ENGLISH CHURCH WOODWORK.* [Collar:Nies:ran.]
Massas. HOWARD AND CRossr.EY have respectively written and illustrated a very scholarly and inspiring book on mediaeval ecclesi. astical wood-carving. It is an altogether admirable book, except for the wilful way in which it fails to make good its title. Though admittedly only concerning themselves with the work of some two centuries, roughly 1300 to 1500, the authors have the hardihood to call it English Church Woodwork. That this epoch produced a truly pro. digious amount of very exquisite yet virile work is beyond dispute, but it cannot claim thus airily to be fully representative of English church woodwork, as though all the glory had departed at the close of the fifteenth century, and as though there had never been a Wren, a Hawksmoor, or a Gibbons. What if one were to order a book entitled English Military Costume, and were then to find that it devoted itself exclusively to describing and illustrating the dress and accoutrements of the Crusaders ? It might be a most pro- found and illuminating treatise, and yet not at all what one bar- gained for—an impostor with high pretences, a fraud. Now as there can be no possible question of a fraud in the case of this woodwork book, it being quite patently a labour of love, one can but suppose that the authors do honestly believe their own selected phase of plastic art to be the one true and only, all later periods being decadent, all later styles debased. It is a grievous thing to find the commercial " Church Furnishing " shops thus confirmed in their pernicious conventions and delusions by the invidious eclecticism of such distinguished authorities as Mr. Howard and Mr. Crossley. It is doubly grievous because they quite clearly hold the " Church Pew and Memorial Merchant " in the pious detestation proper to decent men, and would be the last to give him the slightest intentional support, moral or other. Their book, indeed, drives not a few shrewd nails into his cheap-and-nasty coffin. But to the vulgar, still, to be " ecclesiastical " is necessarily to be " Gothic," St. Peter's and St. Paul's notwithstanding. Conversely, and very curiously, anything professing to be " Gothic " is ipso facto deemed
to be religious," " Christian," " ecclesiastical," and decently orthodox ; for all the world as though there were some hidden magic in mediaeval mannerisms—as though the wearing of trunk- hose and a baldric were somehow conducive, if not indeed essential, to the leading of a Christian life. They would be immeasurably shocked by a Chippendale Bishop's throne, whilst blithely accept- ing the Bishop's tailoring. Both are, however, in the fashion of the eighteenth century, and why a handsome claw-and-ball mahogany armchair should be more shocking and un-Christian than the gaitered and aproned Bishop who sits in it, is not very obvious. The truth is that such taste as the masses possess is still debauched and tainted by the illiberal fallacies of John Ruskin. God rest his noble, fanatical soul ! May he be spared all knowledge of what Tottenham Court Road and Wardour Street do in his thus dishonoured name.
Would you build or furnish a church indeed " religiously " ? Then build or furnish as honestly seems best to you, as seems most beautiful and reasonable—not to an arbitrary and stereotyped formula that may mean nothing to you beyond a supposed guaran- tee of orthodox " good form." If your taste is uninformed, the result may well be artistically unfortunate, but at least it will not be apathetically, frigidly undevout. There is no inherent occult virtue in a pointed window, a vaulted ceiling, or a Gothic pew. If these things• do not seem the best and most beautiful possible of their several kinds to you, in using them you are not building religiously —you are merely the poor-spirited follower of an unreasonable convention. If you chance to be a genuine Gothic revivalist, a true mediaeval enthusiast, well and good; you will express yourself and your aspirations naturally, and therefore best, in the mediaeval manner. But if you have classic tastes and leanings in your home, or are a thoroughgoing modernist, why (literally) in Heaven's name should you fly off to an archaic medium quite alien to your natural habit for the expression of what should be the most spon- taneous and unaffected thing about you—your religion ? With a congenital inability to perceive much merit in Futurism, the writer would none the less behold a Futurist reredos with eagerness and delight, taking it as a sign that some one had given to God what he himself believed to be the most beautiful, and not merely what
's English Church Woodruork. By F, E Howard and F. H. Crossley London: B. T. Botsford. Ms. neLl
some one else had assured him was " proper," " orthodox," or " ecclesiastical."
But to return to the book. Having said what has been said, one need only add that as a guide to and illustrator of mediaeval English church woodwork it is superlatively good. The authors take the country county by county, noting the curious local varia- tions and characteristics of both design and construction peculiar to different districts, tracing evolution and development, and illus- trating their thesis with a truly wonderful collection of the most admirable photographs. The text is full of research—gleaned in- formatton presented in stimulating form :- " In \Vales the churches are humble, and certainly not cal- culated to catch the eye of the tourist. They are indeed utterly insignificant amid their solemn surroundings of great hills. Very few visitors ever enter them, but, if by chance they do so, they cannot fail to be impressed with the skill and devotion of those mediaeval wood-carvers who could make even these mean structures glorious with rood-lofts such as those of Llananno or Llanrwst."
" Wales presents a very interesting problem. Although possess- ing few natural resources, and at no time particularly prosperous, it produced much work which surpasses that of many of the wealthy English counties."
" It cannot be too strongly emphasised that fine woodwork, though now found in comparatively few churches, was once possessed by all. Every church had its pews, its rood-loft, its font-cover - and there is no reason to suppose that those which have survived have escaped destruction because of their exceptional beauty. Indeed the reverse is far more likely."
" Then again the methods of the mediaeval craftsman were so human, so full of energy, so devoid of effort. Never having seen the results of machine labour, he had no desire to emulate it. Minute accuracy and exact symmetry were not esteemed as virtues, nor was smoothness and regularity of surface regarded as an end in itself. If one cares to examine a bit of mediaeval tracery, one will generally find the remains of the setting out lines deeply scored mto the wood, and a glimpse will be obtained into the actual pro- cesses employed. The carving is true product of the chisel and the gauge, not a reproduction in wood of a clay original model."
" Though figure sculpture was not a strong point of the English woodworker, he excelled in the comic element, without which much mediaeval carving would be almost too pretty. The value of the grotesque can only be appreciated fully when one contemplates examples of Victorian restorations in which mediaeval grotesques, thought by those supersensitive souls to be too coarse for a place of worship, have been superseded by innocuous angels. There is no contrast, and just as it appears to take good and bad men to make a world, so the beautiful and the grotesque must be combined to produce woodwork with the charm of that of the Middle Ages. Not that mediaeval grotesques symbolise evil. Many of them are the most engaging beasties and devils, possessing in a high degree the beauty of extreme ugliness, while many of the most hideous were employed to teach the most moral stories."
" The usually accepted idea that. in these far-off days the wood- carver took infinite care and pains over his work, while the modern worker is slapdash and inclined to jerry-build, is absolutely at variance with the facts. The mediaeval worker always had an eye to the general effect, and cared very little for open joints, twisted timbers, irregular setting out, and rough surface, provided the com- plete work was strong in construction and beautiful in design. The average modern craftsman, working blindly from the design of the architect, gives his whole mind to producing a perfect regularity both of setting out and surface."
" It is the hope of the authors that this book may be of real service to fellow-enthusiasts ; that it may lead many to whom mediaeval art is but a name to love and appreciate it ' • that the craftsman of to-day may pore over the illustrations and be humble ; and that it may serve as a check to the unnatural lust for destruction, or the more reasonable but almost equally harmful passion for over-
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