owers 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
reverential, still expressive of consecrated sentiments, yet more
cheerful. The foliated shaft, the rich tracery of the window, the
graceful pinnacle, the Arabian gorgeousness of the interior,--as if the
crusaders had learned something from the East,--the innumerable shrines
and pictures, the variegated marbles of the altar, with its vessels of
silver and gold, the splendid dresses of the priests, the imposing
character of the ritualism, the treasures lavished everywhere, all
speak greater independence, wealth, and power. The church takes the
place of all amusements. Its various attractions draw together the
people from their farms and shops. They are gaily dressed, as if they
were attending a festival. Their condition is so improved that they have
time for holidays. And these the Church multiplies; for perpetual toil
is the grave of intellect. The people must have rest, amusement,
excitement. All these things the Catholic Church gives, and consecrates.
Crusader, baron, knight, priest, peasant, all resort to the church for
benedictions. Women too are there, and in greater numbers; and they
linger for the confessional. When the time comes that women stay away
from church, like busy, preoccupied, sceptical men, then let us be on
the watch for some great catastrophe, since practical paganism will then
be restored, and the angels of light will have left the earth.

Paris and its neighborhood was the cradle of this new development of
architecture which we wrongly call the Gothic, even as Paris w