A SHORT CHAPTER ON COUNTRY CHURCHES. 261 



and features of the human face ; — and yet this is a fact as well 

 known by S.11 true architects, 6a that joy and sorrow,, pleasure and 

 pain, are capable of irradiating or darkening the countenance. Yes, 

 and we do not Say too much, when, we add, that right expression 

 in a building for religious purposes, has as much to do with awak- 

 ening devotional feelings,' and begetting an attachment in the heart, 

 as the unmistakable signs of virtue and benevolence in our fellpw- 

 oreatures, have in awakeniiig' kindred feeling in our own breasts. 



We do not, of course, mean to say, that a beautiful rural 

 church will make all the population ■ about it devotional, any more 

 than that sunshine will banish all gloom ; but it is one of the in- 

 fluence? that prepare the way for religious feeling, and which we 

 are as unwise to neglect, as we should be to abjure the world and 

 bury ourselves li^e the ancient troglodytes, in caves and caverns. 



To speak out the truth boldly, would be to say that the ugli*t 

 church architecture in Christendom, is at this moment to be found 

 in the coimtry towns ahd villages of the United States. Doubtless, 

 the hg,tred which originally existed in the minds of our puritan an- 

 cestors, against every thing that belonged to the Romish Church, in- 

 cluding in one general sweep all beauty and all taste, along with 

 all the superstitions and errors of what had become a corrupt 

 system of religion, is a key to the bareness and baldriesi, and ab- 

 sence of all that is lovely , to the ^e in the primitive churches of 

 New Eilgland — which are for the most part the type-churches, of 

 all America. 



But, little by little, 'this ultra-puritanical spirit is wearing off. 

 Men are not now so blinded by personal feeling against great spi- 

 ritual Wrongs, as to identify for ever, all that bfessed boon of har- 

 mony, grace, proportion, symmetry and expression, which make 

 what we call Beauty, with the vices, either real or supposed, of any 

 particular creed. In short, as a people, our eyes are opening to 

 the pei'ception of influences that are good, healthful, and elevating 

 to the soul, in all ages, and all countries — and we separate the 

 vices of men from the laws of order and beauty, by which the uni- 

 verse is governed. i 



The first step which we have taken to show our emancipation 

 from Puritanism in architecture, is that of building our churches 



