present world, or age, or scheme of things, or whatever other term we choose as a rendering of the alov or sæculum in which we are now living.

Again, the opening of the month in which the Feast occurred was noted by a special ordinance, as a great change of time. The same moon, which at the full shone on the rejoicing nation, had at its first appearance been greeted as the great new moon, and the sound of trumpets had proclaimed that a new civil year was begun. Is it not probable that these Divine arrangements tally with things in greater revolution of time? The Sacred Year represents to us the history of the kingdom of God. The event which we call the Coming of that Kingdom, does not form the commencement of the history, but falls far on in its progress. It is the event of the seventh month. Yet at the hour of its arrival a new dispensation of external circumstances, a new polity, a new age, a new world will have begun: the old things will have passed away, and all things will have become new. The Scripture, in announcing that great transition, continually recalls to our thoughts that ancient ordinance of the Feast of Trumpets, which in the Old Covenant marked the commencement of the month, which was the seventh, and yet the first. "The trumpet shall sound and the dead shall be raised." (1 Cor. xv. 52.) "He shall send his angels with the great sound of a trumpet." (Matt. xxiv. 31.) "The Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the Archangel, and with the trump of God." (1 Thess. v.) "The seventh Angel sounded, and there were great voices in heaven, saying, The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ." (Rev. xi. 15.) Such is the heavenly answer to that Feast of Trumpets which served as an introduction to the Feast of Tabernacles.

Lastly, this festival was in an especial sense the Feast of joy. More particular and repeated directions to "rejoice" were added to its institution. Its peculiar symbols, "the boughs of goodly trees, and the branches of palm trees," have been ever well known symbols of gladness; and as a matter of fact it is known to have been celebrated with added tokens of joy, which (as described by Rabbinical authorities) were some of them seemly and solemn, and some of them strangely the reverse. Especially on occasion of the ceremony (added in later times) of drawing the water of Siloam, and pouring it out before the Lord, the expressions of gladness were such as to give occasion for the proverb, "He that never saw the rejoicing of drawing water, never saw rejoicing in all his life." Most fitly indeed did this character of peculiar gladness belong to an ordinance which typified the day when the "redeemed of the Lord shall come with singing unto Zion, and everlasting joy upon their heads, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.'

As we look back on the successive ordinances of the Old Covenant, we see the shadows of the great realities pass one after another over each revolving year. If it is interesting to dwell upon those which time has already interpreted, there is in some sense a superior interest in one which has yet to be fulfilled. We are still sojourning in tabernacles, and travelling in the wilderness, and our souls from time to time are discouraged because of the way. But it is pleasant to read, in the last ordinance given to "the Fathers," the pledge and promise of that coming day, "when, in sure dwellings and quiet resting places," we shall "remember all the way by which the Lord our God led us these many years in the wilderness." Then, when the journey is over and the rest attained, when the labours are ended and the harvest secured, the kingdom of God shall keep its Feast of Tabernacles. In the prospect of that day, both writer and reader may lift up their hearts and cry, "Oh remember me with the favour that thou bearest unto thy chosen, and visit me with thy salvation, that I may see the felicity of thy chosen, and rejoice in the gladness of thy people, and give thanks with thine inheritance."

T. D. B.

FERRER'S RECOLLECTIONS OF A. N. WELBY PUGIN.

Recollections of A. N. Welby Pugin. By Benjamin Ferrers. London: E. Stanford. 1861.

THERE are some biographies which we undertake with a reluctant hand. The life has its interest and instruction; but the interest is sad, and the instruction is conveyed through warning. The story is unrolled before it is finished and complete; we feel that it has not reached its proper end; and the curtain drops, with its deep, slow folds, over a scene which is darkened and doubtful. It is not the trials which cause us distress in such a review; nor the sorrows, nor the losses; for these may have served their purpose, and worked the end for which they were sent. Our regret is when we see gifts, genius, powers and opportunities bestowed, and yet are afraid, after all, that they were sent in vain.

Yet, however depressing such histories are, we must not refuse them. If we leave them unnoticed, they may mislead; for where there has been great intellectual work, and genius has left its traces on letters and arts, we are apt to admire the intellect, and shut our eyes to the errors. So, without censoriousness, which cannot be fitting, or a breach of charity, which is never required of us, we would present to our readers a

biography which may awaken interest, and which, if it will not satisfy our wishes and yearnings, may at least present to us some points which are attractive, and the signs of genius which we can never observe without admiration.

Augustus Welby Pugin was the son of a French emigrant, one of a family of note in France, who was struck by the fury of the Revolution, and, hardly escaping from it with life, took refuge in London. There he found employment with Mr. Nash, then in the height of his repute as an architect; and having entered as a student in the Royal Academy, with the late Sir Martin Shee, he became a competent draughtsman. The times were the basest times of English architecture, when unseemly castles, mocking older days, were sought after by our gentry, or a bastard Gothic of stucco and frippery prevailed, which marked and disgraced the taste of Horace Walpole. Such fancies were exactly fitted to the architectural notions of Mr. Nash who in laying out grounds (as St. James's Park bears witness) had the true eye of a landscape painter, but applying this art to buildings, as he did for the Regent in the Brighton Pavilion, showed that he had no conception of the principles of architecture. He advised Pugin to draw sketches for Gothic villas and houses; but, happily for him, he resolved to prepare a work for publication, and to fill it with illustrations from the cathedrals and public buildings of France. He travelled, therefore, with his pupils, to copy the details of the churches and halls of Normandy; and, though he found these mutilated by revolutionary violence, he recovered enough from their remains to make his work one of interest and value. In this work we discover the training of the mind of his son, his future qualities and his defects. For by the time that Pugin was engaged in this work, his son had reached his thirteenth year. The refugee had married Miss Welby, one of the Lincolnshire family of that name; the lady had brought to the Frenchman's household intelligence, principle, and somewhat, it must be confessed, of a temper. Over the pupils who were articled to her husband, as well as over the ménage, she reigned an autocrat, and her yoke was severe and unbending. She had integrity and religious principle; and as she advanced in life, she became devoted to the Presbyterian form. Her religion seems to have been earnest, and in later life it brought her comfort. But it had a good deal to conquer, and there was a certain harshness and austerity which did not offer religion in its most attractive form. Though this was noticed by her son with keen observation, and gave to his mind (unfairly) a bias against her faith, it was counteracted, as far as he was concerned, by maternal tenderness; for in all his youthful troubles she was ready with her sympathy. We are not able therefore to excuse his subsequent abandonment of his

Protestant faith, by the infirmities of his parent. There remains enough to show that a well-constituted and generous mind would have recognized the ruling principle of his mother's character, and seen its superiority to her natural weaknesses.

But from an early period, and through life, as far as we can judge from his acts and his letters, the mind of Augustus Pugin was not happily balanced. Quick perceptions, great taste, aspirations after the beautiful, appreciation of colour and form, admiration of religion, and a wish to attain it,-these are evident; but we do not trace the firm principle which would have checked and regulated his varying impulses. His language was violent, vehement in praise as in blame, and coarse in expression. He was sent, as a boy, to Christ's Hospital, and there he was noticed for his quickness in learning; though the dogmatism with which he expressed his opinions, and his contempt for others, made him anything but popular. He soon showed his natural talents for drawing; and in his father's office he found ample opportunity for prac tice. He early turned to Gothic times; tales of chivalry and drawings of ancient buildings delighted him. An old church, a cathedral, a castle, rivetted his interest. As he accompanied his father in his tours to France in 1825 and 1827, he had before him the best models of building, and he sketched with indefatigable industry the details. Normandy, with its various grand buildings, was his first and best teacher. His first work was executed for the celebrated goldsmiths, Messrs. Rundell and Bridge. Discovering his knowledge of medieval art, they employed him to draw sketches for their designs for plate. In the same direction, Morel and Sedden, who were employed on the ancient furniture required by George IV. for Windsor Castle, used the lad's services for designs. From these works he passed into the service of the managers of theatres. He was employed by them to design scenery for operas and plays; and he became so enchanted with his new оссиpation, that he had a floor of his father's house converted into a model stage, on which he tried every variety of mechanical device, and arrangements of scenery and buildings. With characteristic ardour he hunted up every thing that had been written or sketched by earlier artists; and he found ideas in the works of Peruzzi, and in the inventions which Inigo Jones had contrived for the masques and dramas of his time.

But the boy's fancies changed, and he now conceived a passion for the life of a sailor. He first became owner of a small boat, then he commanded a smack and a schooner, in which he went to drive a trade with Holland, and to fetch eggs from France; though together with these homely articles were gathered carvings from the stores of Flanders, to form, what he always kept in view, a museum of art. His navigation was not, we suspect, as correct as his taste; certainly it was not

fortunate, as during one of his voyages his ship was wrecked on the coast of Scotland, and he and his crew had a narrow escape with their lives.

Arriving destitute in Edinburgh, he fell into the hands of an architect, then well known, and of some repute-Mr. Gillespie Graham; and Mr. Graham, a man of shrewd observation and warmth of heart, was attracted by the genius of the youth. He conjured him to give up the sea; bid him follow the bent of his mind by returning to the calling of an architect, and gave him his pocket compasses as a memorial of his friendly advice. He used the compasses, marked with the year 1830, through life; and he returned at length to his proper occupation. His habits, however, and his language, had not been softened by this interlude, and both his slovenliness in dress and his roughness of tone had been increased and confirmed by his habits at sea.

His first essay in the real work of an architect was in an attempt to unite the builder and the artist. He had abundant drawings and specimens of carvings-details of windows and their tracery, arches and their mouldings. He set up a yard in which he employed masons, and they executed under his eye the ornaments from his designs. These were to be sent, ready finished, to any one who wanted them. Orders, indeed, flowed in, and works went out; but he had neither the experience nor the habits which fitted him to superintend such an establishment, and it ended in failure. He lost all he had, and gave up his adventure, after narrowly escaping a lodging in prison. His marriage followed in 1831, while he was yet a minor; but his wife died in her first confinement. In this sorrow, which he felt keenly, his mother's sympathy and piety helped to comfort him. She at least looked to the true source of comfort, and sought it earnestly for her son.

After his health recovered the shock, he was anxious to find a home; and the first house he designed was one for himself near Salisbury. His editor tells us, and the sketch he gives confirms it, that though the house had a certain character of its own, which we find often re-produced in his buildings, it was a failure in those things for which, after all, houses are needed-comfort, arrangement, and accommodation. Ill arranged, however, it served him for a time to store up his papers and other treasures; and from it he made excursions to visit the English cathedrals. We trace in his letters to an intimate friend the growing development of the architect's mind; and his remarks show to us his characteristic merits and his predominant faults. This quality he had-a bold, vigorous, self-reliant judgment; and doubtless, in the times when he began his observations on English churches, in 1833, there was much place for the sharpest and most cutting

censure.