Page:Suggestions on the Arrangement and Characteristics of Parish Churches.djvu/15

15 the altar, with becoming order and solemnity. The second is to supply a place in which the faithful can devoutly and reverentially assist at the holy offices. To meet these two demands, it is evident that in a Church there must be two parts, somewhat separate and distinct. And in some sort, though imperfectly, we find this distinction in our modern Churches: but too often the distinctive character of the holy place is little marked from that appropriated to the worshippers. Frequently the congregation crowd up at either side of the altar; sometimes we find the altar so completely isolated that the congregation surrounds it, and, occasionally, we find it so situated that it is most irreverently overlooked from galleries on all sides. All such arrangements are plainly calculated to lessen the solemn effects of religious ceremonies, and to distract the attention of the ministers at the altar. It is necessary, in arranging a Church, not only effectually to separate that part appropriated to the celebration of Divine worship from the place occupied by worshippers, but the separation should be clearly and strikingly marked. In the oldest remains of ecclesiastical architecture, as well as in those of the middle ages, this distinction is well and plainly preserved; and in whatever other respects they may differ, in this, at least, they agree. In the early Roman basilica this separation of the holy place from the other part of the Church was defined by a railing or cancelli: hence the word chancel. The figure of a ship was used as a symbol of the spiritual Church by the early Christians: hence the name navis, or nave, was applied to that portion of the material Church in which the faithful worshipped. These names—chancel and nave—have been preserved with the things they represent; they indicate “the two, and the only two, absolutely essential parts of a Church:” as has been well said, “if it have not the