THE TOURIST AND THE TUTOR
is in hearty accord with the spirit of the Gothic builders. After praising the cathedral of Strassburg as "a very fine building," he goes on to say: "Our Gothic ancestors, like the Greeks and Romans, built for posterity. Their ideas in architecture, though different from those of the Grecian artists, were vast, sublime, and generous, far superior to the selfish smugness of modern taste, which is generally confined to one or two generations; the plans of our ancestors with a more extensive benevolence embrace distant ages."[1]
In 1787, St. John, in his "Letters from France," shows himself a passionate admirer of the Gothic. "Though there are," says he, "absurdities in the Gothic architecture, yet I think the moderns are wrong totally to exclude it."[2] He dwells upon "the lofty majesty and beauty of the inside" of Nôtre Dame[3] and declares: "I would rather spend my life even in an old Gothic castle in a romantic situation, with rocks and woods and cataracts around me, than in all the formal grandeur and stupid regtilarity of Versailles."[4] Of Chantilly he says with enthusiasm: "The castle is a great pile of Gothic building, with huge round towers at the angles to serve as bastions. The venerable aspect of this groupe of Gothic castles, dark and solemn, in the middle of a fine sheet of water, impresses the beholder with awe and admiration. … It appears antique, solemn and romantic; and the noblest piece of Corinthian architecture does not appear so awful and majestic as the antique walls and ramparts of Chantilly."[5]
But it is unnecessary to multiply examples. Henceforth one needed not to apologize for admiring the most fascinating architecture in Europe, though two or three generations had yet to pass before one could judge Gothic buildings with thoroughly intelligent understanding of their development.
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