It Is Stupendously Light And Airy; The Best Specimens Of Norman Art That I Have Seen (And Surely The Crusaders Must Have Carried Home The Models Of These Heathenish Temples In Their Eyes) Do Not Exceed Its Noble Grace And Simplicity.

The mystics make discoveries at home, that the Gothic architecture is Catholicism carved in stone - (in which case, and

If architectural beauty is a criterion or expression of religion, what a dismal barbarous creed must that expressed by the Bethesda meeting-house and Independent chapels be?) - if, as they would gravely hint, because Gothic architecture is beautiful, Catholicism is therefore lovely and right, - why, Mahometanism must have been right and lovely too once. Never did a creed possess temples more elegant; as elegant as the Cathedral at Rouen, or the Baptistery at Pisa.

But it is changed now. There was nobody at prayers; only the official beadles, and the supernumerary guides, who came for backsheesh. Faith hath degenerated. Accordingly they can't build these mosques, or invent these perfect forms, any more. Witness the tawdry incompleteness and vulgarity of the Pasha's new temple, and the woful failures among the very late edifices in Constantinople!

However, they still make pilgrimages to Mecca in great force. The Mosque of Hassan is hard by the green plain on which the Hag encamps before it sets forth annually on its pious peregrination. It was not yet its time, but I saw in the bazaars that redoubted Dervish, who is the master of the Hag - the leader of every procession, accompanying the sacred camel; and a personage almost as much respected as Mr. O'Connell in Ireland.

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