Page:Alexis de Chateauneuf - The Country House.djvu/28

 former examination of the subject of style, and my deduction from such examination.

You will call to mind that the principal different manners which have prevailed in Europe, are, first the Greek style, and the additions made to it by the Roman adaptation of it, then the Gothic in its different periods, and the different treatments of such periods in the different countries; and under this period may be added the partial adoption of the Arabian style in the south. Then this great æra of the revival or Renaissance style, as it seemingly arose in Italy, France, Germany, Flanders, and England. This being, as regards England, your boasted Elizabethan style.

It is only very recently that my attention has been bestowed on that style which in the north of Europe succeeded to the Gothic; whereas, till then, it had been all along imagined that the Italians alone had comprehended the spirit of the antique, and been able to revive it in a newer form of their own; an error against which we should be upon our guard. Why should we not recognize the various modes of treating the antique, as we find them in different countries; and admit them to be all emanations from one common source and principle. In like manner, the Gothic principle or style was in common adopted and worked out through the whole of Europe, and was in common consentaneously abandoned wherever it had flourished; and the elements of ancient architecture became as commonly substituted for it. And this abandonment of the Gothic, it may be remarked, is the first instance in all history, when the creative power of a people (and, by people, I do not mean a single nation, but the whole of Christendom, united by one common religion) has survived the style of architecture, originally invented and brought to perfection by themselves.

This last subject would be an interesting and fertile one to investigate, and would throw considerable light on the development of the human mind throughout Europe. Such consideration, even confined merely as regards architecture, would be one too far from the present subject now to discuss. Since, however, the Gothic as well as the revival of the antique principle have extended over all Europe, in order to attain a knowledge of either, we should not confine ourselves to isolated specimens of particular countries. It is only by taking a survey of the entire field of Gothic architecture, that we can rightly comprehend its varied powers. Is it possible I would ask, from the mere acquaintance with English Gothic to imagine, or from its elements to compose a tower like that of the Minster of Freiburg in Brisgau, or a loggia of similar character to that called the Loggia da Orcagna, at Florence? On the other