Beacon Lights of History, Volume 3 part 1: The Middle AgesLord, John
History
Beacon Lights of History, Volume 3 part 1: The Middle Ages
Lord, John
History
So a lighter, more cheerful, and grander architecture, with
symbolic beauties, appeared with changing ideas and sentiments.
The Church, no longer a gloomy power, struggling with Saracens and
barbarism, but dominant, triumphant, issues forth from darksome
crypts and soars upward,--elevates her vaulted roofs. "The
Oriental ogive appears. . . . The architects heap arcade on arcade,
ogive on ogive, pyramid on pyramid, and give to all geometrical
symmetry and artistic grace. . . . The Greek column is there, but
dilated to colossal proportions, and exfoliated in a variegated
capital." The old Roman arch disappears, and the pointed arch is
substituted,--graceful and elevated. The old Egyptian obelisk
appears in the spire reaching to heaven, full of aspiration. The
window becomes larger and encroaches on the naked wall, and
radiates in mystic roses. The arches widen and the piers become
more lofty. Stained glass appears and diffuses religious light.
Every part of the church becomes decorated and symbolical and
harmonious, though infinitely variegated. The altars have pictures
over them. Shrines and monuments appear in the niches. The
dresses of the priests are more gorgeous. The music of the choir
peals forth hallelujahs. Christ is risen from the tomb. "The
purple of his blood colors the windows." The roof, like pinnacles
and spires, seems to reach the skies. The pressure of the walls is
downwards rather than lateral. The vertical lines of Cologne are
as marked as the old horizontal lines of the Parthenon. The walls
too are not so heavy, and are supported by buttresses, which give
increased beauty to the exterior,--greater light and shade. "Every
part of the church seems to press forward and strive for greater
freedom, for outward manifestation." Even the broad and expansive
window presses to the outer surface of the walls, now broken by
buttresses and pinnacles. The window--the eye of the edifice--is
more cheerful and intelligent. More calm is the imposing facade,
with its mighty towers and lofty spires, tapering like a pyramid,
with its round oriel window rich in beautiful tracery, and its wide
portal with sculptured saints and martyrs. And in all the churches
you see geometrical proportions. "Even the cross of the church is
deduced from the figure by which Euclid constructed the equilateral
triangle." The columns present the proportions of the Doric, as to
diameter and height. The love of the true and beautiful meet. The
natural and supernatural both appear. All parts symbolize the
passion of Christ. If the crypt speaks of death, the lofty and
vaulted roof and the beautiful pointed arches, and the cheerful
window, and the jubilant chants speak of life. "The old church
reminds one of the Christ that lay in the tomb; the new, of the
Christ who arose the third day." The old fosters meditation and
silence; the new kindles the imagination, by its variety of
perspective arrangement and mystic representation,--still
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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