Stones of Venice, Volume 3 — Conclusion, part 3

§ XXV.

Now, the truly great artist neither leaves the imagination to itself, like Sir Joshua, nor insults it by realization, like Hobbima, but finds it continual employment of the happiest kind.

Having summoned it by his vigorous first touches, he says to it: "Here is a tree for you, and it is to be an oak.

Now I know that you can make it green and intricate for yourself, but that is not enough: an oak is not only green and intricate, but its leaves have most beautiful and fantastic forms which I am very sure you are not quite able to complete without help; so I will draw a cluster or two perfectly for you, and then you can go on and do all the other clusters.

So far so good: but the leaves are not enough; the oak is to be full of acorns, and you may not be quite able to imagine the way they grow, nor the pretty contrast of their glossy almond-shaped nuts with the chasing of their cups; so I will draw a bunch or two of acorns for you, and you can fill up the oak with others like them.

Good: but that is not enough; it is to be a bright day in summer, and all the outside leaves are to be glittering in the sunshine as if their edges were of gold: I cannot paint this, but you can; so I will really gild some of the edges nearest you,[52] and you can turn the gold into sunshine, and cover the tree with it.

Well done: but still this is not enough; the tree is so full foliaged and so old that the wood birds come in crowds to build there; they are singing, two or three under the shadow of every bough.

I cannot show you them all; but here is a large one on the outside spray, and you can fancy the others inside."

§ XXVI.

In this way the calls upon the imagination are multiplied as a great painter finishes; and from these larger incidents he may proceed into the most minute particulars, and lead the companion imagination to the veins in the leaves and the mosses on the trunk, and the shadows of the dead leaves upon the grass, but always multiplying thoughts, or subjects of thought, never working for the sake of realization; the amount of realization actually reached depending on his space, his materials, and the nature of the thoughts he wishes to suggest.

In the sculpture of an oak-tree, introduced above an Adoration of the Magi on the tomb of the Doge Marco Dolfino (fourteenth century), the sculptor has been content with a few leaves, a single acorn, and a bird; while, on the other hand, Millais' willow-tree with the robin, in the background of his "Ophelia," or the foreground of Hunt's "Two Gentlemen of Verona," carries the appeal to the imagination into particulars so multiplied and minute, that the work nearly reaches realization.

But it does not matter how near realization the work may approach in its fulness, or how far off it may remain in its slightness, so long as realization is not the end proposed, but the informing one spirit of the thoughts of another.

And in this greatness and simplicity of purpose all noble art is alike, however slight its means, or however perfect, from the rudest mosaics of St. Mark's to the most tender finishing of the "Huguenot" or the "Ophelia."

§ XXVII.

Only observe, in this matter, that a greater degree of realization is often allowed, for the sake of color, than would be right without it.

For there is not any distinction between the artists of the inferior and the nobler schools more definite than this; that the first _color for the sake of realization_, and the second _realize for the sake of color_.

I hope that, in the fifth chapter, enough has been said to show the nobility of color, though it is a subject on which I would fain enlarge whenever I approach it: for there is none that needs more to be insisted upon, chiefly on account of the opposition of the persons who have no eye for color, and who, being therefore unable to understand that it is just as divine and distinct in its power as music (only infinitely more varied in its harmonies), talk of it as if it were inferior and servile with respect to the other powers of art;[53] whereas it is so far from being this, that wherever it enters it must take the mastery, and, whatever else is sacrificed for its sake, _it_, at least, must be right.

This is partly the case even with music: it is at our choice, whether we will accompany a poem with music, or not; but, if we do, the music _must_ be right, and neither discordant nor inexpressive.

The goodness and sweetness of the poem cannot save it, if the music be harsh or false; but, if the music be right, the poem may be insipid or inharmonious, and still saved by the notes to which it is wedded.

But this is far more true of color.

If that be wrong, all is wrong.

No amount of expression or invention can redeem an ill-colored picture; while, on the other hand, if the color be right, there is nothing it will not raise or redeem; and, therefore, wherever color enters at all, anything _may_ be sacrificed to it, and, rather than it should be false or feeble, everything _must_ be sacrificed to it: so that, when an artist touches color, it is the same thing as when a poet takes up a musical instrument; he implies, in so doing, that he is a master, up to a certain point, of that instrument, and can produce sweet sound from it, and is able to fit the course and measure of his words to its tones, which, if he be not able to do, he had better not have touched it.

In like manner, to add color to a drawing is to undertake for the perfection of a visible music, which, if it be false, will utterly and assuredly mar the whole work; if true, proportionately elevate it, according to its power and sweetness.

But, in no case ought the color to be added in order to increase the realization.

The drawing or engraving is all that the imagination needs.

To "paint" the subject merely to make it more real, is only to insult the imaginative power and to vulgarize the whole.

Hence the common, though little understood feeling, among men of ordinary cultivation, that an inferior sketch is always better than a bad painting; although, in the latter, there may verily be more skill than in the former.

For the painter who has presumed to touch color without perfectly understanding it, not for the color's sake, nor because he loves it, but for the sake of completion merely, has committed two sins against us; he has dulled the imagination by not trusting it far enough, and then, in this languid state, he oppresses it with base and false color; for all color that is not lovely, is discordant; there is no mediate condition.

So, therefore, when it is permitted to enter at all, it must be with the predetermination that, cost what it will, the color shall be right and lovely: and I only wish that, in general, it were better understood that a _painter's_ business is _to paint_, primarily; and that all expression, and grouping, and conceiving, and what else goes to constitute design, _are of less importance than color, in a colored work_.

And so they were always considered in the noble periods; and sometimes all resemblance to nature whatever (as in painted windows, illuminated manuscripts, and such other work) is sacrificed to the brilliancy of color; sometimes distinctness of form to its richness, as by Titian, Turner, and Reynolds; and, which is the point on which we are at present insisting, sometimes, in the pursuit of its utmost refinements on the surfaces of objects, an amount of realization becomes consistent with noble art, which would otherwise be altogether inadmissible, that is to say, which no great mind could otherwise have either produced or enjoyed.

The extreme finish given by the Pre-Raphaelites is rendered noble chiefly by their love of color.

§ XXVIII.

So then, whatever may be the means, or whatever the more immediate end of any kind of art, all of it that is good agrees in this, that it is the expression of one soul talking to another, and is precious according to the greatness of the soul that utters it.

And consider what mighty consequences follow from our acceptance of this truth!

what a key we have herein given us for the interpretation of the art of all time!

For, as long as we held art to consist in any high manual skill, or successful imitation of natural objects, or any scientific and legalized manner of performance whatever, it was necessary for us to limit our admiration to narrow periods and to few men.

According to our own knowledge and sympathies, the period chosen might be different, and our rest might be in Greek statues, or Dutch landscapes, or Italian Madonnas; but, whatever our choice, we were therein captive, barred from all reverence but of our favorite masters, and habitually using the language of contempt towards the whole of the human race to whom it had not pleased Heaven to reveal the arcana of the particular craftsmanship we admired, and who, it might be, had lived their term of seventy years upon the earth, and fitted themselves therein for the eternal world, without any clear understanding, sometimes even with an insolent disregard, of the laws of perspective and chiaroscuro.

But let us once comprehend the holier nature of the art of man, and begin to look for the meaning of the spirit, however syllabled, and the scene is changed; and we are changed also.

Those small and dexterous creatures whom once we worshipped, those fur-capped divinities with sceptres of camel's hair, peering and poring in their one-windowed chambers over the minute preciousness of the labored canvas; how are they swept away and crushed into unnoticeable darkness!

And in their stead, as the walls of the dismal rooms that enclosed them, and us, are struck by the four winds of Heaven, and rent away, and as the world opens to our sight, lo!

far back into all the depths of time, and forth from all the fields that have been sown with human life, how the harvest of the dragon's teeth is springing!

how the companies of the gods are ascending out of the earth!

The dark stones that have so long been the sepulchres of the thoughts of nations, and the forgotten ruins wherein their faith lay charnelled, give up the dead that were in them; and beneath the Egyptian ranks of sultry and silent rock, and amidst the dim golden lights of the Byzantine dome, and out of the confused and cold shadows of the Northern cloister, behold, the multitudinous souls come forth with singing, gazing on us with the soft eyes of newly comprehended sympathy, and stretching their white arms to us across the grave, in the solemn gladness of everlasting brotherhood.

§ XXIX.

The other danger to which, it was above said, we were primarily exposed under our present circumstances of life, is the pursuit of vain pleasure, that is to say, false pleasure; delight, which is not indeed delight; as knowledge vainly accumulated, is not indeed knowledge.

And this we are exposed to chiefly in the fact of our ceasing to be children.

For the child does not seek false pleasure; its pleasures are true, simple, and instinctive: but the youth is apt to abandon his early and true delight for vanities,--seeking to be like men, and sacrificing his natural and pure enjoyments to his pride.

In like manner, it seems to me that modern civilization sacrifices much pure and true pleasure to various forms of ostentation from which it can receive no fruit.

Consider, for a moment, what kind of pleasures are open to human nature, undiseased.

Passing by the consideration of the pleasures of the higher affections, which lie at the root of everything, and considering the definite and practical pleasures of daily life, there is, first, the pleasure of doing good; the greatest of all, only apt to be despised from not being often enough tasted: and then, I know not in what order to put them, nor does it matter,--the pleasure of gaining knowledge; the pleasure of the excitement of imagination and emotion (or poetry and passion); and, lastly, the gratification of the senses, first of the eye, then of the ear, and then of the others in their order.

§ XXX.

All these we are apt to make subservient to the desire of praise;

nor unwisely, when the praise sought is God's and the conscience's: but if the sacrifice is made for man's admiration, and knowledge is only sought for praise, passion repressed or affected for praise, and the arts practised for praise, we are feeding on the bitterest apples of Sodom, suffering always ten mortifications for one delight.

And it seems to me, that in the modern civilized world we make such sacrifice doubly: first, by laboring for merely ambitious purposes; and secondly, which is the main point in question, by being ashamed of simple pleasures, more especially of the pleasure in sweet color and form, a pleasure evidently so necessary to man's perfectness and virtue, that the beauty of color and form has been given lavishly throughout the whole of creation, so that it may become the food of all, and with such intricacy and subtlety that it may deeply employ the thoughts of all.

If we refuse to accept the natural delight which the Deity has thus provided for us, we must either become ascetics, or we must seek for some base and guilty pleasures to replace those of Paradise, which we have denied ourselves.

Some years ago, in passing through some of the cells of the Grand Chartreuse, noticing that the window of each apartment looked across the little garden of its inhabitant to the wall of the cell opposite, and commanded no other view, I asked the monk beside me, why the window was not rather made on the side of the cell whence it would open to the solemn fields of the Alpine valley.

"We do not come here," he replied, "to look at the mountains."

§ XXXI.

The same answer is given, practically, by the men of this century, to every such question; only the walls with which they enclose themselves are those of pride, not of prayer.

But in the middle ages it was otherwise.

Not, indeed, in landscape itself, but in the art which can take the place of it, in the noble color and form with which they illumined, and into which they wrought, every object around them that was in any wise subjected to their power, they obeyed the laws of their inner nature, and found its proper food.

The splendor and fantasy even of dress, which in these days we pretend to despise, or in which, if we even indulge, it is only for the sake of vanity, and therefore to our infinite harm, were in those early days studied for love of their true beauty and honorableness, and became one of the main helps to dignity of character, and courtesy of bearing.

Look back to what we have been told of the dress of the early Venetians, that it was so invented "that in clothing themselves with it, they might clothe themselves also with modesty and honor;"[54] consider what nobleness of expression there is in the dress of any of the portrait figures of the great times, nay, what perfect beauty, and more than beauty, there is in the folding of the robe round the imagined form even of the saint or of the angel; and then consider whether the grace of vesture be indeed a thing to be despised.

We cannot despise it if we would; and in all our highest poetry and happiest thought we cling to the magnificence which in daily life we disregard.

The essence of modern romance is simply the return of the heart and fancy to the things in which they naturally take pleasure;

and half the influence of the best romances, of Ivanhoe, or Marmion, or the Crusaders, or the Lady of the Lake, is completely dependent upon the accessaries of armor and costume.

Nay, more than this, deprive the Iliad itself of its costume, and consider how much of its power would be lost.

And that delight and reverence which we feel in, and by means of, the mere imagination of these accessaries, the middle ages had in the vision of them; the nobleness of dress exercising, as I have said, a perpetual influence upon character, tending in a thousand ways to increase dignity and self-respect, and together with grace of gesture, to induce serenity of thought.

§ XXXII.

I do not mean merely in its magnificence; the most splendid time was not the best time.

It was still in the thirteenth century,--when, as we have seen, simplicity and gorgeousness were justly mingled, and the "leathern girdle and clasp of bone" were worn, as well as the embroidered mantle,--that the manner of dress seems to have been noblest.

The chain mail of the knight, flowing and falling over his form in lapping waves of gloomy strength, was worn under full robes of one color in the ground, his crest quartered on them, and their borders enriched with subtle illumination.

The women wore first a dress close to the form in like manner, and then long and flowing robes, veiling them up to the neck, and delicately embroidered around the hem, the sleeves, and the girdle.

The use of plate armor gradually introduced more fantastic types; the nobleness of the form was lost beneath the steel;

the gradually increasing luxury and vanity of the age strove for continual excitement in more quaint and extravagant devices; and in the fifteenth century, dress reached its point of utmost splendor and fancy, being in many cases still exquisitely graceful, but now, in its morbid magnificence, devoid of all wholesome influence on manners.

From this point, like architecture, it was rapidly degraded; and sank through the buff coat, and lace collar, and jack-boot, to the bag-wig, tailed coat, and high-heeled shoes; and so to what it is now.

§ XXXIII.

Precisely analogous to this destruction of beauty in dress, has been that of beauty in architecture; its color, and grace, and fancy, being gradually sacrificed to the base forms of the Renaissance, exactly as the splendor of chivalry has faded into the paltriness of fashion.

And observe the form in which the necessary reaction has taken place; necessary, for it was not possible that one of the strongest instincts of the human race could be deprived altogether of its natural food.

Exactly in the degree that the architect withdrew from his buildings the sources of delight which in early days they had so richly possessed, demanding, in accordance with the new principles of taste, the banishment of all happy color and healthy invention, in that degree the minds of men began to turn to landscape as their only resource.

The picturesque school of art rose up to address those capacities of enjoyment for which, in sculpture, architecture, or the higher walks of painting, there was employment no more; and the shadows of Rembrandt, and savageness of Salvator, arrested the admiration which was no longer permitted to be rendered to the gloom or the grotesqueness of the Gothic aisle.

And thus the English school of landscape, culminating in Turner, is in reality nothing else than a healthy effort to fill the void which the destruction of Gothic architecture has left.

§ XXXIV.

But the void cannot thus be completely filled; no, nor filled in any considerable degree.

The art of landscape-painting will never become thoroughly interesting or sufficing to the minds of men engaged in active life, or concerned principally with practical subjects.

The sentiment and imagination necessary to enter fully into the romantic forms of art are chiefly the characteristics of youth; so that nearly all men as they advance in years, and some even from their childhood upwards, must be appealed to, if at all, by a direct and substantial art, brought before their daily observation and connected with their daily interests.

No form of art answers these conditions so well as architecture, which, as it can receive help from every character of mind in the workman, can address every character of mind in the spectator;

forcing itself into notice even in his most languid moments, and possessing this chief and peculiar advantage, that it is the property of all men.

Pictures and statues may be jealously withdrawn by their possessors from the public gaze, and to a certain degree their safety requires them to be so withdrawn; but the outsides of our houses belong not so much to us as to the passer-by, and whatever cost and pains we bestow upon them, though too often arising out of ostentation, have at least the effect of benevolence.

§ XXXV.

If, then, considering these things, any of my readers should determine, according to their means, to set themselves to the revival of a healthy school of architecture in England, and wish to know in few words how this may be done, the answer is clear and simple.

First, let us cast out utterly whatever is connected with the Greek, Roman, or Renaissance architecture, in principle or in form.

We have seen above, that the whole mass of the architecture, founded on Greek and Roman models, which we have been in the habit of building for the last three centuries, is utterly devoid of all life, virtue, honorableness, or power of doing good.

It is base, unnatural, unfruitful, unenjoyable, and impious.

Pagan in its origin, proud and unholy in its revival, paralyzed in its old age, yet making prey in its dotage of all the good and living things that were springing around it in their youth, as the dying and desperate king, who had long fenced himself so strongly with the towers of it, is said to have filled his failing veins with the blood of children;[55] an architecture invented, as it seems, to make plagiarists of its architects, slaves of its workmen, and Sybarites of its inhabitants; an architecture in which intellect is idle, invention impossible, but in which all luxury is gratified, and all insolence fortified;--the first thing we have to do is to cast it out, and shake the dust of it from our feet for ever.

Whatever has any connexion with the five orders, or with any one of the orders,--whatever is Doric, or Ionic, or Tuscan, or Corinthian, or Composite, or in any way Grecized or Romanized; whatever betrays the smallest respect for Vitruvian laws, or conformity with Palladian work,--that we are to endure no more.

To cleanse ourselves of these "cast clouts and rotten rags" is the first thing to be done in the court of our prison.

§ XXXVI.

Then, to turn our prison into a palace is an easy thing.

We have seen above, that exactly in the degree in which Greek and Roman architecture is lifeless, unprofitable, and unchristian, in that same degree our own ancient Gothic is animated, serviceable, and faithful.

We have seen that it is flexible to all duty, enduring to all time, instructive to all hearts, honorable and holy in all offices.

It is capable alike of all lowliness and all dignity, fit alike for cottage porch or castle gateway; in domestic service familiar, in religious, sublime; simple, and playful, so that childhood may read it, yet clothed with a power that can awe the mightiest, and exalt the loftiest of human spirits: an architecture that kindles every faculty in its workman, and addresses every emotion in its beholder; which, with every stone that is laid on its solemn walls, raises some human heart a step nearer heaven, and which from its birth has been incorporated with the existence, and in all its form is symbolical of the faith, of Christianity.

In this architecture let us henceforward build, alike the church, the palace, and the cottage; but chiefly let us use it for our civil and domestic buildings.

These once ennobled, our ecclesiastical work will be exalted together with them: but churches are not the proper scenes for experiments in untried architecture, nor for exhibitions of unaccustomed beauty.

It is certain that we must often fail before we can again build a natural and noble Gothic: let not our temples be the scenes of our failures.

It is certain that we must offend many deep-rooted prejudices, before ancient Christian architecture[56] can be again received by all of us: let not religion be the first source of such offence.

We shall meet with difficulties in applying Gothic architecture to churches, which would in no wise affect the designs of civil buildings, for the most beautiful forms of Gothic chapels are not those which are best fitted for Protestant worship.

As it was noticed in the second volume, when speaking of the Cathedral of Torcello it seems not unlikely, that as we study either the science of sound, or the practice of the early Christians, we may see reason to place the pulpit generally at the extremity of the apse or chancel; an arrangement entirely destructive of the beauty of a Gothic church, as seen in existing examples, and requiring modifications of its design in other parts with which we should be unwise at present to embarrass ourselves; besides, that the effort to introduce the style exclusively for ecclesiastical purposes, excites against it the strong prejudices of many persons who might otherwise be easily enlisted among its most ardent advocates.

I am quite sure, for instance, that if such noble architecture as has been employed for the interior of the church just built in Margaret Street[57] had been seen in a civil building, it would have decided the question with many men at once; whereas, at present, it will be looked upon with fear and suspicion, as the expression of the ecclesiastical principles of a particular party.

But, whether thus regarded or not, this church assuredly decides one question conclusively, that of our present capability of Gothic design.

It is the first piece of architecture I have seen, built in modern days, which is free from all signs of timidity or incapacity.

In general proportion of parts, in refinement and piquancy of mouldings, above all, in force, vitality, and grace of floral ornament, worked in a broad and masculine manner, it challenges fearless comparison with the noblest work of any time.

Having done this, we may do anything; there need be no limits to our hope or our confidence; and I believe it to be possible for us, not only to equal, but far to surpass, in some respects, any Gothic yet seen in Northern countries.

In the introduction of figure-sculpture, we must, indeed, for the present, remain utterly inferior, for we have no figures to study from.

No architectural sculpture was ever good for anything which did not represent the dress and persons of the people living at the time;

and our modern dress will _not_ form decorations for spandrils and niches.

But in floral sculpture we may go far beyond what has yet been done, as well as in refinement of inlaid work and general execution.

For, although the glory of Gothic architecture is to receive the rudest work, it refuses not the best; and, when once we have been content to admit the handling of the simplest workman, we shall soon be rewarded by finding many of our simple workmen become cunning ones: and, with the help of modern wealth and science, we may do things like Giotto's campanile, instead of like our own rude cathedrals; but better than Giotto's campanile, insomuch as we may adopt the pure and perfect forms of the Northern Gothic, and work them out with the Italian refinement.

It is hardly possible at present to imagine what may be the splendor of buildings designed in the forms of English and French thirteenth century _surface_ Gothic, and wrought out with the refinement of Italian art in the details, and with a deliberate resolution, since we cannot have figure sculpture, to display in them the beauty of every flower and herb of the English fields, each by each; doing as much for every tree that roots itself in our rocks, and every blossom that drinks our summer rains, as our ancestors did for the oak, the ivy, and the rose.

Let this be the object of our ambition, and let us begin to approach it, not ambitiously, but in all humility, accepting help from the feeblest hands; and the London of the nineteenth century may yet become as Venice without her despotism, and as Florence without her dispeace.

FOOTNOTES:

[46] In the works of Turner and the Pre-Raphaelites.

[47] Observe, I speak of these various principles as self-evident, only under the present circumstances of the world, not as if they had always been so; and I call them now self-evident, not merely because they seem so to myself, but because they are felt to be so likewise by all the men in whom I place most trust.

But granting that they are not so, then their very disputability proves the state of infancy above alleged, as characteristic of the world.

For I do not suppose that any Christian reader will doubt the first great truth, that whatever facts or laws are important to mankind, God has made ascertainable by mankind; and that as the decision of all these questions is of vital importance to the race, that decision must have been long ago arrived at, unless they were still in a state of childhood.

[48] I intended to have given a sketch in this place (above referred to) of the probable results of the daguerreotype and calotype within the next few years, in modifying the application of the engraver's art, but I have not had time to complete the experiments necessary to enable me to speak with certainty.

Of one thing, however, I have little doubt, that an infinite service will soon be done to a large body of our engravers; namely, the making them draughtsmen (in black and white) on paper instead of steel.

[49] I mean art in its highest sense.

All that men do ingeniously is art, in one sense.

In fact, we want a definition of the word "art" much more accurate than any in our minds at present.

For, strictly speaking, there is no such thing as "fine" or "high" art.

All _art_ is a low and common thing, and what we indeed respect is not art at all, but _instinct_ or _inspiration_ expressed by the help of art.

[50] "_Socrates_.

This, then, was what I asked you; whether that which puts anything else to service, and the thing which is put to service by it, are always two different things?

_Alcibiades.

_ I think so.

_Socrates.

_ What shall we then say of the leather-cutter?

Does he cut his leather with his instruments only, or with his hands also?

_Alcibiades.

_ With his hands also.

_Socrates.

_ Does he not use his eyes as well as his hands?

_Alcibiades.

_ Yes.

_Socrates.

_ And we agreed that the thing which uses and the thing which is used, were different things?

_Alcibiades.

_ Yes.

_Socrates.

_ Then the leather-cutter is not the same thing as his eyes or hands?

_Alcibiades.

_ So it appears.

_Socrates.

_ Does not, then, man make use of his whole body?

_Alcibiades.

_ Assuredly.

_Socrates.

_ Then the man is not the same thing as his body?

_Alcibiades.

_ It seems so.

_Socrates.

_ What, then, _is_ the man?

_Alcibiades.

_ I know not."

_Plato_, Alcibiades I. [51] Thus the grapes pressed by Excesse are partly golden (Spenser, book ii.

cant.

12. ): "Which did themselves amongst the leaves enfold, As lurking from the view of covetous guest, That the weake boughes, with so rich load opprest Did bow adowne as overburdened."

[52] The reader must not suppose that the use of gold, in this manner, is confined to early art.

Tintoret, the greatest master of pictorial effect that ever existed, has gilded the ribs of the fig-leaves in his "Resurrection," in the Scuola di San Rocco.

[53] Nothing is more wonderful to me than to hear the pleasure of the eye, in color, spoken of with disdain as "sensual," while people exalt that of the ear in music.

Do they really suppose the eye is a less noble bodily organ than the ear,--that the organ by which nearly all our knowledge of the external universe is communicated to us, and through which we learn the wonder and the love, can be less exalted in its own peculiar delight than the ear, which is only for the communication of the ideas which owe to the eye their very existence?

I do not mean to depreciate music: let it be loved and reverenced as is just; only let the delight of the eye be reverenced more.

The great power of music over the multitude is owing, not to its being less but _more_ sensual than color; it is so distinctly and so richly sensual, that it can be idly enjoyed; it is exactly at the point where the lower and higher pleasures of the senses and imagination are balanced; so that pure and great minds love it for its invention and emotion, and lower minds for its sensual power.

[54] Vol. II.

Appendix 7. [55] Louis the Eleventh.

"In the month of March, 1481, Louis was seized with a fit of apoplexy at _St.

Bénoit-du-lac-mort_, near Chinon.

He remained speechless and bereft of reason three days; and then but very imperfectly restored, he languished in a miserable state....

To cure him," says a contemporary historian, "wonderful and terrible medicines were compounded.

It was reported among the people that his physicians opened the veins of little children, and made him drink their blood, to correct the poorness of his own."

--_Bussey's History of France.

_ London, 1850. [56] Observe, I call Gothic "Christian" architecture, not "ecclesiastical."

There is a wide difference.

I believe it is the only architecture which Christian men should build, but not at all an architecture necessarily connected with the services of their church.

[57] Mr. Hope's Church, in Margaret Street, Portland Place.

I do not altogether like the arrangements of color in the brickwork; but these will hardly attract the eye, where so much has been already done with precious and beautiful marble, and is yet to be done in fresco.

Much will depend, however, upon the coloring of this latter portion.

I wish that either Holman Hunt or Millais could be prevailed upon to do at least some of these smaller frescoes.

APPENDIX.

1. ARCHITECT OF THE DUCAL PALACE.

Popular tradition and a large number of the chroniclers ascribe the building of the Ducal Palace to that Filippo Calendario who suffered death for his share in the conspiracy of Faliero.

He was certainly one of the leading architects of the time, and had for several years the superintendence of the works of the Palace; but it appears, from the documents collected by the Abbé Cadorin, that the first designer of the Palace, the man to whom we owe the adaptation of the Frari traceries to civil architecture, was Pietro Baseggio, who is spoken of expressly as "formerly the Chief Master of our New Palace,"[58] in the decree of 1361, quoted by Cadorin, and who, at his death, left Calendario his executor.

Other documents collected by Zanotto, in his work on "Venezia e le sue Lagune," show that Calendario was for a long time at sea, under the commands of the Signory, returning to Venice only three or four years before his death; and that therefore the entire management of the works of the Palace, in the most important period, must have been entrusted to Baseggio.

It is quite impossible, however, in the present state of the Palace, to distinguish one architect's work from another in the older parts; and I have not in the text embarrassed the reader by any attempt at close definition of epochs before the great junction of the Piazzetta Façade with the older palace in the fifteenth century.

Here, however, it is necessary that I should briefly state the observations I was able to make on the relative dates of the earlier portions.

In the description of the Fig-tree angle, given in the eighth chapter of Vol. II.

, I said that it seemed to me somewhat earlier than that of the Vine, and the reader might be surprised at the apparent opposition of this statement to my supposition that the Palace was built gradually round from the Rio Façade to the Piazzetta.

But in the two great open arcades there is no succession of work traceable; from the Vine angle to the junction with the fifteenth century work, above and below, all seems nearly of the same date, the only question being of the accidental precedence of workmanship of one capital or another; and I think, from its style, that the Fig-tree angle must have been first completed.

But in the upper stories of the Palace there are enormous differences of style.

On the Rio Façade, in the upper story, are several series of massive windows of the third order, corresponding exactly in mouldings and manner of workmanship to those of the chapter-house of the Frari, and consequently carrying us back to a very early date in the fourteenth century: several of the capitals of these windows, and two richly sculptured string-courses in the wall below, are of Byzantine workmanship, and in all probability fragments of the Ziani Palace.

The traceried windows on the Rio Façade, and the two eastern windows on the Sea Façade, are all of the finest early fourteenth century work, masculine and noble in their capitals and bases to the highest degree, and evidently contemporary with the very earliest portions of the lower arcades.

But the moment we come to the windows of the Great Council Chamber the style is debased.

The mouldings are the same, but they are coarsely worked, and the heads set amidst the leafage of the capitals quite valueless and vile.

I have not the least doubt that these window-jambs and traceries were restored after the great fire;[59] and various other restorations have taken place since, beginning with the removal of the traceries from all the windows except the northern one of the Sala del Scrutinio, behind the Porta della Carta, where they are still left.

I made out four periods of restoration among these windows, each baser than the preceding.

It is not worth troubling the reader about them, but the traveller who is interested in the subject may compare two of them in the same window; the one nearer the sea of the two belonging to the little room at the top of the Palace on the Piazzetta Façade, between the Sala del Gran Consiglio and that of the Scrutinio.

The seaward jamb of that window is of the first, and the opposite jamb of the second, period of these restorations.

These are all the points of separation in date which I could discover by internal evidence.

But much more might be made out by any Venetian antiquary whose time permitted him thoroughly to examine any existing documents which allude to or describe the parts of the Palace spoken of in the important decrees of 1340, 1342, and 1344; for the first of these decrees speaks of certain "columns looking towards the Canal"[60] or sea, as then existing, and I presume these columns to have been part of the Ziani Palace, corresponding to the part of that palace on the Piazzetta where were the "red columns" between which Calendario was executed; and a great deal more might be determined by any one who would thoroughly unravel the obscure language of those decrees.

Meantime, in order to complete the evidence respecting the main dates stated in the text, I have collected here such notices of the building of the Ducal Palace as appeared to me of most importance in the various chronicles I examined.

I could not give them all in the text, as they repeat each other, and would have been tedious; but they will be interesting to the antiquary, and it is to be especially noted in all of them how the Palazzo _Vecchio_ is invariably distinguished, either directly or by implication, from the Palazzo Nuovo.

I shall first translate the piece of the Zancarol Chronicle given by Cadorin, which has chiefly misled the Venetian antiquaries.

I wish I could put the rich old Italian into old English, but must be content to lose its raciness, as it is necessary that the reader should be fully acquainted with its facts.

"It was decreed that none should dare to propose to the Signory of Venice to ruin the _old_ palace and rebuild it new and more richly, and there was a penalty of one thousand ducats against any one who should break it.

Then the Doge, wishing to set forward the public good, said to the Signory, ...

that they ought to rebuild the façades of the _old_ palace, and that it ought to be restored, to do honor to the nation: and so soon as he had done speaking, the Avogadori demanded the penalty from the Doge, for having disobeyed the law; and the Doge with ready mind paid it, remaining in his opinion that the said fabric ought to be built.

And so, in the year 1422, on the 20th day of September, it was passed in the Council of the Pregadi that the said new palace should be begun, and the expense should be borne by the Signori del Sal; and so, on the 24th day of March, 1424, it was begun to throw down the _old_ palace, and to build it anew."

--_Cadorin_, p. 129. The day of the month, and the council in which the decree was passed, are erroneously given by this Chronicle.

Cadorin has printed the words of the decree itself, which passed in the Great Council on the 27th September: and these words are, fortunately, much to our present purpose.

For as more than one façade is spoken of in the above extract, the Marchese Selvatico was induced to believe that both the front to the sea and that to the Piazzetta had been destroyed; whereas, the "façades" spoken of are evidently those of the Ziani Palace.

For the words of the decree (which are much more trustworthy than those of the Chronicle, even if there were any inconsistency between them) run thus: "Palatium nostrum fabricetur et fiat in forma decora et convenienti, quod respondeat _solemnissimo principio palatii nostri novi_."

Thus the new council chamber and façade to the sea are called the "most venerable beginning of our _New_ Palace;" and the rest was ordered to be designed in accordance with these, as was actually the case as far as the Porta della Carta.

But the Renaissance architects who thenceforward proceeded with the fabric, broke through the design, and built everything else according to their own humors.

The question may be considered as set at rest by these words of the decree, even without any internal or any farther documentary evidence.

But rather for the sake of impressing the facts thoroughly on the reader's mind, than of any additional proof, I shall quote a few more of the best accredited Chronicles.

The passage given by Bettio, from the Sivos Chronicle, is a very important parallel with that from the Zancarol above: "Essendo molto vecchio, e quasi rovinoso el Palazzo sopra la piazza, fo deliberato di far quella parte tutta da novo, et continuarla com' è quella della Sala grande, et cosi il Lunedi 27 Marzo 1424 fu dato principio a ruinare detto Palazzo vecchio dalla parte, ch' è verso panateria cioè della Giustizia, ch' è nelli occhi di sopra le colonne fino alla Chiesa et fo fatto anco la porta grande, com' è al presente, con la sala che si addimanda la Libraria."

[61] We have here all the facts told us in so many words: the "old palace" is definitely stated to have been "on the piazza," and it is to be rebuilt "like the part of the great saloon."

The very point from which the newer buildings commenced is told us; but here the chronicler has carried his attempt at accuracy too far.

The point of junction is, as stated above, at the third pillar beyond the medallion of Venice; and I am much at a loss to understand what could have been the disposition of these three pillars where they joined the Ziani Palace, and how they were connected with the arcade of the inner cortile.

But with these difficulties, as they do not bear on the immediate question, it is of no use to trouble the reader.

The next passage I shall give is from a Chronicle in the Marcian Library, bearing title, "Supposta di Zancaruol;" but in which I could not find the passage given by Cadorin from, I believe, a manuscript of this Chronicle at Vienna.

There occurs instead of it the following thus headed:-- "Come _la parte nova_ del Palazzo fuo hedificata _novamente_.

"El Palazzo novo de Venesia quella parte che xe verso la Chiesia de S. Marcho fuo prexo chel se fesse del 1422 e fosse pagado la spexa per li officiali del sal.

E fuo fatto per sovrastante G. Nicolo Barberigo cum provision de ducati X doro al mexe e fuo fabricado e fatto nobelissimo.

Come fin ancho di el sta e fuo grande honor a la Signoria de Venesia e a la sua Citta."

This entry, which itself bears no date, but comes between others dated 22nd July and 27th December, is interesting, because it shows the first transition of the idea of _newness_, from the Grand Council Chamber to the part built under Foscari.

For when Mocenigo's wishes had been fulfilled, and the old palace of Ziani had been destroyed, and another built in its stead, the Great Council Chamber, which was "the new palace" compared with Ziani's, became "the old palace" compared with Foscari's; and thus we have, in the body of the above extract, the whole building called "the new palace of Venice;" but in the heading of it, we have "the new _part_ of the palace" applied to the part built by Foscari, in contradistinction to the Council Chamber.

The next entry I give is important, because the writing of the MS. in which it occurs, No. 53 in the Correr Museum, shows it to be probably not later than the end of the fifteenth century: "El palazo nuovo de Venixia zoe quella parte che se sora la piazza verso la giesia di Miss. San Marcho del 1422 fo principiado, el qual fo fato e finito molto belo, chome al presente se vede nobilissimo, et a la fabricha de quello fo deputado Miss. Nicolo Barberigo, soprastante con ducati dieci doro al mexe."

We have here the part built by Foscari distinctly called the Palazzo Nuovo, as opposed to the Great Council Chamber, which had now completely taken the position of the Palazzo Vecchio, and is actually so called by Sansovino.

In the copy of the Chronicle of Paolo Morosini, and in the MSS.

numbered respectively 57, 59, 74, and 76 in the Correr Museum, the passage above given from No. 53 is variously repeated with slight modifications and curtailments; the entry in the Morosini Chronicle being headed, "Come fu principiato il palazo che guarda sopra la piaza grande di S. Marco," and proceeding in the words, "El Palazo Nuovo di Venetia, cioè quella parte che e sopra la piaza," &c. , the writers being cautious, in all these instances, to _limit their statement_ to the part facing the Piazza, that no reader might suppose the Council Chamber to have been built or begun at the same time; though, as long as to the end of the sixteenth century, we find the Council Chamber still included in the expression "Palazzo Nuovo."

Thus, in the MS. No. 75 in the Correr Museum, which is about that date, we have "Del 1422, a di 20 Settembre fu preso nel consegio grando de dover _compir_ el Palazo Novo, e dovesen fare la spessa li officialli del Sal (61. M.

2. B.

)."

And, so long as this is the case, the "Palazzo Vecchio" always means the Ziani Palace.

Thus, in the next page of this same MS. we have "a di 27 Marzo (1424 by context) fo principia a butar zosso, el _Palazzo Vecchio_ per refarlo da novo, e poi se he" (and so it is done); and in the MS. No. 81, "Del 1424, fo gittado zoso el _Palazzo Vecchio_ per refarlo de nuovo, a di 27 Marzo."

But in the time of Sansovino the Ziani Palace was quite forgotten; the Council Chamber was then the _old_ palace, and Foscari's part was the new.

His account of the "Palazzo Publico" will now be perfectly intelligible; but, as the work itself is easily accessible, I shall not burden the reader with any farther extracts, only noticing that the chequering of the façade with red and white marbles, which he ascribes to Foscari, may or may not be of so late a date, as there is nothing in the style of the work which can be produced as evidence.

2. THEOLOGY OF SPENSER.

The following analysis of the first books of the "Faërie Queen," may be interesting to readers who have been in the habit of reading the noble poem too hastily to connect its parts completely together; and may perhaps induce them to more careful study of the rest of the poem.

The Redcrosse Knight is Holiness,--the "Pietas" of St. Mark's, the "Devotio" of Orcagna,--meaning, I think, in general, Reverence and Godly Fear.

This Virtue, in the opening of the book, has Truth (or Una) at its side, but presently enters the Wandering Wood, and encounters the serpent Error; that is to say, Error in her universal form, the first enemy of Reverence and Holiness; and more especially Error as founded on learning; for when Holiness strangles her, "Her vomit _full of bookes and papers was_, With loathly frogs and toades, which eyes did lacke."

Having vanquished this first open and palpable form of Error, as Reverence and Religion must always vanquish it, the Knight encounters Hypocrisy, or Archimagus; Holiness cannot detect Hypocrisy, but believes him, and goes home with him; whereupon Hypocrisy succeeds in separating Holiness from Truth; and the Knight (Holiness) and Lady (Truth) go forth separately from the house of Archimagus.

Now observe: the moment Godly Fear, or Holiness, is separated from Truth, he meets Infidelity, or the Knight Sans Foy; Infidelity having Falsehood, or Duesa, riding behind him.

The instant the Redcrosse Knight is aware of the attack of Infidelity, he "Gan fairly couch his speare, and towards ride."

He vanquishes and slays Infidelity; but is deceived by his companion, Falsehood, and takes her for his lady: thus showing the condition of Religion, when, after being attacked by Doubt, and remaining victorious, it is nevertheless seduced, by any form of Falsehood, to pay reverence where it ought not.

This, then, is the first fortune of Godly Fear separated from Truth.

The poet then returns to Truth, separated from Godly Fear.

She is immediately attended by a lion, or Violence, which makes her dreaded wherever she comes; and when she enters the mart of Superstition, this Lion tears Kirkrapine in pieces: showing how Truth, separated from Godliness, does indeed put an end to the abuses of Superstition, but does so violently and desperately.

She then meets again with Hypocrisy, whom she mistakes for her own lord, or Godly Fear, and travels a little way under his guardianship (Hypocrisy thus not unfrequently appearing to defend the Truth), until they are both met by Lawlessness, or the Knight Sans Loy, whom Hypocrisy cannot resist.

Lawlessness overthrows Hypocrisy, and seizes upon Truth, first slaying her lion attendant: showing that the first aim of licence is to destroy the force and authority of Truth.

Sans Loy then takes Truth captive, and bears her away.

Now this Lawlessness is the "unrighteousness," or "adikia," of St. Paul; and his bearing Truth away captive, is a type of those "who hold the truth in unrighteousness,"--that is to say, generally, of men who, knowing what is true, make the truth give way to their own purposes, or use it only to forward them, as is the case with so many of the popular leaders of the present day.

Una is then delivered from Sans Loy by the satyrs, to show that Nature, in the end, must work out the deliverance of the truth, although, where it has been captive to Lawlessness, that deliverance can only be obtained through Savageness, and a return to barbarism.

Una is then taken from among the satyrs by Satyrane, the son of a satyr and a "lady myld, fair Thyamis," (typifying the early steps of renewed civilization, and its rough and hardy character "nousled up in life and manners wilde,") who, meeting again with Sans Loy, enters instantly into rough and prolonged combat with him: showing how the early organization of a hardy nation must be wrought out through much discouragement from Lawlessness.

This contest the poet leaving for the time undecided, returns to trace the adventures of the Redcrosse Knight, or Godly Fear, who, having vanquished Infidelity, presently is led by Falsehood to the house of Pride: thus showing how religion, separated from truth, is first tempted by doubts of God, and then by the pride of life.

The description of this house of Pride is one of the most elaborate and noble pieces in the poem; and here we begin to get at the proposed system of Virtues and Vices.

For Pride, as queen, has six other vices yoked in her chariot; namely, first, Idleness, then Gluttony, Lust, Avarice, Envy, and Anger, all driven on by "Sathan, with a smarting whip in hand."

From these lower vices and their company, Godly Fear, though lodging in the house of Pride, holds aloof; but he is challenged, and has a hard battle to fight with Sans Joy, the brother of Sans Foy: showing, that though he has conquered Infidelity, and does not give himself up to the allurements of Pride, he is yet exposed, so long as he dwells in her house, to distress of mind and loss of his accustomed rejoicing before God.

He, however, having partly conquered Despondency, or Sans Joy, Falsehood goes down to Hades, in order to obtain drugs to maintain the power or life of Despondency; but, meantime, the Knight leaves the house of Pride: Falsehood pursues and overtakes him, and finds him by a fountain side, of which the waters are "Dull and slow, And all that drinke thereof do faint and feeble grow."

Of which the meaning is, that Godly Fear, after passing through the house of Pride, is exposed to drowsiness and feebleness of watch; as, after Peter's boast, came Peter's sleeping, from weakness of the flesh, and then, last of all, Peter's fall.

And so it follows: for the Redcrosse Knight, being overcome with faintness by drinking of the fountain, is thereupon attacked by the giant Orgoglio, overcome and thrown by him into a dungeon.

This Orgoglio is Orgueil, or Carnal Pride;

not the pride of life, spiritual and subtle, but the common and vulgar pride in the power of this world: and his throwing the Redcrosse Knight into a dungeon, is a type of the captivity of true religion under the temporal power of corrupt churches, more especially of the Church of Rome; and of its gradually wasting away in unknown places, while carnal pride has the preëminence over all things.

That Spenser means, especially, the pride of the Papacy, is shown by the 16th stanza of the book; for there the giant Orgoglio is said to have taken Duessa, or Falsehood, for his "deare," and to have set upon her head a triple crown, and endowed her with royal majesty, and made her to ride upon a seven-headed beast.

In the meantime, the dwarf, the attendant of the Redcrosse Knight, takes his arms, and finding Una tells her of the captivity of her lord.

Una, in the midst of her mourning, meets Prince Arthur, in whom, as Spenser himself tells us, is set forth generally Magnificence; but who, as is shown by the choice of the hero's name, is more especially the magnificence, or literally, "great doing" of the kingdom of England.

This power of England, going forth with Truth, attacks Orgoglio, or the Pride of Papacy, slays him; strips Duessa, or Falsehood, naked; and liberates the Redcrosse Knight.

The magnificent and well-known description of Despair follows, by whom the Redcrosse Knight is hard bested, on account of his past errors and captivity, and is only saved by Truth, who, perceiving him to be still feeble, brings him to the house of Coelia, called, in the argument of the canto, Holiness, but properly, Heavenly Grace, the mother of the Virtues.

Her "three daughters, well up-brought," are Faith, Hope, and Charity.

Her porter is Humility; because Humility opens the door of Heavenly Grace.

Zeal and Reverence are her chamberlains, introducing the new comers to her presence; her groom, or servant, is Obedience; and her physician, Patience.

Under the commands of Charity, the matron Mercy rules over her hospital, under whose care the Knight is healed of his sickness; and it is to be especially noticed how much importance Spenser, though never ceasing to chastise all hypocrisies and mere observances of form, attaches to true and faithful _penance_ in effecting this cure.

Having his strength restored to him, the Knight is trusted to the guidance of Mercy, who, leading him forth by a narrow and thorny way, first instructs him in the seven works of Mercy, and then leads him to the hill of Heavenly Contemplation; whence, having a sight of the New Jerusalem, as Christian of the Delectable Mountains, he goes forth to the final victory over Satan, the old serpent, with which the book closes.

3. AUSTRIAN GOVERNMENT IN ITALY.

I cannot close these volumes without expressing my astonishment and regret at the facility with which the English allow themselves to be misled by any representations, however openly groundless or ridiculous, proceeding from the Italian Liberal party, respecting the present administration of the Austrian Government.

I do not choose here to enter into any political discussion, or express any political opinion; but it is due to justice to state the simple facts which came under my notice during my residence in Italy.

I was living at Venice through two entire winters, and in the habit of familiar association both with Italians and Austrians, my own antiquarian vocations rendering such association possible without exciting the distrust of either party.

During this whole period, I never once was able to ascertain, from any liberal Italian, that he had a single _definite_ ground of complaint against the Government.

There was much general grumbling and vague discontent; but I never was able to bring one of them to the point, or to discover what it was that they wanted, or in what way they felt themselves injured; nor did I ever myself witness an instance of oppression on the part of the Government, though several of much kindness and consideration.

The indignation of those of my own countrymen and countrywomen whom I happened to see during their sojourn in Venice was always vivid, but by no means large in its grounds.

English ladies on their first arrival invariably began the conversation with the same remark: "What a dreadful thing it was to be ground under the iron heel of despotism!"

Upon closer inquiries it always appeared that being "ground under the heel of despotism" was a poetical expression for being asked for one's passport at San Juliano, and required to fetch it from San Lorenzo, full a mile and a quarter distant.

In like manner, travellers, after two or three days' residence in the city, used to return with pitiful lamentations over "the misery of the Italian people."

Upon inquiring what instances they had met with of this misery, it invariably turned out that their gondoliers, after being paid three times their proper fare, had asked for something to drink, and had attributed the fact of their being thirsty to the Austrian Government.

The misery of the Italians consists in having three festa days a week, and doing in their days of exertion about one fourth as much work as an English laborer.

There is, indeed, much true distress occasioned by the measures which the Government is sometimes compelled to take in order to repress sedition; but the blame of this lies with those whose occupation is the excitement of sedition.

So also there is much grievous harm done to works of art by the occupation of the country by so large an army; but for the mode in which that army is quartered, the Italian municipalities are answerable, not the Austrians.

Whenever I was shocked by finding, as above-mentioned at Milan, a cloister, or a palace, occupied by soldiery, I always discovered, on investigation, that the place had been given by the municipality; and that, beyond requiring that lodging for a certain number of men should be found in such and such a quarter of the town, the Austrians had nothing to do with the matter.