purpose, except the adoption of this Pointed arch as the pervading rule. Thus a consistent and harmonious system of vaulting can be obtained in no way but by the use of Pointed arches. I formerly attempted to show this, and to point at the manner in which the operation of this necessity appears in the churches of the Rhine, and I think the considerations and instances I there adduced must be allowed to have some weight. Even if we grant that the Pointed arch, among many other forms, as a matter of fancy and caprice, was borrowed from some foreign models, we have still to explain the way in which the Pointed arch gained the mastery over all other forms, so that they became subordinate to it, as when the trefoil appears in feathering, or the ogee in canopies. This universal predominance of the Pointed arch is no doubt the joint result of convenience and of harmony of form; and these causes operate in other parts of the fabric as well as in the vaulting; but in no other part so imperatively or so universally."-Preface, p. xxiv. a A vast body of facts deduced from the examination of various Cathedrais in Germany, are brought forward in support of Mr. Whewell's theory; and the tenor of the whole body of evidence tends at least to show that the complete formation of the Pointed style was greatly influenced by vaulting; and the preponderance of the vertical line as the prevailing feature on the Gothic churches, seems to indicate that the idea of connecting the vault in an harmonious and pleasing manner with the residue of the buildings, was very important object with the builders. Mr.Whewell objects to other theories for the origin of the Pointed arch, "inasmuch as they only show how the form of such an arch may have been suggested, not how the use of it must have become universal." The necessity of its application to vaulting, he assigns as the universal cause of its adoption; this is we believe strictly true, but it is worthy of remark that previous to the Pointed style we have churches vaulted after the Roman manner, and when this was not practicable or was beyond the power of the architect, the church was not vaulted over its larger space, but covered with a timber roof. And in the review of Mr. Willis's work, we have already noticed the mode in which the object might be effected by Roman GENT. MAG. VOL. IV. vaulting; in addition to which, Mr. Whewell shows by the mode adopted in the Cologne churches (the waggon vault), that the vaulted covering might in all cases be used without the assistance of a Pointed arch. We are therefore strengthened in the conclusion that the knowledge of the Pointed arch must have preceded its application to vaulting; still we must, in justice to Mr. Whewell, add, that we never met with a better theory for accounting for the manner in which the Pointed arch so completely obtained the mastery over the circular, as that which he supports. The Temple church is worthy of the serious attention of the advocates of Mr. Whewell's theory. The extreme difficulty of vaulting the circular aisle with round arches, appears to have operated strongly with the architect, and to have guided his adoption of Pointed ones. The doorway and windows both of the aisle and clerestory, are round-headed, and so are the arches of the triforium; but the pier arches in the circular range are acutely pointed, as well as the arches ribbed and groined of the vaulting, with which they are connected. The fact that Pointed architecture and vaulting have grown to maturity together, is a powerful auxiliary to Mr. Whewell's theory; for, although we have seen that vaulted roofs might have been constructed in the circular styles, we find such was not the universal practice; but that, so soon as the Pointed arch was discovered, in this country at least, vaulted roofs in that style were speedily added to the older buildings, as at Durham Cathedral, at Christ Church, and in the humble example of St. Peter, Oxford. Having placed the theory of Mr. Whewell fairly before our readers, we have only to notice the remainder of his pleasing book, which we must do very rapidly; recommending to our readers' perusal the third chapter, occupied by suggestions as to the manner of making architectural notes, and warning them against the perils attendant on the pursuit of the subject on foreign land, by the ludicrous arrest of the author by the National Guard, while surveying a country church. We have made several extracts, 2 P chiefly with a view to parallel examples at home, which may form useful hints to the student of English architecture. Apsis.-In many German churches there is an apse at the west as well as the eastern end. We have in this country an instance of a western apse in an obscure parish church, the plan of which has been engraved in the Gentleman's Magazine, vol. c. part ii. p. 585, from a communication by J. A. Repton, Esq. architect. The Church is at Langford in Essex, and the architecture is Norman. "Towers.-If we suppose the great Cathedrals of Mentz, Spires, and Worms, to be executed according to the original plan, which seems to be preserved to us in the form of the Church of Laach, it would appear that the complete type of a large church consisted of four towers (the two pairs having different forms and magnitudes), and of two cupolas or pyramids. In this manner the outline of a single cathedral would present a group of edifices, clustered and varied like the view of a fine city."-p. 80. Canterbury has many peculiarities, which distinguish it from most English churches; some of these peculiarities we have noticed in our review of Mr. Hope's work (Gent. Mag. vol. III. p. 619). We mention it now in connexion with the above extract, to account for the existence of more than one tower, lofty in themselves, but rendered insignificant by the more recent additions of the Dunstan and Bell Harry steeples; and which, forming no very conspicuous part of the present design, may have had their rise in a plan constructed after the same model as that of the ancient churches referred to in the extract. "Triforium.-In England, in our Norman buildings, and almost constantly in the later ones, this space in large churches is filled by a row of openings or pannelings of various kinds. "It is mostly, however, a merely ornamental member, and I do not know that it was ever applied to any customary use. In the churches on the Rhine, above Bonn, the gallery is still appropriated to a particular part of the congregation, namely, the young men, and is generally called the Mannechor, or as I was told at Sinzig, the Mannhaus."-p. 91. The Triforium was not an useless feature in our churches; at Chichester the existence of a breastwork for the protection of persons in the triforium, proves that it must have been equally useful with the same portion in the German examples. A similar contrivance exists at Oxford cathedral. It is probable that these galleries were borrowed from the Greek church, and were at first the galleries for the women, although German gallantry may have assigned a more comfortable situation to the ladies, leaving to the young men the task of climbing winding staircases, and threading the gloomy passages of the upper works of the cathedral. We find a " Bachelors' pew" in some of the London churches. "Galleries of open arches on shafts set two deep.-Shafts set two deep are a very common mode of enriching Romanesque buildings, and date apparently from a very early period. They are found for instance in the cloisters adjacent to the ancient churches of Laach, Zurich, and Aschaffenburg. They exist also in many ancient buildings in Italy, and in the palace of Frederic Barbarossa, at Gelnhausen."-p. 102. An example of such an arrangement of shafts, if we mistake not, appears in the very curious gallery of Norman architecture, recently brought to light in Westminster Hall. A rare if not an unique specimen in this country. "Double tracery.-Among other examples of prodigality of ornament, we have in both these buildings double planes of tracery; that is, two tracery windows or frames, one behind another, in the being often different in the two. same opening; the pattern of the tracery This extravagance (for it almost deserves to be so called) appears in the towers at Cologne; at Strasburg it is carried to such an extent in the west front, that the building looks as if it were placed behind a rich open screen, or a cage of woven stone."-p. 114. The only example we have of this kind of tracery, is in the choir of York. In addition to the notes on German churches, which constituted the whole of the former treatise, the author has added in the present a series of similar architectural notes on the churches of Picardy and Normandy, in the prosecution of which he met with the disagreeable adventure we have before alluded to, From these valuable no tices we have only space to call our readers' attention to the architecture styled Flamboyant," and to insert the author's observations on the interesting cathedral of Amiens, with which the English reader, we are assured, will feel interested. "The reader is probably aware that Amiens is one of the strongholds of those who maintain that the advances of French Gothic architecture are anterior to the corresponding steps of English work. It was built about the same time as Salisbury, a few years before 1250. At Salisbury there is little or no tracery, though there are manifest symptoms that our countrymen were approaching to that kind of decoration. Upon the whole, it is undeniable that Amiens in such features approaches nearer to our style of the fourteenth century, than Salisbury does. But on looking a little further, it is by no means so clear that the French architecture is advanced much beyond the English. The French building has not yet acquired the beautiful complex piers of Salisbury, in which the slender detached shafts combine so well with the deep bundles of arch mouldings. Instead of these mouldings it has a few plain members, which with us would belong to a much earlier date; it has a square abacus to most of the single shafts, a Norman feature which in England disappeared at the first dawn of good Gothic. It has no where the skilful accumulation of small parts producing deep lines of shades, yet exquisitely bold and free in the details, which we find so constantly in our early English works. And even with regard to tracery, we are not to make our concessions too largely; for if Salisbury has only those perforations of the heads of pannels and windows, which seem to be the mere germs of tracery, Bishop Lucy's work at Winchester, which is within a very few years of 1200, has these germs at least as much developed as Amiens; and Amiens, in many of its parts, as for instance in the triforium of the nave, has such perforations in the place of tracery."-p. 145. We have long wished to see a name more expressive than "Norman❞ adopted for the circular architecture of Eng. land. Mr. Hope styles it " Lombard architecture," which is perhaps open to the same objection as the present term. Mr. Whewell uses the term Romanesque, which on many grounds is the more preferable. In taking our leave of these valuable treatises, we cannot pay a better compliment to the authors than by recommending every inquirer into the nature and origin of Gothic architecture to possess himself of them, as each author has pursued the surest road to the attainment of a complete knowledge of the subject, which is by the examination of a great number of ancient examples. We can only recommend to our readers to adopt the same course, and in the same manner as these gentlemen have done before them, and whatever conclusions they may then arrive at, it is certain they will not err (if they err at all) from want of knowledge. A Protestant Memorial for the Commemoration, on the 4th Oct. 1835, of the Third Centenary of the Reformation, and of the publication of the first entire Version of the Bible. By T. H. Horne, B.D. &c. Cadell. 12mo. AT a meeting of the clergy of the city of London, in July, Mr. Horne was requested to draw up a tract for the commemoration of the third centenary of the Reformation, which will be generally observed on that day, the fourth of next October; and which should, in a clear and concise manner, give an authentic account [authentic, because from their own formularies and decrees] of the manifold corrupmade it necessary either that that tions of the Church of Rome, which Church should voluntarily purge itself of its mass of accumulated error, unscriptural doctrines, and its tyrannical power-seeing that instead of going along with Scripture, in spirit and in word and in deed, it stood in opposition to it-or that the Christian who looked to Holy Scripture as his guide to salvation, should separate from it. The cause and progress of this separation is given with truth and sufficient fulness for the purpose by Mr. Horne. He has there furnished an account of much interest of the First Entire Protestant English Version of the Bible, by Miles Coverdale, Bishop of Exeter, printed at Zurich, in 1535, and reprinted in 4to in 1550, and again in 1553. As Mr. Horne justly observes," the noble simplicity, perspicuity, and purity of its style, are truly astonishing." its The second section of Mr. Horne's work is an answer to the question commonly proposed by Romanists'Where was your religion before Luther?' This arrogant and foolish question is most easily and irrefragably answered: but Mr. Horne has wisely asked another in return-Where was the Romish religion before the Council of Trent, which legitimated all the innovations of Popery, and was concluded only about the year 1563, long after Luther began to preach against the profligate sale of indulgences. The pretended supremacy of the popes or bishops of Rome commenced only with Boniface III., about 600 years after the birth of Christ. The invocation of saints and of the Virgin Mary was first introduced by P. Gnapheus of Antioch, about A. D. 470. Temples were erected in honour of supposed saints in the 6th century. In the 9th century the Roman pontiffs assumed the power of raising mortals to the dignity of saints, and making them objects of worship. In the 12th century the two sacraments were multiplied into seven. Transubstantiation was not imposed as a doctrine till the Lateran Council in 1215. The cup in the communion was not taken away from the laity till the Council of Constance in 1416. Purgatory was not positively affirmed till 1140. Thus was this unholy, unchristian system of spiritual and secular pride and dominion, built up by the ambition and avarice of succeeding Pontiffs and Councils: and when the Romanist asks where our religion was before the days of Luther? we answer, that it existed in the Holy Scriptures, and in the primitive Christian churches, where we find that theirs was not. The fourth section of Mr. Horne's tract has presented much valuable truth in a very convenient form; being a collection of texts of Scripture which are directly opposed to the peculiar tenets of Popery, as expressed in the accredited formularies of Councils of the Romish church. Lastly, Mr. Horne has an observation on the last and latest act of the Roman Catholic Church, which proves that her old spirit of pursuing her ungodly ends, regardless of the nature of the means through which they are effected, is existing as strong as ever. Den's complete Body of Theology was printed at Dublin in 1808, in consequence of an unanimous agreement of the Roman Catholic Prelates of Ireland, held 14th Sept. 1808,-that it was the best book on the subject that could be re-published! This impression (3,000 copies) being exhausted, a Dublin publisher printed a second edition in 1832, which he dedicated to Dr. Daniel Murray, the titular Archbishop of Dublin, as being undertaken with his approbation (ejus cum approbatione susceptam). After public attention had been drawn to this work, Dr. Murray addressed a letter to the Prime Minister of England in which he denied that he directed the work of Den to be published: notwithstanding this dedication asserts his privity to and approbation of the undertaking; and notwithstanding the Rev. D. O'Croley asserts that it was published in Ireland permissu superiorum! It was printed in Ireland expressly for the use of the Irish Catholic priests, to be their guide in casuistry and speculation, and notwithstanding there are 50 or 60 copies of it in Dr. Murray's seminary in Cork. Thus is the Archbishop convicted of a direct falsehood, or a disengenuous evasion: let him choose between the two. But we have not done with him yet. This dedication,' says Mr. Horne, " was castrated in 48 out of 50 copies consigned to the London booksellers. The fraud, however, was detected, and numerous other copies, with the dedication, have since come into commerce; one of which is in the library of the Athenæum in Pall Mall. The London clergy showed their high estimation of Mr. Horne's character and learning, in their earnest request that he would prepare for them a work becoming the interesting event, which they in thankfulness of spirit to God and purity and simplicity of heart intend to commemorate; and Mr. Horne has fully justified the opinion they entertained, by completing, in a few hours snatched from the necessary repose of body and mind, as well as from other pressing avocations, a very excellent defence of the Protestant Church; and by arranging in a clear and luminous argument the heads of its original and continued dissent from a Church that, in belief and practice, it considers so unscriptural as to refuse communion with it. The Bride of Siena, a poem. 1835. THIS pleasing and elegant little poem is founded on the following lines in the Divina Comedia of Dante : Then remember me; I once was Pia. Siena gave me life, Maremma took it from me; that he knows Who me with jewelled ring did first espouse. Some commentators believed, from the absence of all reproach in these words, that La Pia was deserving of her fate. But the authoress of this poem very justly observes-"those more deeply read in the female heart when animated by undying affection, will probably agree, that these words betray unconquered love for the injurer, rather than a sense of love in the injured. That La Pia existed, that she was the bride of Nello, and that she suffered death in the Maremma for some imputed crime, are facts: the details of the facts are lost; and the authoress has endeavoured to supply that loss from her imagination." Although there is nothing very novel in the design of this poetical commentator on Dante, yet she has taken up the chisel that the great sculptor-poet had left, and used it with a prudent and tasteful hand. And we really have nothing to object to, except the prolonged description of the cruel and parting scene between Lord Nello and La Pia at the fortress of the Maremma. We think there should have been 6 no song,' as there was no supper;' and that it should have been passed over as quietly as possible: the scene is too painful to last. Of the execution we should speak very favourably: the versification is easy and varied, and generally harmonious, and the language poetical; though there is a smack more than we like, of Lord Byron at the bottom of the cask. Had we a La Pia in our house, we would take care She should not get beyond the first six volumes of good old Mr. Anderson's British Poets: this is a duty which all mammas should feel. Can we suppose that the old ladies of Smyrna, and Rhodes, and Colophon, ever permitted their daughters to read Lycophron, and Quintus Calabe, and Coluthus Ly 6 He rent that silken cord; with glaring eyes And hands convulsed, he turned each treasured page, And for a moment love and wild surprise Her charms, though faded thus, if true her heart; And could she treasure up each early token Of love and faith, by her own falsehood broken ?' [tried Bowed by despair, he sat him down and From his own heart his deathless love to hide; Rested his brow upon his folded arms, And closed his eyes, as though La Pia's charms [leaf, Were not so firmly stamped on Memory's That outward darkness could bring no relief. |