which refinement is natural, and which learning and experience
never deprive of simplicity. Apparently his passions were not violent;
perhaps they were restrained by his profound piety. Next to his
devotion, Glastonbury was remarkable for his taste. The magnificent
temples in which the mysteries of the Deity and saints he worshipped
were celebrated developed the latent predisposition for the beautiful
which became almost the master sentiment of his life. In the inspired
and inspiring paintings that crowned the altars of the churches and the
cathedrals in which he ministered, Glastonbury first studied art; and it
was as he glided along the solemn shade of those Gothic aisles, gazing
on the brave groining of the vaulted roofs, whose deep and sublime
shadows so beautifully contrasted with the sparkling shrines and the
delicate chantries below, that he first imbibed that passion for the
architecture of the Middle Ages that afterwards led him on many a
pleasant pilgrimage with no better companions than a wallet and a
sketch-book. Indeed, so sensible was Glastonbury of the influence of the
early and constant scene of his youth on his imagination, that he was
wont to trace his love of heraldry, of which he possessed a remarkable
knowledge, to the emblazoned windows that perpetuated the memory and the
achievements of many a pious founder.

When Glastonbury was about twenty-one years of age, he unexpectedly
inherited from an uncle a sum which, though by no means considerable,
was for him a sufficient independence; and as no opening in the service
of the Church at this moment offered itself, which he considered it a
duty to pursue, he determined to gratify that restless feeling which
seems inseparable from the youth of men gifted with fine sensibilities,
and which probably arises in an unconscious desire to quit the
commonplace and to discover the ideal. He wandered on foot throughout
the whole of Switzerland and Italy; and, after more than three years'
absence, returned to England with several thousand sketches, and a
complete Alpine Hortus Siccus. He was even more proud of the latter than
of having kissed the Pope's toe. In the next seven years the life of
Glastonbury was nearly equally divided between the duties of his sacred
profession and the gratification of his simple and elegant tastes.
He resided principally in Lancashire, where he became librarian to
a Catholic nobleman of the highest rank, whose notice he had first
att