BOOKS.

ausaix's SEVEN LAMPS.* Joan Russ" dint " the Oxford Graduate," has made people, even in England, think upon the subject of art—think artistically rather than didactically ; and in that respect he has not only done much to improve the degenerate condition of our artists, by reviving in them something of the religion of art, but has prepared a very large portion of the publics to receive impressions—has dug up the hard-bound soiL He has indeed

gone even considerably beyond, in awakening the moral feelings which it is the province of art to keep alive.

Mr. Ruskin has done this in spite of serious faults, one of which makes him fail in ascribing to art its true function. When he is explaining " the Lamp of Memory," he lays far too much stress on the didactically.. historical influence of architecture, or what Mr. Ferguson would call its "phonetic" element, and misses any direct statement of the mode in which art does operate on the mind. He has done much the same in his larger but uncompleted work, the Modern Painters. Indeed, few men carry their own personal peculiarities so obviously into their writing, and in few are the results to be so clearly measured by the natural capacity. Mr. Ruskin's personal qualities—his zeal, his generosity, his intense love of art—contribute powerfully to the influence whicn he has acquired; make his books read, and, striking test! make them sell. His foibles come out proportionately; though at the first utterance of the words we may surprise his warmest admirers by avowing what we take to be his chief faults—deficiency of the purely reasoning faculty, and infirmity of temper. With the keenest eye for observation, he describes so beautifully that he seems to paint with his pen ; he can impart what he feels ; and can describe with corresponding distinctness the work of the artist ; but, for want of a sufficiently sustained or searching power of analysis, he fails to elicit the true reasoning of the doctrine that he inculcates. He conveys the spirit and he can criticize the practice of art, but falls short in expounding the theory.

This natural want is increased by the other weakness—infirmity of temper; of which some remarkable traces appear scattered through the volume before us—in point-blank though apparently unconscious confes- sions of the singular degree to which his temper fails. He seems to pre- sume that what is true of himself in this respect is true of others gene- rally ; and hence he uses general terms. He admits that bad ornaments in churches "are serious obstacles to the repose of mind and temper which should precede devotional exercises." "The traveller who desires to correct the errors of his judgment, necessitated by inequalities of tem- per . . . has no other resource than to wait for the calm verdict of in- terposing years." Mr. Ruskin never looks up to the Col de Balme, from Chamouni, "without a violent feeling of provocation against its hospitable little cabin," whose bright white walls mar the effect of eleva- tion. One of "the strange and evil tendencies of the present day," at

which he scolds, is the decoration of the railway station.

"Now, if there be any place in the world in which people are deprived of that portion of temper and discretion which are necessary to the contemplation of beauty, it is there. It is the very temple of discomfort, and the only charity that the builder can extend to us is to show us, plainly as may be, how soonest to escape from it. The whole system of railroad travelling is addressed to people who, being in a hurry, are therefore, for the time being, miserable. No one would travel in that manner who could help it—who had time to go leisurely over hills and between hedges, instead of through tunnels and between banks: at least those who would, have no sense of beauty so acute as that we need consult it at the station. The railroad is in all its relations a matter of earnest business, to be got through as soon as possible. It transmutes a man from a traveller into a living parcel. For the time he has parted with the nobler characteristics of his hu- manity for the sake of a planetary power of locomotion. Do not ask him to ad- mire anything. You might as well ask the wind. Carry him safely, dismiss him soon: he will thank you for nothing else. All attempts to please him in any other way are mere mockery, and insults to the things by which you endeavour to do so. There never was more flagrant or impertinent folly than the smallest por- tion of ornament in anything concerned with railroads or near them. Keep them out of the way, take them through the ugliest country you can find, confess them the miserable things they are, and spend, nothing upon them but for safety and speed."

This is eloquent writing, but hardly philosophic, and very doubtful in the truth of its main point. We have the more dwelt upon these singu- larly exhibited traits of a personal defect, because we conjecture it to be one which haunts Mr. Ruskin through all the sterner portions of his work, greatly cramps the exercise of his faculties, and diminishes his in- fluence. We would not have him diminish his sensitiveness, but rather cultivate his philosophic faculty of penetration to the truth of things, and take heart of grace to draw toleration from a stronger faith in the su- premacy of the laws which be serves. A man in a fume is not in a mood to philosophize upon the rationale of art.

It appears that Mr. Ruskin has put forth the result of some collateral reflections on the subject of architecture while he proceeds in preparing the third volume of his larger work ; foreshadowed, we presume, under the characteristic title of "The Stones of Venice." The present is a smaller book, full of his animation, keen perceptions, and excellent de- scription; but it is less complete, not only because it is less full of illus- trative matter, but also because its principles are less definitely and sub- stantially elaborated than those expounded in the Modern Painters.

The book consists of a preface, an introduction, and seven chapters describing the "seven lamps of architecture "; which are the lamps of

Sacrifice Truth, Power' Beauty, Life, Memory, and Obedience. If there is something fantastical in the naming of the chapters, the ideas attached to the names are in some instances not less fantastical; and even making an allowance for the licence of a fanciful metaphor, the idea is not always warranted by-the author's explanation of it. The " lamps" are lights to guide the spirit of the architect. "Sacrifice" is to make him see the ne- 4. The Seven Lamps of Architecture. By John Ruskin, Author of" Modem Painters." With Illustrations, drawn and etched by the Author. Published by Smith, Elder, and Co.

cessity of not. working for art in a spirit of trade; not stinting his costly materials, nor thinking that labour bestowed on a great work is not worth much as labour; labour as a sacrifice of love or cost as a tribute to the purpose of a worshipful building. "Truth" Mr. Ruskin deals with in a material and literal sense especially objecting to falsification of materials. "Power" is vaguely defined; but you may gather that the writer holds to the obvious doctrine, that it consists in the ability of the architect to place, dispose, and uphold large masses or skilfully poised forms. The power of constructing an edifice so as to produce a peculiar effect on the mind, is less specifically inculcated in this particular chapter than it is in other parts of the book ; a characteristic preference of a diffused for a definite form of expression. It is a further illustration of the writer's tendency, that he began his strictures on art with landscape, next takes architecture, and postpones figure-painting till the last; although it is in the design of human form and action that the prin- ciples of art attain their highest and most definite shape. The lamp of "Beauty" is left undefined, so far as the writer refers you to another work of his; but he leaves you the alternative of taking the sense of the beautiful as an instinctive perception : he also describes illustrations of the beautiful, and sets up a truly just and lovely standard in the Campa- nile of Giotto at Florence. "Life" is the impress of organic life bestowed upon architecture, in the shape of intelligent labour ; also in that of original design—that is, design which is derived by the living action of the archi- tect's mind, not mechanically got up ; and in the expression of organic life where that forms part of the ornament. We should be inclined, however, to define the "life" proper to architecture itself as consisting in whatever suggested the unceasing operation of natural laws—the life of inorganic nature—its sympathy with the active forces that rule it—gravi- tation, resistance, equipoise, the combating of light by darkness the crys- tallization of inorganic forms into symmetrical forms, and the like; so that a living work of architecture is one that nakedly suggests the ideas of those laws now before you for ever in active work. As that is the life of inorganic nature, so that is the life of inorganic art. The lamp of "Memory," Mr. Ruskin teaches, should cast upon architecture the light of the age in which a building is erected, and through that shine to after ages. The lamp of "Obedience" should most especially guide the archi- tect to adopt the style of his time, so that each day should have its own prevalent style. This is very characteristically and pithily set forth in one arrogant and desponding passage.

"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 go- vernment, 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 pas- eibility 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." As if every age must not advance to the next by the action of an indi- vidual stepping forth from the multitude ! These several lamps are applied hortatively: the consequences of working by their light, or without them in darkness, are shown by examples from existent build- ings; and the text is illustrated by etchings, as rough and vigorous, but not so lucid. To follow out any one chapter in its mode of elaboration we find to be impossible, from the discursive and almost colloquial style of arrangement. in each lecture. We must therefore close the present notice of a very striking and attractive work with a few scattered speci- mens of the mode in which Mr. Ruskin applies his lamps.

THE LIGHT FROM THE LAMP OF SACRIFICE.

Touching the false representation of material, the question is infinitely more simple, and the law more sweeping; all such imitations are utterly base and in- admissible. It is melancholy to think of the time and expense lost in marbling the shop-fronts of London alone, and of the waste of our resources in absolute vanities, in things about which no mortal cares, by which no eye is ever arrested nnIess painfully, and which do not add one whit to comfort or cleanliness, or even to that great object of commercial art—conspicuousness. But in architecture of a higher rank, how mach more is it to be condemned! I have made it a role in the present work not to blame specifically; but I may, perhaps, be permitted, while I express my sincere admiration of the very noble entrance and general ar- chitecture of the British Museum, to express also my regret that the noble granite foundation of the staircase should be mocked at its landing by an imitation, the more blameable because tolerably successful. The only effect of it is to east a suspicion upon the true stones below, and upon every bit of granite afterwards

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encountered. One feels a doubt after t of the honesty of Memnon himself. But even this, however derogatory to the noble architecture around it, is less painful than the want of feeling with which in our cheap modern churches we suffer the wall-decorator to erect about the altar frameworks and pediments daubed with mottled colour, and to dye in the same fashion such skeletons or caricatures of columns as may emerge above the pews: this is not merely bad taste—it is no unimportant or excusable error which brings even these shadows of vanity and falsehood into the house of prayer. The first condition which just feeling re- quires in church furniture is that it should be simple and unaffected, not, fictitious nor tawdry. It may not be in our power to make it beautiful, but let it at least be pure; and if we cannot permit much to the architect, do not let us permit any- thing to the upholsterer.

TRUTH SMOTIIEB.ED BY DECEPTIVE INVOLUTIONS OF MOULDINGS.

It would be too painful a task to follow further the caricatures of form' and eccentricities of treatment, which grew out of this single abuse—the flattened arch, the shrunken pillar, the lifeless ornament, the liny moulding, the distorted and extravagant foliation, until the time came when over these wrecks and rem- Rants, deprived of all unity and principle, rose the foul torrent of the renaissance, and swept them all away. So fell the great dynasty of medireval architecture. It was because it had lost its own strength, and disobeyed its own laws—because its order, and consistency, and organization, had been broken through—that it could oppose no resistance to the rush of overwhelming innovation. And this, observe, all because it had sacrificed a single truth. From that one surrender of its integrity, from that one endeavour to assume the semblance of what it was not, arose the multitudinous forms of disease and decrepitude, which rotted away the pillars of its supremacy. It was not because its time was come • it was not because it was scorned by the classical Romanist, or dreaded by the faithful Pro- teatant. That scorn and that fear it might have survived, and lived ; it would have stood forth in stern comparison with the enervated sensuality of the renais- sance; it would have ripen in renewed and purified honour, and with a new soul, from the ashes into which it sank, giving up its glory, as it had received it, for the honour of God—but its own truth was gone, and it sank for ever. There was no wisdom nor strength left in it to raise it from the dust; and the error of zeal, and the softness of luxury, smote it down and dissolved it away. It is good for us to remember this, as we tread upon the bare ground of its foundations, and stumble over its scattered stones. Those rent skeletons of pierced wall, through which our sea-winds moan and murmur, strewing them joint by joint, and bone by bone, along the bleak promontories on which the pharos lights came once frore houses of prayer—those grey arches and quiet aisles under which the sheep of our rallies feed and rest on the turf that has buried their altars—those shapeless heaps, that are not of the earth, which lift our fields into strange and sudden banks of flowers, and stay our mountain streams with stones that are not their own, have other thoughts to ask from us than those of mourning for the rage that despoiled or the fear that forsook them. It was not the robber, not thefanatic, not the blasphemer, who sealed the destruction that they had wrought: the war the wrath, the terror, might have worked their worst, and the strong walls would have risen, and the slight pillars would have started again from under the band of the destroyer. But they could not rise out of the ruins of their own violated truth.

THE LAMP OF POWER SHINING IN DESIGN.

That, nembrandtism is a noble manner in architecture, though a false one in painting; and I do not believe that ever any building was truly great unless it had mighty masses, vigorous and deep, of shadow mingled with its surface. Ana among the first habits that a young architect should learn, is that of thinking in shadow; not looking at a design in its miserable liny skeleton, but conceiving it as it will be when the dawn lights it and the dusk leaves it, when its stones will be hot and its crannies cool, when the lizards will bask on the one and the birds build in the other. Let him design with the sense of cold and heat upon him; let him cut out the shadows as men dig wells in unwatered plains, and lead along the lights as a founder does his hot metal; let him keep the full command of both, and see that he knows how they fall, and where they fade. His paper lines and proportions are of no value: all that he has to do must be done by spaces of light and darkness; and his business is to see that the one is broad and bold enough not to be swallowed up by twilight, and the other deep enough not to be dried like a shallow pool by a noonday sun.

THE CONDITIONS OF POWER AND BEAUTY SUMMED UP.

Considerable size' exhibited by simple terminal lines. Projection towards the top. Breadth of fiat surface. Square compartments of that surface. Varied and visible masonry. Vigorous depth of shadow, exhibited especially by pierced traceries. Varied proportion in ascent. Lateral symmetry. Sculpture most delicate at, the base. Enriched quantity of ornament at the top. Sculpture abstract in inferior ornaments and mouldings, complete in animal forms. Both to be executed in white marble. Vivid colour introduced in flat geometrical patterns, and obtained by the use of naturally coloured stone. These characteristics occur more or less in different buildings, some in one and some in another. But altogether, and all in their highest possible relative degrees, they exist, as far as I know, ouly in one building in the world, the Campanile of Giotto at Florence. The drawing of the tracery of its upper story, which heads this chapter, rude as it is, will nevertheless give the reader some better conception of that tower's magnificence than the thin outlines in which it is usually pour- frayed. In its first appeal to the stranger's eye there is something unpleasing; a mingling, as it seems to him, of over-severity with over-miuuteness. But let him give it time, as lie should to all other consummate art. I remember well how, when a boy, I used to despise that Campanile, and think it, meanly smooth and finished. But I have since lived beside it many a day, and looked out upon it from my windows by sunlight and moonlight; and I shall not soon forget how pro- found and gloomy appeared to me the savageness of the Northern Gothic, when I afterwards stood, for the first time, beneath the front of Salisbury. The contrast is indeed strange, if it could be quickly felt, between the rising of those grey walls out of their quiet awarded space, like dark and barren rocks oat of a green lake, with their rude, mouldering, rough-grained shafts, and triple lights, without tracery or other ornament than the martins' nests in the height of them, and that bright, smooth, sunny surface of glowine' jasper, those spiral shafts and fairy traceries, so white, so faint, so crystalline, that their slight shapes are hardly tra- ced in darkness on the pallor of the Eastern sky, that serene height of mountain alabaster, coloured like a morning cloud, and chased like a sea-shell. And if this be, as I believe it, the model and mirror of perfect architecture, is there not some- thing to be learned by looking back to the early life of him who raised it? I said that the Power of human mind had its growth in the Wilderness; much more must the love and the conception of that beauty, whose every line and hue we have seen to be at the best a faded image of God's daily work, and an arrested ray of some star of creation, be given chiefly in the places which he has glad- dened by planting there the fir-tree and the pine. Not within the walls of Flo- rence, but among the far away fields of her lilies, was the child trained who was to raise that headstone of Beauty above her towers of watch and war. Remember all that he became; count the sacred thoughts with which he filled the heart of Italy ; ask those who followed him what they learned at his feet; and when you have numbered his labours, and received their testimony, if it seem to you that God had verily poured out upon this his servant no common nor restrained portion of his Spirit, and that he was indeed a king among the children of men, remem- ber also that the legend upon his crown was that of David's—" I took thee from the sheepcote and from following the sheep."