It is a ghastly story, though I have been careful to leave out the most gruesome details.
To-day, immediately in front of Westminster Hall, where his head was first exposed in dishonor, stands a bronze statue of the Great Protector, with a Bible in one hand and a sword in the other,—erected within the last five years,—and doubtless the day will come when a monument of "the greatest prince that ever ruled England" will be given its rightful place in Westminster Abbey.
CHAPTER XXI.
The Cathedrals vs. The Gospel.
London, October 2, 1902.
Original Significance of the Cathedrals.
Before saying what I had in mind when I remarked, in a former letter, that in some respects the English cathedrals had proved to be hindrances to vital religion, I wish to cite what Goldwin Smith says of the significance and beauty of these glorious monuments of mediæval piety: "Nothing so wonderful or beautiful has ever been built by man as these fanes of mediæval religion which still, surviving the faith and the civilization which reared them, rise above the din and smoke of modern life into purity and stillness. In religious impressiveness they far excel all the works of heathen art, and all the classical temples of the Renaissance. Even in point of architectural skill they stand unrivalled, though they are the creations of an age before mechanical science. Their groined roofs appear still to baffle imitation. But we do not fully comprehend the marvel, unless we imagine the cathedrals rising, as they did, out of towns which were then little better than collections of hovels, with but small accumulation of wealth, and without what we now deem the appliances of civilized life. Never did man's spiritual aspirations soar so high above the realities of his worldly lot as when he built the cathedrals." The last proposition is not true. What Professor Smith wished to say was that never did an outward, material expression of man's religion so far surpass all his other outward conditions. But even when thus stated, it must be remembered that these great structures were not erected by those who inhabited the "hovels" referred to, but by kings, or nobles, or prelates who lived in palaces and rolled in wealth. Still, the cathedrals were built as an expression of religion. Religion in the Middle Ages expressed itself chiefly in the erection of these costly and splendid buildings, as it now expresses itself chiefly in missionary activity.
Their Æsthetic Influence.