ss: and we should err grievously in refusing
either to recognize as an essential character of the existing
architecture of the North, or to admit as a desirable character in that
which it yet may be, this wildness of thought, and roughness of work;
this look of mountain brotherhood between the cathedral and the Alp;
this magnificence of sturdy power, put forth only the more
energetically because the fine finger-touch was chilled away by the
frosty wind, and the eye dimmed by the moor-mist, or blinded by the
hail; this outspeaking of the strong spirit of men who may not gather
redundant fruitage from the earth, nor bask in dreamy benignity of
sunshine, but must break the rock for bread, and cleave the forest for
fire, and show, even in what they did for their delight, some of the
hard habits of the arm and heart that grew on them as they swung the
axe or pressed the plough.

If, however, the savageness of Gothic architecture, merely as an
expression of its origin among Northern nations, may be considered, in
some sort, a noble character, it possesses a higher nobility still,
when considered as an index, not of climate, but of religious
principle.

In the 13th and 14th paragraphs of Chapter XXL of the first volume of
this work, it was noticed that the systems of architectural ornament,
properly so called, might be divided into three:--1. Servile ornament,
in which the execution or power of the inferior workman is entirely
subjected to the intellect of the higher;--2. Constitutional ornament,
in which the executive inferior power is, to a certain point,
emancipated and independent, having a will of its own, yet confessing
its inferiority and rendering obedience to higher powers;--and 3.
Revolutionary ornament, in which no executive inferiority is admitted
at all. I must here explain the nature of these divisions at somewhat
greater length.

Of Servile ornament, the principal schools are the Greek, Ninevite, and
Egyptian; but their servility is of different kinds. The Greek
master-workman was far advanced in knowledge and power above the
Assyrian or Egyptian. Neither he nor those for whom he worked could
endure the appearance of imperfection in anything; and, therefore, what
ornament he appointed to be done by those beneath him was composed of
mere geometrical forms,--balls, ridges, and perfectly symmetrical
foliage,--which could be executed with absolute precision by line and
rule, and were as perfect in their way, whe