Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 4.djvu/94

440 and beauty, into an object of ridicule to the bitter critic. It may be in general questioned how far such a building, however much its swelling magnificence may serve to add dignity to a vast prospect without, or solemnity to an important pageant within, is suited for the more retired purposes of a library. The student seldom wishes to have his attention obstructed by the intrusion of a wide prospect upon his view, whenever he raises his eyes; and perhaps when extent and grandeur are desired, a more suitable method of accommodating them with comfortable retirement may be found in a corridor or gallery, where any one, if he is anxious, may indulge himself by standing at one end, and luxuriate in the perspective of the whole length, while he who wishes to study uninterrupted may retire into a niche, whence his view is bounded by the opposite side of the narrow gallery. In the completion of the quadrangle of All Souls, Gibbs had the great good fortune to receive a growl of uncharitable praise from Walpole. "Gibbs," says the imperious critic, "though he knew little of Gothic architecture, was fortunate in the quadrangle of All Souls, which he has blundered into a picturesque scenery not void of grandeur, especially if seen through the gate that leads from the schools. The assemblage of buildings in that quarter, though no single one is beautiful, always struck me with singular pleasure, as it conveys such a vision of large edifices unbroken by private houses, as the mind is apt to entertain of renowned cities that exist no longer." Such is the opinion of one, whose taste in Gothic architecture, as represented by the straggling corridors, and grotesque and toyish mouldings of Strawberry Hill, would not, if curiosity thought it of sufficient importance to be inquired into, bear the test of a very scrutinizing posterity. A comparison of his various opinions of the different works of Gibbs are among the most amusing specimens of the construction of the noble critic's mind. Where the architect has been tasteful and correct, he only shows that mere mechanical knowledge may avoid faults, without furnishing beauties, "and where he has been picturesque and not void of grandeur, the whole is the effect of chance and blunder." Among the other works of Gibbs are the monument of Holies, duke of Newcastle, in Westminster Abbey, the senate house at Cambridge, a very favourable specimen of his correct and tasteful mi ad, and some buildings in the palace of Stowe. The west church of St Nicholas in his native city, a very fine specimen, if we may believe the accounts of contemporaries, of Gothic taste, having fallen nearly to ruin, Gibbs presented the magistrates with a plan for a church that might reinstate it. In this production we look in vain for the mind which imagined the lofty pomp of the Radcliffe, or the eye that traced the chaste proportions of St Martin's; and one might be inclined to question with what feelings the great architect made his donation. The outside is of no description of architecture under the sun "in particular;" it just consists of heavy freestone walls, with a roof, and plain Roman arched windows. The inside is a degree worse. Heavy groined arches, supported on heavier square pillars, overtop the gallery. There is in every corner all the gloom of the darkest Gothic, with square corners instead of florid mouldings, and square beams instead of clustered pillars; while the great arched windows of the Gothic piles, which send a broken and beautiful light into their farthest recesses, are specially avoided, a preference being given to wooden square glazed sashes, resembling those of a shop in the whole, the building is one singularly repulsive to a correct taste.

Gibbs, in 1728, published a folio volume of designs, which have acquired more fame for the knowledge than for the genius displayed in them. By this work he gained the very considerable sum of £1900. Besides a set of plans of the Radcliffe Library, this forms his only published work : his other papers and manuscripts, along with his library, consisting of about 500 volumes.