366 
tluties assigned to it, and that the architect of the miscalled 
dark ages effected his object with the same apparent playful- 
ness, but with the same unerring certainty as the Mexican 
hunter displays, when, singling out from the herd the devoted 
bull, he throws his " lasso" around his head for a few seconds, 
and then hurls the fatal cord with never-failing precision, and 
brings his victim to the ground ! 
Having thus briefly brought under notice some of the most 
important features of our Gothic structures, and 1 hope 
clearly proved their dependence upon geometry, I shall, in 
conclusion, make some remarks upon the ornamental accesso- 
ries of the style. 
Unlike its sister-arts of sculpture and painting, architec- 
ture addresses the judgment and not the passions. It is true 
that the reasoning faculty is called into exercise by means of 
the outward sense of sight, and that taste in architecture is 
inseparable from the pleasures of imagination ; nevertheless, 
the aid of the imagination is called for lastly, so that the 
attributes of taste, as defined by Burke, are simply reversed 
in order. 
It will be perceived, that in the illustrations of the two 
papers read before this Society, the diagrams have simply 
displayed the skeleton of Gothic architecture, and are with- 
out the charms of colouring, or the ornamental accessories. 
If they have excited any interest, it must have arisen from 
the proofs which they afford, that the style is not devoid of 
scientific principle, which has been denied it by so many of 
the early writers upon the subject. But some may be ready 
to exclaim, that Gothic architecture was the work of monkish 
times, and must^ therefore, be barbarous. Let it not, how- 
ever, be forgotten, that the term Gothic is a misnomer ; that 
it arose with Evelyn* — was taken up by Sir C. Wren, and that 
. * " A certain licentious manner of building called modem or Gothic.^* — EvehjrCs 
Account of Architects and Architecture. 
