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as it lay on the last occasion on which it appeared before the eye, and as it was deposited in the grave. Its attitude was real and true-it was the attitude of a dying man in the house of prayer. If spiritual beings were represented kneeling round his pillow, or sitting at his feet, they were angels; and if the niches surrounding the tomb were filled with images, those images represented the relatives and friends of the deceased gathered there to do him honour. But at the approach of heathen art all this vanishes by degrees. As in the Greek comedy, the personages pass first into representatives of classes-as the armed figures round the tombs of Sir Francis Vere and Francis Norris in Westminster Abbey -and then lose not only their individuality only, but their truth.

Not only do the sons and daughters and mourners who were originally placed in niches on the sides of the altar-tombs pass into marble allegories of Fame and Time, and other heterodox if not vicious abstractions, who stand or sit in very mournful attitudes about the monument, but a whole flight of little boys unclothed, and with their fingers in their eyes, perch themselves on every available site of cornices, pedestals, and pediment; and on the same nihil velare' principle, the marble allegories them selves seem to have little else to do but to exhibit the admirable muscular power with which the sculptor has contrived to invest them. Of the little boys, indeed, however uncomfortable and dangerous the position which they occupy, some account may be given how they reached their several places: for most of them are furnished with wings -and, it is to be understood, are representatives of angels; though, why angels should take this form of little boys, and why they should lament so deeply for the transition of a good man from earth to heaven, may still be a question. But there are also females (who or what they are it is hard even to imagine), who about this time have contrived to c imb up, and lay themselves across the curves of the pediment, wherever one exists; and there hold themselves on, with evident distress, in this painful and alarming posture, one leg loosely dangling down the side, and the other coiled up to get a purchase to support themselves. This practice of taking repose on a sloping penthouse-roof, at a most break-neck distance from the ground, appears to have been prevalent in the seventeenth century; and we should willingly hope that there was some meaning in it, like that of the pyramid on halls, to repre

sent the instability of human affairs, and to convey strikingly the moral lesson of the proneness of human grandeur to fall. In the meanwhile the principal figure lies in an easy, luxurious attitude of perfect indifference-an attitude which for a living person to assume in the house of God would denote a scandalous irreverence; and in which to be found even in a drawing-room would require some excuse of illness. Neither ladies nor gentlemen are in the habit, when they want repose, of laying themselves along the top of a sarcophagus wine-cooler, like the Duchess of Protector Somerset in Westminster Abbey; and if they are sick and dying, as the monument seems to imply, they do not dress themselves in state habiliments, or lean negligently on their arms, as if in the possession of full health. Sir Cloudesley Shovel did not earn his fame by 'reposing himself upon velvet cushions under a canopy of state.' Dr. Busby would assuredly not have liked to have been found by his boys in the posture which he occupies. Dr. South, we suspect, was not in the habit of reading in bed; nor Sir Christopher and Lady Hatton of sleeping upon two inclined planes. Nor would Bishop Hough have liked to exhibit himself as if just frightened out of his sleep, with his episcopal robes thrown round him in much admired disorder. And yet ease and repose, careless ease and indolent repose, are the only characteristics which the artists of these monuments have forcibly impressed upon their works. It is not even repose after toil. There is no expression of manliness, of vigour, of calm, composed dignity, of deep thought, of that stillness and gravity which carries to the mind of the spectator a sense of a superior being placed before him, and which religion so imperatively requires, and sculpture can so admirably exhibit. They have neither the energy of life nor the repose of death.

And when it is remembered that to build up these piles of marble in our cathedrals, in almost every instance some portion of the edifice has been disfigured, or window blocked up, a pillar undermined, or some rich canopy or tracery pared off; that the inscriptions, like the tombs themselves, contain little but a record of family pride ; that almost all devotional feeling evaporates from the figure; that pagan emblems, such as inverted torches, begin to make their appearance; that a gaudy mixture of colouring and gilding prevails in most; and that the whole erection resembles more the façade of a house of many stories for the liv

life extinct, intimating that the dead man
died without a belief in immortality; the
mourner that cannot be consoled blas-
pheming against the command 'not to sor-
row as men without hope.'
And the epi-
taphs-but this is a subject not briefly to
be touched on-and our space is come to
an end.

One part of this subject we have left untouched, because it has been alluded to by us before, and deserves a more full examin

ing, than a receptacle for the body of the dead; we can scarcely lament that their enormous expense soon led to the disuse of them; and that as Grecian taste became more defecated from its mixture with the remains of Gothic, we arrive about the end of the seventeenth century at the next stage of our sepulchral monuments, which may be called the doorway style, or two pillars supporting an architrave, and enclosing either a tablet, or sometimes still a figure. Whether this form was borrowedation than we can give it at present. We from the triumphal arch, or was the natural mean the character of our national monuresiduum of the former architectural sto- ments in Westminster Abbey and St. ried structure, when purified of its semi- Paul's. Private follies and extravagances Gothic excrescences, may be doubted. are of comparatively little moment; but There is or was a monument of the kind when the government of a great and Chrisin the Jesuits' Church at Rouen, which tian nation could find no better mode of transferred the former notion to the in- commemorating the dead than by re-erectscription: Non est hic tumulus, sed ar- ing images of Neptune, and Mars, and cus triumphalis virtutum, cujus basis fides Fame, and Victory, mixed up with draet scientia, columnæ justitia et prudentia, goons and drummers, catapults and canornamenta timor Dei et pietas, coronamen-nons, men without clothes in a field of battum charitas.' Many of these in them-tle, or English Generals in Roman togas, selves are beautiful in their proportions; but their total inconsistency with the buildings in which they are placed, and their unmeaning character, except as an elaborate and expensive frame for very long and therefore very bad epitaphs, render them perhaps the greatest disfigurement to our old churches. The monuments of Elizabeth and James do possess richness, variety, and intricacy, which in some degree interest the eye, and blend with the grotesqueness of Gothic architecture. But the doorways have nothing of the kind. And yet even these are ill exchanged for the huge slabs of pyramids sliced upon the wall, and exposing only a plain surface of variegated marble, which, as executors became more economical, and the dead less cared for, soon after usurped their places. From these the transition is easy to the mural monuments of the present day; those blots upon the walls of our churches-which either affect no duty but to act as a family register of names and dates-or, if they do indulge in any flight of imagination, rarely venture beyond the weeping lady hanging over an urn and standing under a willow; the inverted torch, emblem of the light of

and all the trash of the poorest pedant; and when a Christian Church in a Christian metropolis is selected as the fittest de pository for these outrages, without regard to the ecclesiastical or religious character of those whom the State thus chooses to honour, there must have been something most unsound in the tone and manners of the age.

We laugh at the anachronisms of King John's barons in the Antijacobin, armed with blunderbusses and pocket-pistols, and rushing upon the stage with Knights Templars and Prussian grenadiers, Quintus Curtius and Marcus Curius Dentatus, the Roman legion and the battering-ram, to attack a convent; but is there anything more ludicrous here than in the account of the actual monuments raised in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries by the British people in their metropolitan Cathedrals?

To use the words of the guide-book, not our own —

'General Wolfe is represented (naked) in his last agonies, pressing his hand upon the wound in his breast which caused his death, and supported on the hip of a grenadier, who with one There is a well-known illustration of the reli- hand gently raises the commander's falling arm, gious feeling connected with the erection of these and with the other points to the figure of Glory monstrous cdifices in the history of the Earl of Cork's descending from heaven to crown him with monument in St. Patrick's Cathedral, and Archbi- laurel. Upon the pyramid, in relief, a Highland shop Laud's efforts to obtain its removal from its sergeant is introduced, standing with folded original position at the back of the altar to its pre-hands, and thus silently contemplating the sent site. It is one of the most striking specimens wreck of youth and valour.' (By Wilton, cost of this stage in sepulchral art; heavy, cumbrous, without unity or elegance, and still more glaring in 30007.) its deformity by the restoration of the original colouring and gilding.

'Admiral Holmes is represented as a Roman warrior, resting his head on a cannon mounted

on its carriage. An anchor, flag-staff, and other, naval emblems, diversify the background.'

'Admiral Watson, robed in the Roman toga, is introduced amidst a grove of palm-trees. On the one side is a personification of the goddess or genius of Calcutta prostrate; and, on the other, a similar emblem of Chandernagore, which is to be distinguished by the chains with which it appears bound.'

'Sir Charles Wager :-upon a neatly wrought double pedestal sits a figure of Fame, holding a portrait of the deceased, which is supported by an infant Hercules. The background is sheltered by a pyramid, under the apex of which is placed a coat of arms. The lower pedestal is occupied by a piece of alto relievo, descriptive of the capture of the Spanish galleons.'

Earl Stanhope, clad as an ancient warrior, is introduced in a recumbent posture, clasping a truncheon in his right, and a scroll in his left hand; at his feet stands an urchin leaning against a shield. A state-tent protects his person; on the crown of which is seated an armed Pallas, with a javelin in one hand and a scroll in the other: a pyramid conceals the background.'

'Lord Robert Manners and Captains Blair and Bayne (by Nollekens):-the background is composed of a pyramid, before which is placed a rostral column, surmounted by a statue of Fame, who elevates a wreath of laurel for the purpose of crowning three medallions, which a winged boy is attaching to the front of the column. In the foreground--Neptune, reposing on a sea-horse, addresses himself to Britannia, who appears guarded by a lion.' (Cost 40007.) Lord Rodney (by Rossi, at the cost of 6000 guineas)-stands on a pedestal, on one side of which is seated a figure, meant for a personification of History, listening to Fame, on the other side, who is expatiating upon the merits of Rodney.'

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Major-General Bowes, by Chantrey' [in the House of the God of Peace and Love.] A scene admirably chiselled from life. Bowes was slain in the breach at the storming of Salamanca; and the actual circumstances of his death are here excellently portrayed. The shattered wall, the beaten enemy tumbling headlong with his colours, the charging British, and the victorious general falling, on the foreground, into the arms of a comrade, are all faithfully preserved and vividly exhibited.'

Sir W. Myers:-Hercules and Minerva, or, as some suppose, Wisdom and Valour, meet before a tomb, and shake hands.'

Sir W. Ponsonby-his horse is introduced faintly sinking; while the rider, a naked figure, is placed on the foreground, in a strained kneeling attitude, for the purpose of receiving a wreath of laurel from the hands of a statue of Victory.

Mr. Pitt-habited in the robes of Chancellor of the Exchequer, and in the act of addressing the House of Commons, while History, a female, catching his portrait, is seated on one side, and a man naked and bound with chains, supposed to represent Anarchy, is on the other.' (63007,) Major-General Hay (by Hopper):-The deceased, habited in his regimentals, appears sinking into the arms of an athletic (undressed) attend

ant; a sentinel stands by in an attitude of grief; and in the background a guard is seen marching its round.'

'Sir Thomas Picton (by Gahagan) :--Genius, personified in the statue of a winged youth, leans on the shoulder of an ancient warrior, who is designed to represent Valour, and stands in the act of receiving a wreath of laurel from the hands of Victory.'

Mr. Perceval (by Westmacott):-His effigy is introduced upon a mattress, with a statue of Power indicated by the fasccs, weeping over him; and figures of Truth and Temperance, the one distinguished by a bridle, and the other by a mirror, erect at his feet. Along the background runs an animated scene in basso relievo, descriptive of the lobby of the House of Commons at the moment of his fall.' (52501.)

'Sir John Moore:-Valour and Victory are seen lowering the general into a grave with a wreath of laurel, while the Genius of Spain plants the standard of conquest over his grave.'

Chantrey, the lamented Chantrey, has, we hope, exploded Neptune and Mars, and Glory, and the Goddess of Calcutta, and the Genius of Spain, and the rest of the Pantheon, for ever. It was Chantrey, not the Church, who first made us, of this day, sensible of these solecisms. He brought us back to Nature, and we owe him much for it. But there is still something to be done. It is still to be considered whether a statue which tells of nothing but the greatness of the departed, and the gratitude of the survivors, is the most fitting mode of commemorating the one, or of exhibiting the other in a Christian Church. It is but a barren homage. It is not the homage which a good man would choose if he could be called from the grave, and asked in what manner he would wish that his name should be recorded. Surely, if the thousands now lavished on these public memorials were consecrated to some lasting work of honour to God and utility to mau, which should at once preserve the memory of the dead, and encourage and direct the good deeds of the living; if, as Mr. Markland suggests, instead of busts and sculpture, we raised churches, or chapels, or school-houses, or founded refuges for the poor, or dedicated only some portion or ornament of a sacred building to the memory and name of those whom we wish to honour, we should be acting more consistently with that genuine benevolence which would delight to do good even in the grave; and should contribute, by degrees, to a fund which would soon be thus rendered perAnd in thus doing, we should only be manently available to the noblest uses. treading in the steps of those by whom the noblest of our works of charity and piety were created and transmitted to us :

We build churches,' says Mr. Wilberforce, by calculation, as a matter of necessity; but, of old, church-building was a delight, a luxury, a passion. Then men of wealth would build some glorious fane from foundation to turret, and those whose means were less abundant would furnish a pillar, a transept, or a choir: each man felt a paternal interest in his work while he lived, he delighted to visit it, and watch its progress; when he died, his mortal remains were laid beneath the roof which he had raised, in the hope of His coming whose promise had called forth his bounty.'

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Mr. Fellowes,' he says, 'in his recent travels in Asia Minor, met with several examples of the practice of individuals having contributed to the erection of portions of a building. He describes a beautiful temple of the Corinthian order at Labranda, "with twelve fluted columns, and four not fluted, but apparently prepared for this ornamental finish." These twelve pillars present the great peculiarity of having a panel or tablet not let in, but left uncut, projecting above the fluting: on each tablet is an inscription, showing the temple to have been a votive structure, e. g. "Menecrates, son of Menecrates, the chief physician of the city, gave, whilst Stephanophoros, this column with the base and capital; his daughter Tryphona, herself also a Stephanophoros and Gymnasiarchos, superintending the work." "Leo, the son of Leo, whilst Stephanophoros, gave the column with the base and capital, according to his promise," &c., &c.

The symmetry of a column must necessarily be "much disturbed," as Mr. Fellowes states is the case, by the introduction of tablets of this description; but if the precedent were adopted in this country, inscriptions (whether as records of private liberality, or as posthumous memorials) might be so placed around the base of a column, that the eye could not be offended by them.'

Wilberforce on the Parochial System, p. 99. Several instances of this practice still remain in the church of St. Mary, Beverly. For example:-the pillars which support the north side of the nave, are angels with scrolls in their hands, charged with inscriptions, which are repeated at the back of the columns,' recording the donors of pillars. The Minstrells left behind them an evidence of their public spirit. They built one of the columns on the north side of the church, and placed an emblematical device on its capital with this inscription:

Thys Pyllor made the Meynstyrls. -Oliver's Hist. of Beverly, pp. 167, 178, 351.

What we would wish to suggest in our modern days may best be stated in Mr. Markland's own words :-

'Surely,' he says, 'by the rebuilding and reshould render far more honour to the dead than storation of the old waste places of our Zion we by a continuance of our present practice. nd let it be remembered that in all the works which have been recommended, panels with suitable inscriptions may be carefully let into the walls, recording the occasion when they were raised and perfected, and the names of the individuals to be commemorated. Thus the name of a relation or friend would be identified with font and the altar call for restoration, there are many touching associations, which point them out as most fitting memorials. At the one the deceased may have been baptized, and been made an inheritor of that kingdom in which it may be humbly hoped his spirit rests in peace; and at that altar he may, during the largest portion of his life, have meekly knelt, and "reof God's heavenly promises." ceived with trembling joy the signs and seals

the shrine which holds his ashes. Should the

'If the works here recommended for adoption appear to be such as can only be accomplished by a large outlay of money, and can therefore be effected solely by persons of fortune, there are modes by which the same objects can be atIn tained by individuals of moderate means. the first place, instead of a paltry design being at once COMPLETED, and an inferior church erected out of limited funds, ought not the old custom of building by degrees to be resorted to? A plan for a large church might be laid down, but a portion of it merely, a chancel or a transept, might in the first instance be perfected; or the interior of a church might be finished, while the completion and ornaments of the external walls, tower or spire, might be left to the care and munificence of others in future years. In all these undertakings there might be a principle of expansion, both as regards the size and ornaments of a building.

It

'A signal example has recently been given us of this laudable practice. The liberal founder of a church in the district of Eastover, Bridgewater, thus expressed himself in relation to the proposed fabric:-" The proposal which I now make is to build the church, as far as may be, according to the drawing which is now laid As accurately as it is posbefore the meeting. sible to calculate, it will cost about 3,000l. to complete the church, exclusive of the spire. is my wish to go thus far at once, leaving the spire to be completed at some future time, when, from my own resources, or by the assistance of my friends, the necessary funds can be found. It was on this plan that the great cathedrals were almost all erected: one bishop generally completed one portion of the building, leaving the whole to be finished by future generations; so that frequently two, three, or even four centuries, elapsed between the commencement and the completion of the work."

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We may add an instance where a beautiful addition has been made to a parish

church by the erection of a transept in early English, the lower part of which is appropriated to a family vault, and the upper to stalls and seats for the family, while slabs are placed within the tracery of the windows to receive the names of the persons who lie beneath. This is one of the nearest approaches which we have seen to the realization of our author's suggestions. The church is that of Calbourne in the Isle of Wight; and the plan originated in the benevolence, good taste, and good sense of Sir Richard Simeon, Bart.

Mr. Markland has not been unmindful of the objections which may be advanced.

6

Should it be urged,' he says, that these plans, if generally pursued, would lead to a neglect of sculpture, and that we should transfer the commemoration of the dead from sculpture to architecture, a little reflection will satisfy us that the art of sculpture would, on the contrary, be materially benefited. The accomplished artist, instead of being doomed to tasks which must often be to him of the most insipid and uninteresting character, from their not calling for any high exercise of his genius, would be left to devote himself to works more congenial to his taste and feelings. Let statues, and busts, and relievos be multiplied, but let their destination be changed. Let the statues and busts of literary men be placed in those Institutions with which they have been connected. Let those of lawyers be placed in Courts of Justice, or in the Halls of the Inns of Court; those of medical men in the Colleges, where their lectures were delivered, or in the Hospitals, which they have benefited by the exercise of their talents and philanthropy; and those of eminent ecclesiastics in their College Libraries or Halls. Let provision be made in the Houses of Parliament now rising for the introduction of statues within their walls. How much more advantageously might those of Lord Chatham and of Pitt, of Fox, Horner, and Canning, have appeared in such a building, than crowded, almost buried, as they are, in the adjoining Abbey of Westminster! Of such men monuments are not required on the particular spots where their ashes rest-these form the most precious de

posit.

"In Santa Croce's holy precincts lie

Ashes which make it holier, dust which is Even in itself an immortality." Shakspeare's gravestone, with its "quaint lines, would have drawn the same number of pilgrims

to Stratford if no mural monument to his me

mory had existed; and when we approach the gravestone, simply inscribed with the name of SAMUEL JOHNSON, in Poet's Corner, it awakens far keener emotions than the contemplation of his colossal statue in St. Paul's. But we must recollect that sculpture is essentially combined with the plans here proposed. The churchporch, the altar-screen, and the font, may all be decorated, lavishly decorated, if desired, with appropriate sculpture; all these ecclesiastical

appendages would admit its introduction with perfect propriety and the best effect. Grinlin Gibbons's font in St. James's Church, Westminster, and Sir Richard Westmacott's alto relievos instances in point.' on the screen of the Chapel of New College, are

ART. VI-Marschall Vorwärts; oder Leben, Thaten, und Character des Fürsten Blücher von Wahlstadt. Von Dr. Raushnick. (Marshal Forwards; or Life, Actions, and Character of Prince Blücher von Wahlstadt.) Leipsig, 1836.

THE unjust apportionment of present and posthumous fame to military eminence has often been the subject of grave remonstrance on the part of the aspirants to civil and literary distinction. Helvetius, in his work Sur l'Esprit,' once famous, now little read, attempts the solution of this standing riddle in human affairs :—

'If we can in any instance imagine that we perceive a rallying point for the general esteem of mankind-if, for example, the military be considered among all nations the first of sciences

the reason is, that the great captain is in nearly all countries the man of greatest utility, at least up to the period of a convention_for general peace. This peace once confirmed, a preference over the greatest captain in the world would unquestionably be given to men celebrated in science, law, literature, or the fine arts. From whence,' says Helvetius, with an eye to the pervading theory of his fallacious treatise, I conclude that the general interest is in every nation the only dispenser of its esteem!'

Unfortunately for the French sage, that which he calls esteem, which we should rather term renown, is indiscriminately enough bestowed upon the destroyers as well as the saviours of nations-upon the selfish aggressor who amuses himself with the bloody game of foreign conquest, as well as upon the patriot who resists him. Philosophers may draw distinctions in the study, but Cæsar will share the meed with evident fact-to investigate the principle Leonidas. To give a sounder solution of the on which society seems agreed to furnish the price for the combination of moral and physical qualities, essential to the composition of military eminence, would lead us beyond our limits, if not beyond our depth. So far, we fear, Helvetius is right, that till the millenium shall arrive it will be vain to struggle against the pervading tendencies in which the alleged abuse originates; and that the injured parties must still be con

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