188

THE LAMP OF OBEDIENCE.

not take liberties with his materials, or with his rules: I do not say that strange changes will not sometimes be wrought by his efforts, or his fancies, in both. But those changes will be in-structive, natural, facile, though sometimes marvellous; they will never be sought after as things necessary to his dignity or to his independence; and those liberties will be like the liberties that a great speaker takes with the language, not a defiance of its rules for the sake of singularity; but inevitable, uncalculated, and brilliant consequences of an effort to express what the language, without such infraction, could not. There may be times when, as I have above described, the life of an art is manifested in its changes, and in its refusal of ancient limitations: so there are in the life of an insect; and there is great interest in the state of both the art and the insect at those periods when, by their natural progress and constitutional power, such changes are about to be wrought. But as that would be both an uncomfort-able and foolish caterpillar which, instead of being contented with a caterpillar's life and feeding on caterpillar's food, was always striv-ing to turn itself into a chrysalis; and as that would be an unhappy chrysalis which should lie awake at night and roll restlessly in its cocoon, in efforts to turn itself prematurely into a moth; so will that art be unhappy and unprosperous which, instead of supporting itself on the food, and contenting itself with the customs, which have been enough for the support and guidance of other arts before it and like it, is struggling and fretting under the natural limitations of its existence, and striving to become something other than it is. And though it is the nobility of the highest creatures to look forward to, and partly to understand the changes which are appointed for them, preparing for them beforehand; and if, as is usual with *appointed* changes, they be into a higher state, even desiring them, and rejoicing in the hope of them, yet it is the strength of every creature, be it changeful or not, to rest for the time being, contented with the conditions of its existence, and striving only to bring about the changes which it desires, by ful-filling to the uttermost the duties for which its present state is appointed and continued.

THE LAMP OF OBEDIENCE.

V. Neither originality, therefore, nor change, good though both may be, and this is commonly a most merciful and enthusiastic supposition with respect to either, is ever to be sought in itself, or can ever be healthily obtained by any struggle or rebellion against common laws. We want neither the one nor the other. The forms of architecture already known are good enough for us, and for far better than any of us; and it will be time enough to think of changing them for better when we can use them as they are. But there are some things which we not only want, but cannot do without; and which all the struggling and raving in the world, nay more, which all the real talent and resolution in England, will never enable us to do without: and these are Obedience, Unity, Fellowship, and Order. And all our schools of design, and committees of taste; all our academies and lectures, and journalisms, and essays; all the sacrifices which we are beginning to make, all the truth which there is in our English nature, all the power of our English will, and the life of our English intellect, will in this matter be as useless as efforts and emotions in a dream, unless we are contented to submit architecture and all art, like other things, to English law.

VI. I say architecture and all art; for I believe architecture must be the beginning of arts, and that the others must follow her in their time and order; and I think the prosperity of our schools of painting and sculpture, in which no one will deny the life, though many the health, depends upon that of our architecture. I think that all will languish until that takes the lead, and (this I do not think, but I proclaim, as confidently as I would assert the necessity, for the safety of society, of an understood and strongly administered legal government) our architecture will languish, and that in the very dust, until the first principle of common sense be manfully obeyed, and an universal system of form and workmanship be everywhere adopted and enforced. It may be said that this is impossible. It may be so—I fear it is so: I have nothing to do with the possibility or impossibility of it; I simply know and assert the necessity of it. If it be impossible, English art is impossible. Give it up at once. You are

190

THE LAMP OF OBEDIENCE.

wasting time, and money, and energy upon it, and though you
exhaust centuries and treasuries, and break hearts for it, you will
never raise it above the merest dilettanteism. Think not of it.
It is a dangerous vanity, a mere gulph in which genius after
genius will be swallowed up, and it will not close. And so it will
continue to be, unless the one bold and broad step be taken at the
beginning. We shall not manufacture art out of pottery and
printed stuffs; we shall not reason out art by our philosophy; we
shall not stumble upon art by our experiments, nor create it by
our fancies: I do not say that we can even build it out of brick
and stone; but there is a chance for us in these, and there is
none else; and that chance rests on the bare possibility of ob-
taining the consent, both of architects and of the public, to choose
a style, and to use it universally.

VII. How surely its principles ought at first to be limited, we
may easily determine by the consideration of the necessary modes
of teaching any other branch of general knowledge. When we
begin to teach children writing, we force them to absolute
copyism, and require absolute accuracy in the formation of the
letters; as they obtain command of the received modes of literal
expression, we cannot prevent their falling into such variations
as are consistent with their feeling, their circumstances, or their
characters. So, when a boy is first taught to write Latin, an
authority is required of him for every expression he uses: as he
becomes master of the language he may take a license, and feel
his right to do so without any authority, and yet write better
Latin than when he borrowed every separate expression. In the
same way our architects would have to be taught to write the
accepted style. We must first determine what buildings are to
be considered Augustan in their authority; their modes of con-
struction and laws of proportion are to be studied with the most
penetrating care; then the different forms and uses of their
decorations are to be classed and catalogued, as a German
grammarian classes the powers of prepositions; and under this
absolute, irrefragable authority, we are to begin to work; ad-
mitting not so much as an alteration in the depth of a cavetto, or

THE LAMP OF OBEDIENCE.

191

the breadth of a fillet. Then, when our sight is once accustomed
to the grammatical forms and arrangements, and our thoughts
familiar with the expression of them all; when we can speak this
dead language naturally, and apply it to whatever ideas we have
to render, that is to say, to every practical purpose of life; then,
and not till then, a license might be permitted, and individual
authority allowed to change or to add to the received forms,
always within certain limits; the decorations, especially, might
be made subjects of variable fancy, and enriched with ideas either
original or taken from other schools. And thus, in process of
time and by a great national movement, it might come to pass
that a new style should arise, as language itself changes; we
might perhaps come to speak Italian instead of Latin, or to speak
modern instead of old English; but this would be a matter of
entire indifference, and a matter, besides, which no determination
or desire could either hasten or prevent. That alone which it is
in our power to obtain, and which it is our duty to desire, is an
unanimous style of some kind, and such comprehension and
practice of it as would enable us to adapt its features to the
peculiar character of every several building, large or small,
domestic, civil, or ecclesiastical. I have said that it was im-
material what style was adopted, so far as regards the room
for originality which its developement would admit: it is
not so, however, when we take into consideration the far more
important questions of the facility of adaptation to general
purposes, and of the sympathy with which this or that style
would be popularly regarded. The choice of Classical or Gothic,
again using the latter term in its broadest sense, may be
questionable when it regards some single and considerable
public building; but I cannot conceive it questionable, for an
instant, when it regards modern uses in general: I cannot con-
ceive any architect insane enough to project the vulgarization
of Greek architecture. Neither can it be rationally questionable
whether we should adopt early or late, original or derivative
Gothic; if the latter were chosen, it must be either some im-
potent and ugly degradation, like our own Tudor, or else a style

192

THE LAMP OF OBEDIENCE.

whose grammatical laws it would be nearly impossible to limit
or arrange, like the French Flamboyant. We are equally pre-
cluded from adopting styles essentially infantine or barbarous,
however Herculean their infancy, or majestic their outlawry, such
as our own Norman, or the Lombard Romanesque. The choice
would lie I think between four styles:—1. The Pisan Ro-
manesque; 2. The early Gothic of the Western Italian Republics,
advanced as far and as fast as our art would enable us to the
Gothic of Giotto; 3. The Venetian Gothic in its purest develope-
ment; 4. The English earliest decorated. The most natural,
perhaps the safest choice, would be of the last, well fenced from
chance of again stiffening into the perpendicular; and perhaps
enriched by some mingling of decorative elements from the ex-
quisite decorated Gothic of France, of which, in such cases, it
would be needful to accept some well known examples, as the
North door of Rouen and the church of St. Urbain at Troyes, for
final and limiting authorities on the side of decoration.

VIII. It is almost impossible for us to conceive, in our present
state of doubt and ignorance, the sudden dawn of intelligence and
fancy, the rapidly increasing sense of power and facility, and, in
its proper sense, of Freedom, which such wholesome restraint would
instantly cause throughout the whole circle of the arts. Freed
from the agitation and embarrassment of that liberty of choice
which is the cause of half the discomforts of the world; freed
from the accompanying necessity of studying all past, present, or
even possible styles; and enabled, by concentration of individual,
and co-operation of multitudinous energy, to penetrate into the
uttermost secrets of the adopted style, the architect would find
his whole understanding enlarged, his practical knowledge certain
and ready to hand, and his imagination playful and vigorous,
as a child's would be within a walled garden, who would sit down
and shudder if he were left free in a fenceless plain. How
many and how bright would be the results in every direction of
interest, not to the arts merely, but to national happiness and
virtue, it would be as difficult to preconceive as it would seem
extravagant to state: but the first, perhaps the least, of them

THE LAMP OF OBEDIENCE.

would be an increased sense of fellowship among ourselves, a
cementing of every patriotic bond of union, a proud and happy
recognition of our affection for and sympathy with each other,
and our willingness in all things to submit ourselves to every
law that could advance the interest of the community; a barrier,
also, the best conceivable, to the unhappy rivalry of the upper and
middle classes, in houses, furniture, and establishments; and even
a check to much of what is as vain as it is painful in the oppo-
sitions of religious parties respecting matters of ritual. These, I
say, would be the first consequences. Economy increased tenfold,
as it would be by the simplicity of practice; domestic comforts
uninterfered with by the caprice and mistakes of architects igno-
rant of the capacities of the styles they use, and all the symmetry
and sightliness of our harmonized streets and public buildings,
are things of slighter account in the catalogue of benefits. But
it would be mere enthusiasm to endeavour to trace them farther.
I have suffered myself too long to indulge in the speculative state-
ment of requirements which perhaps we have more immediate and
more serious work than to supply, and of feelings which it may
be only contingently in our power to recover. I should be unjustly
thought unaware of the difficulty of what I have proposed, or of
the unimportance of the whole subject as compared with many
which are brought home to our interests and fixed upon our con-
sideration by the wild course of the present century. But of diffi-
culty and of importance it is for others to judge. I have limited
myself to the simple statement of what, if we desire to have archi-
tecture, we MUST primarily endeavour to feel and do: but then it
may not be desirable for us to have architecture at all. There
are many who feel it to be so; many who sacrifice much to that
end; and I am sorry to see their energies wasted and their lives dis-
quieted in vain. I have stated, therefore, the only ways in which
that end is attainable, without venturing even to express an opinion
as to its real desirableness. I have an opinion, and the zeal with
which I have spoken may sometimes have betrayed it, but I hold to
it with no confidence. I know too well the undue importance which
the study that every man follows must assume in his own eyes, to

O

194

THE LAMP OF OBEDIENCE.

trust my own impressions of the dignity of that of Architecture;
and yet I think I cannot be utterly mistaken in regarding it as at
least useful in the sense of a National employment. I am confirmed
in this impression by what I see passing among the states of
Europe at this instant. All the horror, distress, and tumult
which oppress the foreign nations, are traceable, among the other
secondary causes through which God is working out His will upon
them, to the simple one of their not having enough to do. I am
not blind to the distress among their operatives; nor do I deny
the nearer and visibly active causes of the movement: the reck-
lessness of villany in the leaders of revolt, the absence of common
moral principle in the upper classes, and of common courage and
honesty in the heads of governments. But these causes themselves
are ultimately traceable to a deeper and simpler one: the reckless-
ness of the demagogue, the immorality of the middle class,
and the effeminacy and treachery of the noble, are traceable in
all these nations to the commonest and most fruitful cause of
calamity in households — idleness. We think too much in our
benevolent efforts, more multiplied and more vain day by day, of
bettering men by giving them advice and instruction. There are
few who will take either: the chief thing they need is occupation.
I do not mean work in the sense of bread,—I mean work in the
sense of mental interest; for those who either are placed above the
necessity of labour for their bread, or who will not work although
they should. There is a vast quantity of idle energy among
European nations at this time, which ought to go into handicrafts;
there are multitudes of idle semi-gentlemen who ought to be shoe-
makers and carpenters; but since they will not be these so long as
they can help it, the business of the philanthropist is to find them
some other employment than disturbing governments. It is of no
use to tell them they are fools, and that they will only make them-
selves miserable in the end as well as others: if they have nothing
else to do, they will do mischief; and the man who will not work,
and who has no means of intellectual pleasure, is as sure to become
an instrument of evil as if he had sold himself bodily to Satan. I
have myself seen enough of the daily life of the young educated

THE LAMP OF OBEDIENCE.

men of France and Italy, to account for, as it deserves, the deepest
national suffering and degradation; and though, for the most
part, our commerce and our natural habits of industry preserve
us from a similar paralysis, yet it would be wise to consider
whether the forms of employment which we chiefly adopt or pro-
mote, are as well calculated as they might be to improve and
elevate us.

We have just spent, for instance, a hundred and fifty mil-
lions, with which we have paid men for digging ground from one
place and depositing it in another. We have formed a large class
of men, the railway navvies, especially reckless, unmanageable,
and dangerous. We have maintained besides (let us state the
benefits as fairly as possible) a number of iron founders in an
unhealthy and painful employment; we have developed (this is
at least good) a very large amount of mechanical ingenuity; and
we have, in fine, attained the power of going fast from one place
to another. Meantime we have had no mental interest or concern
ourselves in the operations we have set on foot, but have been
left to the usual vanities and cares of our existence. Suppose,
on the other hand, that we had employed the same sums in
building beautiful houses and churches. We should have main-
tained the same number of men, not in driving wheelbarrows, but
in a distinctly technical, if not intellectual, employment; and
those who were more intelligent among them would have been
especially happy in that employment, as having room in it for
the developement of their fancy, and being directed by it to that
observation of beauty which, associated with the pursuit of
natural science, at present forms the enjoyment of many of the
more intelligent manufacturing operatives. Of mechanical in-
genuity, there is, I imagine, at least as much required to build a
cathedral as to cut a tunnel or contrive a locomotive: we should,
therefore, have developed as much science, while the artistical
element of intellect would have been added to the gain. Mean-
time we should ourselves have been made happier and wiser by
the interest we should have taken in the work with which we were
personally concerned; and when all was done, instead of the very

02

196

THE LAMP OF OBEDIENCE.

doubtful advantage of the power of going fast from place to place,
we should have had the certain advantage of increased pleasure
in stopping at home.

IX. There are many other less capacious, but more constant,
channels of expenditure, quite as disputable in their beneficial
tendency; and we are, perhaps, hardly enough in the habit of
inquiring, with respect to any particular form of luxury or any
customary appliance of life, whether the kind of employment it
gives to the operative or the dependant be as healthy and fitting
an employment as we might otherwise provide for him. It is
not enough to find men absolute subsistence; we should think of
the manner of life which our demands necessitate; and endeavour,
as far as may be, to make all our needs such as may, in the supply
of them, raise, as well as feed, the poor. It is far better to give
work which is above the men, than to educate the men to be
above their work. It may be doubted, for instance, whether the
habits of luxury, which necessitate a large train of men servants,
be a wholesome form of expenditure; and more, whether the
pursuits which have a tendency to enlarge the class of the jockey
and the groom be a philanthropic form of mental occupation. So
again, consider the large number of men whose lives are employed
by civilized nations in cutting facets upon jewels. There is
much dexterity of hand, patience, and ingenuity thus bestowed,
which are simply burned out in the blaze of the tiara, without, so
far as I see, bestowing any pleasure upon those who wear or who
behold, at all compensatory for the loss of life and mental power
which are involved in the employment of the workman. He
would be far more healthily and happily sustained by being set
to carve stone; certain qualities of his mind, for which there is
no room in his present occupation, would develope themselves in
the nobler; and I believe that most women would, in the end,
prefer the pleasure of having built a church, or contributed to
the adornment of a cathedral, to the pride of bearing a certain
quantity of adamant on their foreheads.

X. I could pursue this subject willingly, but I have some
strange notions about it which it is perhaps wiser not loosely to

THE LAMP OF OBEDIENCE.

set down. I content myself with finally reasserting, what has
been throughout the burden of the preceding pages, that what-
ever rank, or whatever importance, may be attributed or attached
to their immediate subject, there is at least some value in the
analogies with which its pursuit has presented us, and some in-
struction in the frequent reference of its commonest necessities
to the mighty laws, in the sense and scope of which all men are
Builders, whom every hour sees laying the stubble or the stone.

I have paused, not once nor twice, as I wrote, and often have
checked the course of what might otherwise have been impor-
tunate persuasion, as the thought has crossed me, how soon all
Architecture may be vain, except that which is not made with
hands. There is something ominous in the light which has
enabled us to look back with disdain upon the ages among whose
lovely vestiges we have been wandering. I could smile when
I hear the hopeful exultation of many, at the new reach of
worldly science, and vigour of worldly effort; as if we were
again at the beginning of days. There is thunder on the hori-
zon as well as dawn. The sun was risen upon the earth when
Lot entered into Zoar.

o 3

NOTES.

1. page 13. "*With the idolatrous Egyptian.*" — The probability is indeed slight in comparison, but it *is* a probability nevertheless, and one which is daily on the increase. I trust that I may not be thought to underrate the danger of such sympathy, though I speak lightly of the chance of it. I have confidence in the central religious body of the English and Scottish people, as being not only untainted with Romanism, but immovably adverse to it: and, however strangely and swiftly the heresy of the Protestant and victory of the Papist may seem to be extending among us, I feel assured that there are barriers in the living faith of this nation which neither can overpass. Yet this confidence is only in the ultimate faithfulness of a few, not in the security of the nation from the sin and the punishment of partial apostasy. Both have, indeed, in some sort, been committed and suffered already; and, in expressing my belief of the close connection of the distress and burden which the mass of the people at present sustain, with the encouragement which, in various directions, has been given to the Papist, do not let me be called superstitious or irrational. No man was ever more inclined than I, both by natural disposition and by many ties of early association, to a sympathy with the principles and forms of the Romanist Church; and there is much in its discipline which conscientiously, as well as sympathetically, I could love and advocate. But, in confessing this strength of affectionate prejudice, surely I vindicate more respect for my firmly expressed belief, that the entire doctrine and system of that Church is in the fullest sense anti-Christian; that its lying and idolatrous Power is the darkest plague that ever held commission to hurt the Earth; that all those yearnings for unity and fellowship, and common obedience, which have been the root of our late heresies, are as false in their grounds as fatal in their termination; that we never can have the remotest fellowship with the utterers of that fearful Falsehood, and live; that we have nothing to look to from them but treacherous hostility; and that, exactly in proportion to the sternness of our separation

200

NOTES.

from them, will be not only the spiritual but the temporal blessings granted by God to this country. How close has been the correspondence hitherto between the degree of resistance to Romanism marked in our national acts, and the honour with which those acts have been crowned, has been sufficiently proved in a short essay by a writer whose investigations into the influence of Religion upon the fate of Nations have been singularly earnest and successful—a writer with whom I faithfully and firmly believe that England will never be prosperous again, that the honour of her arms will be tarnished, and her commerce blighted, and her national character degraded, until the Romanist is expelled from the place which has impiously been conceded to him among her legislators. "Whatever be the lot of those to whom error is an inheritance, woe be to the man and to the people to whom it is an adoption. If England, free above all other nations, sustained amidst the trials which have covered Europe, before her eyes, with burning and slaughter, and enlightened by the fullest knowledge of divine truth, shall refuse fidelity to the compact by which those matchless privileges have been given, her condemnation will not linger. She has already made one step full of danger. She has committed the capital error of mistaking that for a purely political question which was a purely religious one. Her foot already hangs over the edge of the precipice. It must be retracted, or the empire is but a name. In the clouds and darkness which seem to be deepening on all human policy—in the gathering tumults of Europe, and the feverish discontents at home—it may be even difficult to discern where the power yet lives to erect the fallen majesty of the constitution once more. But there are mighty means in sincerity; and if no miracle was ever wrought for the faithless and despairing, the country that will help itself will never be left destitute of the help of Heaven." (Historical Essays, by the Rev. Dr. Croly, 1842.) The first of these essays, "England the Fortress of Christianity," I most earnestly recommend to the meditation of those who doubt that a special punishment is inflicted by the Deity upon all national crime, and perhaps, of all such crime, most instantly upon the betrayal, on the part of England, of the truth and faith with which she has been entrusted.

2. p. 17. "*Not the gift, but the giving.*"— Much attention has lately been directed to the subject of religious art, and we are now in possession of all kinds of interpretations and classifications of it, and of the leading facts of its history. But the greatest question of all connected with it remains entirely unanswered, What good did it do to real religion? There is no subject into which I should so much rejoice to see a serious and con-

NOTES.

scientious inquiry instituted as this; an inquiry, undertaken neither in artistical enthusiasm nor in monkish sympathy, but dogged, merciless, and fearless. I love the religious art of Italy as well as most men, but there is a wide difference between loving it as a manifestation of individual feeling, and looking to it as an instrument of popular benefit. I have not knowledge enough to form even the shadow of an opinion on this latter point, and I should be most grateful to any one who would put it in my power to do so. There are, as it seems to me, three distinct questions to be considered: the first, What has been the effect of external splendour on the genuineness and earnestness of Christian worship? the second, What the use of pictorial or sculptural representation in the communication of Christian historical knowledge, or excitement of affectionate imagination? the third, What the influence of the practice of religious art on the life of the artist?

In answering these inquiries, we should have to consider separately every collateral influence and circumstance; and, by a most subtle analysis, to eliminate the real effect of art from the effects of the abuses with which it was associated. This could be done only by a Christian; not a man who would fall in love with a sweet colour or sweet expression, but who would look for true faith and consistent life as the object of all. It never has been done yet, and the question remains a subject of vain and endless contention between parties of opposite prejudices and temperaments.

3. p. 18. "To the concealment of what is really good or great."—I have often been surprised at the supposition that Romanism, in its present condition, could either patronise art, or profit by it. The noble painted windows of St. Maclou at Rouen, and many other churches in France, are entirely blocked up behind the altars by the erection of huge gilded wooden sunbeams, with interspersed cherubs.

4. p. 25. "With different pattern of traceries in each."—I have certainly not examined the seven hundred and four traceries (four to each niche) so as to be sure that none are alike; but they have the aspect of continual variation, and even the roses of the pendants of the small groined niche roofs are all of different patterns.

5. p. 35. "Its flamboyant traceries of the last and most degraded forms."—They are noticed by Mr. Whewell as forming the figure of the fleur-de-lis, always a mark, when in tracery bars, of the most debased flamboyant. It occurs in the central tower of Baycux, very richly in the buttresses of St. Gervais at Falaise, and in the small niches of some of the domestic buildings.

NOTES.

rules of good architecture, not only because iron is corruptible by rust, but
because it is fallacious, having unequal veins in the metal, some places of
the same bar being three times stronger than others, and yet all sound to
appearance." (Survey of Salisbury Cathedral in 1668, by Sir C. Wren.)
For my own part, I think it better work to bind a tower with iron, than to
support a false dome by a brick pyramid.

9. p. 53. Plate 3. In this plate, figures 4, 5, and 6, are glazed windows, but fig. 2. is the open light of a belfry tower, and figures 1. and 3. are in triforia, the latter also occurring filled, on the central tower of Coutances.

10. p. 87. "Ornaments of the transept towers of Rouen."—The reader cannot but observe the agreeableness, as a mere arrangement of shade, which especially belongs to the "sacred trefoil." I do not think that the element of foliation has been enough insisted upon in its intimate relations with the power of Gothic work. If I were asked what was the most distinctive feature of its perfect style, I should say the Trefoil. It is the very soul of it; and I think the loveliest Gothic is always formed upon simple and bold tracings of it, taking place between the blank lancet arch on the one hand, and the overcharged cinquefoiled arch on the other.

11. p. 88. "And levelled cusps of stone."—The plate represents one of the lateral windows of the third story of the Palazzo Foscari. It was drawn from the opposite side of the Grand Canal, and the lines of its traceries are therefore given as they appear in somewhat distant effect. It shows only segments of the characteristic quatrefoils of the central windows. I found by measurement their construction exceedingly simple. Four circles are drawn in contact within the large circle. Two tangential lines are then drawn to each opposite pair, enclosing the four circles in a hollow cross. An inner circle struck through the intersections of the circles by the tangents, truncates the cusps.

12. p. 118. "*Into vertical equal parts*."—Not absolutely so. There are variations partly accidental, (or at least compelled by the architect's effort to recover the vertical,) between the sides of the stories; and the upper and lower story are taller than the rest. There is, however, an apparent equality between five out of the eight tiers.

13. p. 127. "Never paint a column with vertical lines."—It should be observed, however, that any pattern which gives opponent lines in its parts, may be arranged on lines parallel with the main structure. Thus, rows of

MR. RUSKIN'S RECENT WORKS.

I.

THE STONES OF VENICE. By JOHN RUSKIN, Esq., Author of "Modern Painters," "Seven Lamps of Architecture," &c. Now complete, in Three Volumes, imperial 8vo., with 53 Plates, and numerous Woodcuts, drawn by the Author. Price 5s. 15s. 6d., in embossed cloth, with top edge gilt.

*Each Volume may be had separately, viz.—*

VOL. I.—THE FOUNDATIONS, with 21 Plates. Price 2l. 2s.

VOL. II.—THE SEA STORES, with 20 Plates. Price 2l. 2s.

VOL. III.—THE FALL, with 12 Plates. Price 1l. 1s. 6d.

"This book is one which, perhaps, no other man could have written, and one for which the world ought to be and will be thankful. It is in the highest degree eloquent, acute, stimulating to thought, and fertile in suggestion. It shows a power of practical criticism which, when fixed on a definite object, nothing absurd or evil can withstand; and a power of appreciation which has restored treasures of beauty to mankind. It will, we are convinced, elevate taste and intellect, raise the tone of moral feeling, kindle benevolence towards men, and increase the love and fear of God."—*Times*.

"The 'Stones of Venice' is the production of an earnest, religious, progressive, and informed mind. The author of this essay on architecture has condensed into it a poetic apprehension, the fruit of awe of God, and delight in nature,—a knowledge, love, and just estimate of art,—a holding fast to fact and repudiation of hearsay,—an historic breadth, and a fearless challenge of existing social problems, whose union we know not where to find paralleled."—*Spectator*.

"One of the most important works on æsthetics ever published in this country; and which not only equals in profundity any single work put forth in modern times upon art, but surpasses in importance any that has heretofore been written upon the subject; inasmuch as the writer is gifted with the rare tact to make profound truths plain to common understandings."—*Daily News*.

"No one who has studied art in Venice will go through this book without such pleasure as belongs to a revival of some of his warmest admirations, and the refreshment of his most delicious associations. It is full of fine things, and of true things."—*Athenæum*.

"This work shows that Mr. Ruskin's powers of composition and criticism were never in greater force. His eloquence is as rich, his enthusiasm as hearty, his sympathy for all that is high and noble in art as keen as ever. The book, like all he writes, is manly and high-minded, and, as usual, keeps the attention alive to the last."—*Guardian*.

"The reputation which Mr. Ruskin has earned by his former works will probably receive a great accession of lustre from the 'Stones of Venice.' This work, as we had a right to expect from the age and evidently growing powers of the author, may be justly described as his most valuable performance, and fitted to become the most popular of all his productions."—*British Quarterly Review*.

"No one who has visited Venice can read this book without having a richer glow thrown over his remembrances of that city; and for those who have not, Mr. Ruskin paints it with a firmness of outline and vividness of colouring that will bring it before the imagination with the force of reality."—*Literary Gazette*.

"The whole is eloquent and thoughtful, and creative of thought in others. This book is a noble innovation upon the old dead talk of architects, and amateurs in architecture."—*Examiner*.

LONDON: SMITH, ELDER, & Co., 65, Cornhill.

MR. RUSKIN'S RECENT WORKS.

II.

LECTURES on ARCHITECTURE and PAINTING. By JOHN RUSKIN, Esq., Author of "Modern Painters," "Seven Lamps of Architecture," "Stones of Venice," &c. With 15 Plates, drawn by the Author. Second Edition. One Volume, crown 8vo., price 8s. 6d. cloth.

"Mr. Ruskin's Lectures—eloquent, graphic, and impassioned—exposing and ridiculing some of the vices of our present system of building, and exciting his hearers by strong motives of duty and pleasure to attend to architecture—are very successful; and, like his former works, will command public attention. His style is terse, vigorous, and sparkling, and his book is both animated and attractive. It will help to make us ashamed of our present architecture, and help forward architectural reform. By bringing principles of architecture under discussion, Mr. Ruskin is doing the whole community good service."—*Economist*.

"It is superfluous to say of any work by Mr. Ruskin on Art, that it contains matter deserving of serious attention, presented in a manner that is original and impressive. * * * We conceive it to be impossible that any intelligent persons could listen to the Lectures, however they might differ from the judgments asserted and from the general propositions laid down, without an elevating influence and an aroused enthusiasm, which are often more useful in producing true taste and correct views of art than the soundest historical generalizations and the most learned technical criticism in which the heart and the senses own no interest."—*Spectator*.

"Like all the Author's writings, these Lectures are full of originality, of earnest and honest thought, of manly protest against conventionalism, and of a sound, healthy morality. You may disagree with Mr. Ruskin if you like, but it is impossible not to admire him; he is so suggestive. * * * It is impossible for a thoughtful man to read his works without delight and gratitude. Everybody interested in art should get these Lectures."—*Daily News*.

III.

NOTES on some of the PRINCIPAL PICTURES, exhibited in the Rooms of the Royal Academy, 1855. By the Author of "Modern Painters." Second Edition. 8vo., price 6d.

IV.

The OPENING of the CRYSTAL PALACE, considered in some of its Relations to the Prospects of Art. By JOHN RUSKIN, M.A. 8vo., price 1s.

"This is an earnest, eloquent, and very characteristic appeal for the preservation of the ancient monuments of Gothic Architecture, and their rescue from the hands of those well-intentioned 'restorers' who not only preserve, but imitate the old work, and thus, in Mr. Ruskin's opinion destroy the character, effect, and value of the building."—*English Churchman*.