[M2.176L]                                                             [M2.176]								176
                                                                      
                                                                      Bourges 10th April.  I feel more and more as I compare this wonderful
                                                                      		Gothic with the Italian how natural and inevitable would
                                                                      Northern and	be the prejudice of either nation in favour of their own -
                                                                      Southern Gothic	how in each country - the powers of invention and fancy
                                                                      		have existed in an almost equal development - how,
                                                                      Moral of	wherever these exist - coupled with general greatness of
                                                                      Architecture	mind and religious faith a great architecture exists,
                                                                      		which it is utterly futile to condemn or criticise because
                                                                      		it is not in this rule or in that, because it is not
                                                                      		classical in its mouldings - or natural in its structure.
                                                                      		Now, whenever fancy fails and affectation and infidelity
                                                                      		appear, mean architecture  follows be it in France Italy
                                                                      		or Germany:  This is the leading point I must develope.
                                                                      Naturalism	It is curious to compare the Naturalism of this Gothic and
                                                                      		of all frank early unimitative work, with the
This naturalism is carried as far as it can be - for I see            		sophistication of Palladio the dweller in the woods
that all these leaves whose imitative forms are so beautiful,         		decorates the temple of God with a sculpture of his triumph
have been painted of a bright verdigris green.                        		over their savage hearts and with branches of hawthorn
This is plainly seen in the mediate porch, with stoning of            		and oak and wild rose:  the degraded noblesse of Venice
Stephen:  (when a fat St Paul sits in the corner and one man          		decorated their houses also with the sources of their
is pulling his clothes over his head to give into St                  		pleasures, with grinning masques and sculptured nusical
Paul’s charge)  and it may form another ground of distinction         		instruments.
from Byzantine work, when the colour was a rainbow                    Nave piers.  On No 188 is a general account of them, compare No 189 &
play with gold not imitative at all.                                  		190 where sections and profile.

[Version 0.05: May 2008]