Although the Catholic Church can afford to dispense with outward ceremonial, or adapt herself to a different arrangement of church architecture, and yet remain, in custom, in doctrine, essentially immutable, such is not the privilege of the dominant church in England. Therefore it will not be surprising to any one to know how much the revived taste for art contributed some time ago to the revived sense of decorum in the services of the Episcopalian denomination. Eastlake gives us a graphic description of spiritual desolation in the ante-Gothic days in the country parishes of England:
“In country districts, a bad road or a rainy day sufficed to keep half the congregation away even from Sunday services. Of those who attended, two-thirds left the responses to the parish clerk.... Cracked fiddles and grunting violoncellos frequently supplied the place of the church organ. The village choir—of male and female performers—assembled in the western gallery (!). When they began to sing, the whole congregation faced about to look at them; but to turn towards the east during the recitation of the creed, or to rise when the clergy entered the church, would have been considered an instance of abject superstition. No one thought of kneeling during the longer prayers. Sometimes the Litany was interrupted by thwacks from the beadle’s cane as it descended on the shoulders of parish schoolboys, who devoted themselves to clandestine amusement during that portion of the service. When the sermon began, all, except the very devout, settled themselves comfortably to sleep. The parson preached in a black gown, and not unfrequently read the communion service from his pulpit.”
We have seen in a country church in Rutland—one of the midland counties of England—some lingering tokens of this curious state of things. Most of the other churches of that neighborhood have been magnificently restored, and very much Catholicized, at least in externals. This exception to the rule is in a small parish, and is noticeable for a very curious ancient monument, half sunk in the earth, and covered by a recess of the church wall itself. It is supposed to be that of the founder, who chose this position as typical of his having been a support to the building: at least this was the suggestion of a friend of ours, an architect of the type of Pugin—a Christian artist in the true sense of the word. The interior of the church was a sad contrast to its beautiful outward proportions: high whitewashed pews filled it, hiding the base of the columns, thrusting their wooden cornices into and over the piscinæ, and covering from view the old brasses and monumental slabs on the stone floor. A row of hat-pegs (will it be believed?) ran round the whole church at a convenient height, and rare must have been the decoration appended to them on a Sunday. The “altar plate”—pewter pots hardly a stage better, and certainly a degree duller, than those highly-polished vessels which were no doubt in more constant use in the neighboring tavern—was kept in a worm-eaten old oak chest at the bottom of the church. The communion table was a table; and indeed Cromwell himself might have walked in and felt satisfied that there lurked no “Popery” there. By the bye, why does ignorance always call beautiful art “Popery”? Is it not through some higher and unconscious knowledge which forces itself into expression, like the sibyl’s prophecies, upon reluctant and unbelieving lips?
Eastlake speaks of Westminster Abbey as liable to many of the abuses which he deplores in country churches. “Westminster,” he says, “was not then (1826) as now guarded by circumspect vergers, who are stimulated to additional vigilance by the sixpences of the faithful. There was scarce a monument in the place which had not suffered from ruthless violence, for at that time or not long before, the choristers made a playground of the venerable abbey, and the Westminster scholars played at hockey in the cloisters.”
It is time to mention a few of the architects of the more modern phase of the Revival, and of some of their works, those especially which find a place among the fine engravings of Eastlake’s valuable book. Butterfield is selected as one of the foremost, and as the only leader after Pugin whose influence is yet appreciably felt. He is thus eulogized by our author. “It is especially characteristic of Mr. Butterfield’s design that he aims at originality, not only in form, but in the relative proportion of parts.... This indeed is the secret of the striking and picturesque character which distinguishes his works from others which are less daring in conception and therefore less liable to mistakes. Mr. Butterfield has been the leader of a school, and it is necessary for a leader to be bold.” Of the church of All Saints, in London, built by the same architect, Eastlake says: “The truth is that the design was a bold and magnificent endeavor to shake off the trammels of antiquarian precedent, which had long fettered the progress of the Revival, to create not a new style, but a development of previous styles; to carry the enrichment of ecclesiastical Gothic to an extent which even in the middle ages had been rare in England; to adorn the walls with surface ornament of a durable kind; to spare, in short, neither skill, nor pains, nor cost in making this church the model church of its day—such a building as should take a notable position in the history of modern architecture.” Further on he says of him that there is “a sober earnestness in his work widely different from that of some designers, who seem to be tossed about on the sea of popular taste.... He does not care to produce showy buildings at a sacrifice of constructive strength. To a pretty, superficial school of Gothic and fussy carving, he never condescended.... His work gives one the idea of a man who has designed it not so much to please his clients as to please himself. In estimating the value of his skill, posterity may find something to smile at as eccentric and much that will astonish as daring, but they will find nothing to despise as commonplace or mean.” Several engravings are given of details of his work on the church of St. Alban’s (a high ritualistic stronghold in London) and at All Saints’ and Balliol Chapel (Oxford). Of Carpenter, an architect who died in his prime, we find the following flattering notice: “No practitioner of his day (1840-50) understood so thoroughly the grammar of his art.... As a pupil he appears to have given remarkable attention to the character and application of mouldings.... A knowledge of the laws of proportion, of the conditions of light and shade, and the effective employment of decorative features are arrived at by most architects gradually and after a series of tentative experiments. Carpenter seems to have acquired this knowledge very early in his career, so that even his first works possess an artistic quality far in advance of their state, while those he executed in later years are regarded even now with admiration by all who have endeavored to maintain the integrity of our old national styles.” Mr. Beresford Hope was a true and enthusiastic patron of Carpenter’s artistic career. Of the many works of this talented man, whose life was unfortunately so short, our author chooses a large college in Sussex as the one most worthy of an engraving. Its proportions truly denote a mediæval spirit. Eastlake places Goldie among the later revivalists of note, and gives a fine engraving of his Abbey of St. Scholastica at Teignmouth. The building certainly looks massive and extensive enough for an ancient monastic structure, though the use of the before-mentioned bands of colored brick seems too profuse for that chasteness of design which is surely the highest standard of taste. Goldie is the architect of St. Mary’s Cathedral at Kensington, London, the Pro-Cathedral of the Archiepiscopal See of Westminster. Although we have heard many criticisms passed upon this specimen of his skill, we are by no means capable of giving any opinion, especially as we have not had the opportunity of seeing it. Eastlake gives a view of its western doorway, and goes on to say that the “interior is remarkable for the height of its nave,” a detail which receives but too little attention in many modern buildings. “The roof,” he says, “is ceiled, and follows the outline of a trefoil-headed arch—a form not often adopted, but here peculiarly effective. There are many incidents in the design of this church which are very ingenious and original.... Every detail throughout the work, even to the novel gas-standard, bears evidence of artistic care.”
We fear that, beyond naming these few artists, the richness of our remaining material will not allow us to go deeper into their merits. Yet there are many others, as well or less known, whose conscientious, enthusiastic carrying out of their beautiful principles lends powerful aid to their theory. Hanson and Hadfield, among Catholic architects, and Street and Scott among Anglicans, are well worthy of mention, and since Barry was the ostensible restorer of the Houses of Parliament, we must of course give him a place in this short review. But there is one name which from intimate and pleasant acquaintance we would fain single out, and which is honorably mentioned by Eastlake as belonging to one who with several of his Catholic brethren “have done their best, each in their several ways, to secure honest and substantial work, and to keep clear of that tawdry, superficial style of design which brings discredit on the Gothic cause.”
This is Charles Buckler, the son and successor of John Chessel Buckler, a most finished artist and wonderful draughtsman, who, it may be said with peculiar significance, has let his mantle fall on the heir to his name and art. If any one would see in modern days that oneness of being between faith and art, let him look for it in the life and works of this gifted architect. The most rigorous purist could find no fault in a man who takes for his model the simplicity of the thirteenth century, and in whose manner and address a corresponding simplicity and sweetness are ever manifest. A priest by the vocation of art, as his two brothers are by the vocation of faith and by union with one of the most art-loving orders in the church, he works more willingly for churches and other ecclesiastical buildings than for the houses of the great, and finds his highest gratification in offering to each church he designs some spontaneous gift of his genius, the carving of a piscina or the pedestal of a font. His little church of St. Thomas à Becket, at Exton in the county of Rutland, is a specimen of his design which we believe he himself would not be unwilling to call a representative one. It is the only Catholic Church in the county, and so may claim to interest those who otherwise might not care to examine it. The foundress, as devoted a lover and patroness of art as she was a holy and noble-minded Christian matron, lies buried near the high altar. The church is built in the traditional cross-shape, and has an absidal end pierced by several beautiful windows, the stone tracery of which is in the style of the thirteenth century. The rose-window at the west end is copied from one in the (now Protestant) cathedral of Lausanne, where the writer saw the sketch of it made at the foundress’ desire, by the architect to whom the future building of the church was to be entrusted. The beautiful and simple porch to the north of the church, the little belfry where an old bell found among the ruins of the old manor-house of Exton rings the daily Angelus of restored Catholic belief, the spacious and massive vault, where a plain stone altar is erected for Masses for the dead; the side chapel of St. Ida, the patron saint of the foundress; the Lady chapel, with its more elaborate yet chastely traceried window; the soft surroundings of garden, plantation, and terrace, with the view on the opposite hill of the old church, once Catholic, which three hundred years of false belief have only surrounded with a more touching pathos, as of a noble captive chained to a meaner rival’s car—all this, and the knowledge that within the Tudor mansion which has replaced the ruined manor dwell the family of the foundress, and especially the one destined to finish her church and enshrine her memory therein, makes this personal recollection of St. Thomas’ fane and its charming architect very hallowed and sweet to think on. Many pray in this church, of which the stone interior with its carven and arched tribune, and its broad oak-panelled western recess, is as lovely as its exterior with its high roof and broken outline—many pray there to whom this recollection is as dear and as holy. May those who have prayed with us remember us in their prayers, both he who has borne the burden of the day and its heat, and they to whom he has taught the way of taking up the same cross and bearing it to the same fruitful and happy end!
John Chessel Buckler, the father of our friend, was the second of the three designers chosen out of the hosts of competitors on the occasion of the rebuilding of the Houses of Parliament. Eastlake says of him: “The especial merit of Buckler’s design—second only to that of Barry in the opinion of the judges—was that it avoided the multiplication of detail.... The plan in general arrangement was considered picturesque.... Mr. Buckler obtained credit for the purity of his ornamental details.” He also built Cossey Hall for Lord Stafford, and his son is now continuing his work. No wonder that the spirit of mediæval days should have descended on this favored family, since their dwelling-place for a long time was the matchless old city of Oxford. There is a magic in that name that has a creative artistic suggestion in its very sound.
The late controversy as to Pugin’s part in the Houses of Parliament must be too well known to be revived here. Suffice it to say that the volume published by Barry’s sons as a vindication of their father’s genius was of itself conclusive, and proved too much for his reputation. Hardly a single engraving illustrative of his unassisted efforts was such as could commend itself to a purist in Gothic art, while the one part of the Houses of Parliament which was entirely his own (the unbroken front on the Thames River), though imposing at first sight, was the weakest point of the work as regards the true principles of art. Still, as Eastlake observes, it was a great victory for the Revivalists, and an important fact in the history of the Revival, that such a characteristically national work should have been confided to Gothic architects. It gave the cause both weight and popularity, and threw more in the way of the masses what before had been too much of a luxury and fancy of privileged intellectual orders. And yet, before the old style could be really popularized, it was necessary that the taste for it should be carefully educated by the firm hand of uncompromising art. Eastlake descants thus on the liberty left in the architect’s hands: “He may make an art of his calling, or he may make it a mere business; and in proportion as he inclines to one or the other of these two extremes, he will generally achieve present profit or posthumous renown.” Further on he stigmatizes one of the earlier Gothic Revivalists in these terms: “In instances where he ought to have led, or at least to have tempered and corrected the vitiated taste of his day, he simply pandered to it.” Let the reader pause to apply this to the great majority of modern artists, and to deplore the interested and debased motives which have robbed God of so much glory and the moral world of so much support. And without travelling into the region of other arts, we find among the adjuncts of architecture sufficient proof of degeneracy. Eastlake very justly remarks that the interior of houses is given up to upholsterers and decorators who too frequently are allowed to execute their work independently of the architect’s control. “We enter,” he says, “a Renaissance palace or a Gothic mansion, and find them respectively fitted up in the style of the nineteenth century, which is in point of fact no style at all, but the embodiment of a taste as empirical, as empty, and as fleeting as that which finds expression in a milliner’s fashion-book.” And again: “There is perhaps no feature in the interior of even an ordinary dwelling which is capable of more artistic treatment than the fire-place of its most frequented sitting-room, and yet how long it was neglected! The Englishman’s sacred ‘hearth,’ the Scotchman’s ‘ain fireside,’ the grandsire’s ‘chimney-corner,’ have become mere verbal expressions, of which it is difficult to recall the original significance as we stand before those cold, formal slabs of gray or white marble enclosing the sprucely polished but utterly heartless grate of a modern drawing-room.”