we

same class of models, one might suppose that really no costly church ought to be built, or can ever again be admired, unless it is made to look like some old English example; and that the imitation is only the more to be admired if the original was constructed piecemeal at successive times, and hence had a propriety which in truth never can be transferred to any copy. We need not say that we have no disrelish and no prejudice of any sort against Gothic architecture; claim to enjoy the best specimens we have seen of it as highly as any of those who admire nothing else: but we will not confine our complacency to this as the only true ecclesiastical style, any more than we would shut up our sympathies within any one communion as the only true spiritual house.' Some persons have fallen into a way of speaking about it, from which one would suppose it had been prescribed or at least commended some where in the writings of the primitive fathers, if not in the New Testament. It is sometimes called (not by scientific architects, yet by those who ought to know better) ecclesiastical and even Christian architecture, as if no other style had been appropriated, or reckoned suitable by the world at large, for ecclesiastical or christian Such phraseology is certainly sectarian or at best national, rather than catholic. The Gothic is not, and never has been, the prevailing style of architecture in Christendom at large. It belongs mainly to England and parts of France and Germany. Even within those limits, some of the most noted churches, as for example St. Paul's cathedral, are not Gothic but rather Greek or Roman structures variously modified, and parts of old English ca

use.

*Within a year or two a writer in Blackwood's Magazine, giving an account of his visit to New Haven some years ago, sneers at the architecture of the Congregational churches on the public square,

thedrals called Gothic are rather Norman, distinguished, in common with what is called on the continent the Byzantine or Romanesque style,† by the prevalence of the semicircular instead of the pointed arch. As to the rest of the nominally Christian world, it is said there is not a Gothic church in Rome, and not many in all Italy. With all their culture in the arts, the people of that country are said to disparage this sort of architecture as savoring of barbarism. And beyond the 'temporal estates' of the Pope, the church of Rome-that holy mother' or 'erring sister,' as the Oxford clique call her according to the end they have to answer-shows no distinguishing favor towards this style. St. Peter's is her boast and model, which is as unlike York Minster as one stupendous structure can be unlike another erected originally by the same church for the same purposes. Then if we go back into antiquity, Gothic architecture where it has flourished most, is not half as old as Christianity. As one writer observes, the first hymn arose from a Christian assembly not under pointed arches, but, as soon as buildings could be erected for the purpose, in structures copied, like some seen in Rome, mainly from the ancient Roman basilica. The anteNicene church, so much lauded in some quarters for its catholic purity, knew nothing of the architecture which in the same quarters is extolled as the ecclesiastical. But this style is said to have had its birth under Christianity, and hence from it,

now

and to be congenial with the main ideas of the Christian system, so as to be itself properly called Christian. So far as time is concerned, the same distinction belongs to all the inventions and discoveries made in Christian countries-the press, the steam-engine and gunpowder. The origin of Gothic architecture remains a disputed historical question. It has been traced, plausibly enough, in part to an anti-Christian source in Saracenic examples, and ultimate ly to the avenues and arches of forests with their interlacing boughs, as also the foliage of the capitals of Corinthian columns is said to have been suggested by leaves accidentally growing about and embracing a stone placed upon a plant. Then as to its congeniality with the Christian ideas, the same thing may be affirmed with truth of all good architecture, or of all those styles and orders which in the lapse of time have commended themselves to the cultivated judgment of mankind. Every kind has its own predominant character and expression, and is felt to be accordingly congenial with some chief idea or class of ideas in the Christian revelation, as also in the nature of man. Comparing or rather contrasting a Greek and a Gothic edifice, each being a favorable specimen of its kind, an observer finds the difference pervading every part, extending to the minutest device or ornament, and carried out into the general effect; each building rising as it were from one conception of the mind, according to its own laws enlarging itself, and by coherence and unity coming to that harmonious result which is called (according to the position from which it is described) either the expression or impression of the whole as two kinds of trees grow by their respective laws each into its proper beauty. For example, in Gothic architecture the lines are perpendicular or else slanting, the curves intersect one another as if all aspiring to greater

height, and by mechanical contrivance one part surmounts another to a great comparative elevation; and besides giving the pleasure of ingeniously overcoming difficulty in the construction, the whole has an air of loftiness, grandeur and natural solemnity, and sometimes of grace combined with vastness. In the Greek architecture on the other hand, the lines are for the most part horizontal, and the proportions of all the parts are nicely adjusted both for strength and effect on the eye; the whole making the impression of solidity or massiveness, and repose, and serenity; the Doric order having also the charm of the utmost simplicity, and the Corinthian of rich yet chastened decoration. Now the most critical minds, and the world at large, have for ages generally acknowledged this effect of the Greek orders to be quite congenial with the spirit of Christian worship; and such testimony avails more than the affirmation of any dogmatist. Nor is it of any moment that the same architectural effect was once allied with pagan worship; for the persons who make this objection find no difficulty in edifying themselves with certain ceremonies which the Catholic church borrowed from the idolatrous rites of heathen Rome.* At the same time we make no question that the different effect of the Gothic style in those countries where it has been tried, whatever pagan or barbarous origin may be assigned to it, is also congenial with the spirit of Christian worship. The two effects, however diverse, ally themselves with different elements in religious truth, and different sensibilities of the human mind. We only

* Newman in his Treatise on Christian Doctrine, (written before he became a Romanist,) acknowledges that many ceremonies, and some that are retained in the church of England, were in fact thus appropriated by the Catholic church as late as the fourth or fifth centuries. Not having the book at hand, we can not refer to the place.

complain of the exclusive partiality which many persons of taste now cherish for the one, as in past times for the other. Let us have both. The solemnities of the Apocalypse, such as the opening of the seals, and the pouring out of the vials, and 'the great white throne,' and the voices as of many waters and of mighty thunderings, and the dead, small and great, standing before God-these things we might feel with the most fearful interest when proclaimed under Gothic arches, sounding through long drawn aisle and fretted vault.' Paul's commendation of charity,* and our Lord's last affectionate discourses to his disciples and intercession for them,t we could hear uttered not less suitably from beneath the Greek entablature, perhaps under the dome of St. Peter's. Paul's discourse of the resurrection is so full at once of the solemnity of death and the cheerful hope of the redemption of our body,' that by reason of the one element or the other, it can not fail to harmonize with either kind of architectural accompaniment. The gateway of a cemetery in either style is found to comport with the place, in one aspect or another, and for the same reason either style is found to be essentially appropriate to a place of Christian worship. And what we have here said of Greek architecture in its several proper orders, and of what is strictly the Gothic style, may be applied also to those modifications of either, and those styles which partake more

1 Cor. ch. 13. ↑ John, chaps. 14-17.

1 Cor. ch. 15.

or less of one or the other, which though of later date have a character and expression of their own. The imitations of the old Norman churches, and those that are called Romanesque, are at least akin to the proper Gothic, while such churches as St. Peter's and St. Paul's, though on the whole very unlike any Greek temple, are yet modifications of Greek or Roman forms, and derive from them their predominant effect. Among all the diversities of what may properly be called ecclesiastical architecture, something may be found adapted to all the varieties of Christian sentiment, and possibly some outward form answering to every inward type of Christian character and experience. However this may be, we are sure that a catholic liberality of sentiment ought to prevail on this subject as really as on any other, and will conduce more to improvement in church building than any exclusive or bigoted preference adopted by a fashionable clique or a religious sect.

We add the wish that those congregations in our large cities which erect churches worthy of being looked at, would make them easier of access to strangers, at least by the help of a notice on the building or a sexton in the vicinity. Travelers in Europe tell us that on the continent houses of worship are accessible at any time. In this particular they are symbolically evangelical, as we are taught that

The happy gates of gospel grace Stand open night and day.' And herein we are obliged to conclude with Sterne, They do these things better in France.'

6

WE can scarcely conceive of a more valuable contribution to the literature of a country, than a good dictionary of its language. He who prepares such a work, performs a service which entitles him to the gratitude both of cotemporaries and posterity. His labors are identified with the preservation of the language in its beauty and vigor, and its transmission as a correct vehicle of thought, from age to age. A good dictionary indeed, is an embodiment of the knowledge of a people-a sort of fac simile of the intellect and heart of the nation whose language it unfolds. In settling the

*An American Dictionary of the English Language; containing the whole Vo cabulary of the First Edition in 2 vols. quarto; the entire Corrections and Improvements of the Second Edition in 2 vols. royal octavo; to which is prefixed an Introductory Dissertation on the Ori gin, History, and Connection of the languages of Western Asia and Europe, with an Explanation of the Principles on which languages are formed. By Noah Webster, LL. D., member of the American Philosophical Society in Philadelphia, &c. &c. General Subjects of the work: I. Ety mologies of English Words deduced from an Examination and Comparison of Words of corresponding elements in Twenty Languages of Asia and Europe. II. The true Orthography of words as corrected by their etymologies. III. Pronunciation exhibited and made obvious by the Division of Words into Syllables, by Accentuation, by marking the sounds of the accented vowels when necessary, or by general Rules. IV. Accurate and Discriminating Definitions, illustrated when doubtful, or obscure, by Examples of their Use, selected from respectable Authors, or by familiar Phrases of undisputed Authority. Revised and Enlarged by Chauncey A. Goodrich, Professor in Yale College, with Pronouncing Vocabularies of Scripture, Classical and Geographical Names. Springfield, Mass. Published

by George and Charles Merriam, corner of Main and State streets. 1848.

The same Work abridged in one volume royal octavo. New York: Harper and Brothers, Publishers, 82 Cliff street. 1847.

form and sound of words, in tracing their derivation, in defining their meaning, in sketching the change of each term from its primitive physi cal sense to the remoter abstract idea, and in marking the nice shades of thought expressed by peculiar uses, such a work performs the office of a general instructor. Carried moreover, to its proper extent, as illustrating, in many cases, the signification of phrases and the force of idiomatic expressions, and as giving the synonyms of the tongue, and establishing the legitimate use of words by reference to authorities, or by examples from approved writers, a dictionary imparts information, in a limited compass, of more importance than any other literary production. It constitutes an encyclopedia, in its most condensed form. In it the essence of all learning is included; and the more encyclope diacal its character, if not too extended in bulk, the better for general

use.

He who would produce such a work must possess or command the entire treasures of learning, embraced in the language of which he proposes to give a synopsis. His mind must be of the widest reach, and his taste of the most delicate susceptibility. He must be charac terized by a love of research, by clear views of science, by refinement of thought, and by an appre ciation of every species of intellectual beauty. The technical and learned term must be precisely explained, the evanescent idea seized with a view to give it form and coloring, the tenuous conception stereotyped, so that its image may be ever afterwards recognized. Few minds are adequate to such a task, or rather no single mind is able to do it perfect justice; and the most thoroughly furnished one can

be supposed capable only of an approximation to the completeness demanded. It requires rather a combination of the talents and acquisitions of many minds, directed to that one point-an accumulation of the labors of generations, supplying the materials and shaping the course of study, so as to produce a work which shall answer fully the great end in view.

And yet singularly enough, the labors bestowed upon lexicography in the English tongue, appear to have been very inconsiderable, before the time of Johnson. Extending through the long period from Chaucer to that illustrious philologist, during which the prose of Hook. er and Bacon, and the poetry of Spenser, Shakespeare and Milton, attested the raciness, the strength, and the harmony of our language, no work of any celebrity, ascertaining the orthography and defining the meaning of its terms, appeared. Bailey's Dictionary of the language in 2 vols. octavo, is scarcely an exception; much less the work of Philips, the nephew of Milton, quaintly entitled, A New World of Words. Even Johnson's production, though great for the times, and great as the labor of one man, supplied the desideratum but in part. No one acquainted with the subject can fail to see, that even his herculean intellect borne up by a herculean frame, was incompetent to grapple with all the difficulties of the task. And in the masterly preface to his dictionary, he has ingenuously and beautifully acknowledged the fact. It needed less the general scholar, the profound thinker, and the fine writer, to prepare a vocabulary of terms, with their derivations and definitions, than a person trained up in that particular study, directing all his efforts to that one point, having that single object in view as the end of his literary labors and acquisitions, laying under contribution for its attainment the whole energies of his intellect, VOL. VI. 4

and living, moreover, in that period of the world when there was a sufficient preparation in the labors of others, for the accomplishment of such a design. Johnson made a great advance upon Bailey in the accuracy and fullness of his definitions; and yet tried by the standard of the present day, no small part of Johnson's definitions appear very deficient in logical precision and discriminating exactness. He defined, to a great extent, by a mere enumeration of synonyms, though on moral and literary subjects, he very often made admirably clear and discriminating statements. In the few scientific terms which he introduced, he is usually vague or erroneous. A telescope, according to him, is "a long glass by which distant objects are viewed." Coral is "a plant of a stony nature." Flame is light emitted from fire."

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Hence the necessity which existed after the time of Johnson, and especially after an interval of more than sixty years, for a new dictionary of our language. A work was needed on a more enlarged plan, and of a more scientific structure; giving fuller analogies, and nicer, more logical definitions; and embracing the numerous improvements in the language, caused by the progress of society, and the advancement of knowledge and the arts. It was reserved as an honor for one of our own countrymen, to conceive the true idea of a dictionary in its completeness, and to supply the ob vious deficiency, in an age when a new order of things began to prevail, and the intellect of the world was awakened to unwonted efforts. Noah Webster, imbued with an early love of all knowledge and particularly of philology, having enjoyed a professional training which allowed him to rest in none but clear and logical definitions, gifted with a mind of unusual discrimination and vigor, and impelled by a desire of honorable fame and usefulness, embarked