicitly 

 to be adopted than they are fearlessly proclaimed without the slightest 

 misgiving on his part. 



Whether it be altogether prudent or becoming in an individual, 

 let his ability be what it may, to set himself up as a sort of oracle, and 

 'o assume a self-elected dictatorship over all the rest of the profes- 

 sion, is a point we leave others to settle. Be it either with or without 

 " right," such is in a manner the case ; nor have we to read far in his 

 book before we find, that however unwarrantably it may have been \ 

 usurped, Mr. Pugin is determined to exercise his office with a high 

 land. We do not know if this new volume of his is the same in sub- ' 

 stance with a series of architectural papers announced some time ago 

 under his name, in the Art Union, but which never appeared. It is | 

 not altogether unlikely, for there certainly is much which not every 

 editor would care to sanction ; nor is Mr. Pugin a writer very submis- 

 > editorial control, or disposed (o expunge or qualify or soften 

 down what may be objected to as offensive and unsafe opinions and 

 expressions. 



Like another Sir Huon, Mr. Pugin plucks a Sultan by his beard, the 

 ^ultnn in this case being no other than the Professor — aye, the 

 "living" Professor — of Architecture at the Royal Academy, whom 

 he treats not at all more ceremoniously than he did Sir John Soane, 

 when he showed up the "Professor's Own House." "It is a perfect 

 disgrace to the Royal Academy," he says in a lengthy and piquant 

 note, at his third page, " that its Professor of Architecture should be 

 permitted to poison the minds of the students of that establishment by 

 propagating his erroneous opinions of Christian architecture. The 

 influence which his position naturally gives him over their minds is 

 doubtless considerable, and the effect of his instructions proportionably 

 pernicious. Not content, however, with the disparagement of ancient 

 excellence, which he introduces in his official lectures, he is practi- 

 cally carrying out his contempt of pointed design in both Universities, 

 and in a manner that must cause anguish of soul to any man of Catho- 

 lic mind and feeling. The ancient buildings of King's College, models 

 of perfection in their way, are actually being demolished in order to 

 make room for a monstrous erection of mongrel Italian, a heavy, vul- 



gar, unsightly mass, which already obscures, from some points, the 

 lateral elevation of King's Chapel, and which it is impossible to view 

 without a depression of spirits and feelings of disgust. A man who 

 paganizes in the Universities deserves no quarter." ! 



We need not quote further, but may leave the remainder as a tit- 

 bit in store for those who feel their curiosity wetted, bv the " taste " 

 we have given them of this formidable note, merely remarking here 

 that it hints at "gin-palace design " at Oxford, and prophesies that 

 those, and many other works of the present day, " will be the laughing 

 stock of posterity." Still, though we are inclined to admit that the 

 buildings Mr. Pugin so mercilessly reprobates are decidedly bad, yet 

 not perhaps quite so much so as to occasion "anguish of soul," and 

 actual " depression of spirits ; " we consider them such, not because they 

 are not of " pointed design," but because they are very tasteless and 

 excessively poor in themselves — strangely crude and patched-up 

 abortions, without any manifestation of study bestowed upon them, 

 and egregiously defective, not only in regard to taste, but as buildings, 

 and devoid of all unity of plan and composition. In falling foul of the 

 professor for " paganizing " in the universities, Mr. Pugin is perhaps 

 rather too severe, and somewhat unguarded, for there has been a good 

 deal of " paganizing " elsewhere before now, and the example was set 

 by the very fountain head of orthodoxy, the apostolic city, and by the 

 very successors of St. Peter. The Vatican itself is most dreadfully 

 and scandalously pagan; its galleries are a perfect rendezvous of 

 heathenism. We are, therefore, at liberty to fancy that, although he 

 has not had the candour to admit as much, Mr. Pugin devoutly damns 

 "Leo's golden days," and the "paganism" of Popes and Cardinals, 

 who, to make use of his own expressions, poisoned the minds of archi- 

 tects, artists, and students of all countries, by propagating erroneous 

 opinions of Christian architecture and art. Certain it is that he could 

 not point to that quarter, to Catholic Rome itself, as a model of Chris- 

 tian and Catholic purity, or else he would most assuredly have done 

 so in the language of triumphant argument : whereas it may fairly be 

 suspected, he is tolerably conscious that the less said on that head, 

 and the more it is kept out of sight, the better, since he would, no 

 doubt, be puzzled to reconcile the gross laxity of Rome, with his own 

 rigorous ultra-Catholicism in architecture. Why, then, does he keep 

 continually harping upon that string '. why is he for ever taunting the 

 profession and the public with a reproach which, however well de- 

 served, and how great soever he may consider it to be, cannot possibly 

 have any effect upon either? He tells them that architecture is no 

 longer •' the expression of our faith, or government, or country; " and 

 they reply by laughing at him in his face, as a crack-brained enthu- 

 siast — an arrant Don (Quixote, the champion <> I'uutrancc of a chime- 

 rical Dulcinea. He lays by far too much stress on what are now re- 

 garded matters of perfect indifference, and not without reason so — on 

 the mere externals and paraphernalia of religion, which both have 

 been and are substituted for religion itself where not a particle of the 

 latter exists. The attaching so much importance to the costume of 

 devotion is dangerous, for it leads to a species of mummery and moun- 

 tebankery which disgraces what it professes to honour. 



It might be more discreet on the part of Mr. Pugin were he not to 

 dwell so emphatically and so exclusively, on what forms the staple of 

 his writings, and renders them quite as much polemical as architec- 

 tural. Most certainly we should have been better satisfied had he 

 obtruded upon us fewer of his religious opinions, and favoured us 

 with something more in the shape of tangible criticism. Of the last 

 we obtain but very little; it may, perhaps, be said to be in the. 

 "pointed" style — and so far appropriate enough: yet it is too bare 

 and indiscriminate, and is in manner what would be termed down- 

 right verbiage and flippancy in a reviewer, or a magazine article. By 

 denying all merit to, and endeavouring to convict of absurdity what- 

 ever does not belong to the only style of the art he is disposed to 

 tolerate, he overshoots the mark altogether, and deprives his stric- 

 tures of efficacy. He gives — at least leaves, us to understand, that 

 our former English style is the only one at all suitable for us, and 

 that all buildings in any other, are, without further inquiry into their 

 merits, to be condemned as naught. The consequence is, the sweep- 



