We are fortunate indeed as a nation to have had in our earlier days an architecture that could boast of such pleasing monuments as the New York City Hall. Our ancestors in both the North and South were strongly influenced from the point of view of art by that English Renaissance which reached its culmination in the hands of Sir Christopher Wren. Many a New England church and many a Southern home boasts an architectural beauty of rare charm and in rare accord with the natural setting of this new land. Nor were we less fortunate in public works. The old and new statehouses in Boston, Independence Hall in Philadelphia, and the Capitol in Washington are but a few of the early buildings in America that, like the New York City Hall, are worthy to rank among the best in beauty of design. The latter was the work of John McComb, Jr., and was built between 1803 and 1812 in a style based largely upon the Italian Renaissance. Though not of very great size, its proportions are remarkably fine, and its architecture beautiful. For good taste and for excellence of workmanship it is as worthy of the city of millions today as of the city of thousands for which it was first built. [Illustration: OLD COLONIAL CHAMBER _The office of the Borough President of Manhattan in New York City Hall._] That the source of beauty in architecture is indefinable, this brief account of six of the world's finest buildings has clearly shown. No two are alike; yet all are beautiful. And this quality lies not merely in size and proportions, in design and decoration, but in the appeal that each one makes to the mind as well as to the eye. Thus the Taj Mahal fairly speaks of human remembrance, the Alhambra is the embodiment of oriental luxury, Amiens affords a majestic picture of religious power, and Salisbury of quiet Christian worship, Chambord conjures up visions of gay kings and courtiers, while New York in its City Hall possesses a worthy monument of civic interest and pride. Many another building could be added to such a list as ours, and in the case of each it would be found that added to its visible and tangible beauty was an invisible character that marked it above its fellows. It is from this broad standpoint that all architecture should be judged. [Footnote: SUPPLEMENTARY READING:--"History of Architecture," Hamlin; "Indian and Eastern Architecture," Fergusson; "Medieval Architecture," Porter; "Handbook of English Cathedrals," Van Rensselaer; "Renaissance Architecture in France," Blomfield.] THE MENTOR ISSUED SEMI-MONTHLY BY The Mentor Association, Inc. 381 Fourth Ave., New York, N. Y. Volume I Number 33