Page:History of Architecture in All Countries Vol 1.djvu/631

 Bk. III. Ch. I. GOTHIC CHURCHES. 599 the cinque-cento period ; yet the effect produced, though gorgeous, is remarkably pleasing and beautiful, and is in itself sufficient to set at rest the question as to the expediency of painting the vaults of cliurches, or leaving them j^lain. My own conviction is, that all French vaults Avere once painted to as great an extent as in this case. Our English architects often probably depended only on form and carving for effect, but on the Continent it was otherwise. Of the remaining churches, St. Bavon's at Ghent, and St. Martin's at Liege, both commenced, as they now stand, in the middle of the 16th century, are among the most remarkable, and for their age are Aonderfully free from any traces of the Renaissance. At the same age in France, or even in England, they would liave been Italianized to a far greater extent. There is scarcely a second-rate town or even a village in Belgium that does not possess a church of more or less importance of the Gothic age, or one at all events possessing some fragment or detail worthy of attentive study. This circumstance is easily explained from the fact that during the whole of the Mediasval period, from the 10th to the 16th century, Belgium was rich and prosperous, and since that time till the present comparatively so poor as to have had neither ambition to destroy nor power to rebuild. Considering its extent, the country is indubitably richer in monuments than France, or per- haps than any other country in Europe ; but the architecture is neither so good or satisfactory nor of so high a class.