Trin Coll <1>
Tuesday evening Jan. 26th
My dear Father
I am very much obliged to you for having made an appointment for me with Mr Rogers. I am sorry you think it improbable that you will be in Town when I get there, but as you dont say you are going for certain so soon, perhaps you will not have gone. I had hoped for your society on Sunday, which is not the most convenient day for spending solo in London seeing that with the exception of going to church there is very little to do. Gillespie is not I believe expected to be much higher than 14th wrangler. I don’t think he ever professed to be expect to be higher. Gillespie is undoubtedly a very g clever man, but the competition is tremendous, and I should think also that the year was a very good one, there being many men of repute. The Senior wrangler is to be Purkiss <2> of Trinity. The second is I believe to be Turnbull <3> of Trinity: Trinity is very good this year. I shall not forget to call on the Worsleys. <4> If you are not in Town when I get there, I think it doubtful whether or not I shall go to the Euston Hotel as being close to the Station for starting north, but I hope you will be there in which case I will come to Cox’s. <5>
The weather here is excessively fine. The man (viz upholsterer) has been valuing my furniture, I am go and is going to pack up my pictures books &c to go to Lacock. I also sold a certain number of books of very little use to anybody and least of all to the owner, and realized thereby the large sum of 1£ ·12s.
I have been reading some of Gilbert Scotts <6> books on Architecture as applied to Secular & ecclesiastical buildings and approve of the greater part of them thoroughly. The only parts in which I think it doubtful whether he is to be fully agreed with are when he gets upon Ecclesiology or the questions of a ritualistic arrangement of churches &c. It seems to me that architecture ought to be more considered as an art of or a science having an existence utterly independent of any religious opinions, & capable of being perfected upon simply scientific principles. I have also got partly through a well known book of Ruskins <7> entitled the Seven Lamps of Architecture <8> certainly well worth reading but I think there is very much more to disagree with than in Scotts works. It is curious how Pugin <9> & Scott & Ruskin all differ on the ecclesiological questions & how they all agree very closely on the questions that are strictly architectural.
Pugin & Scott taking diametrically opposite ground. Pugin maintaining that Gothic architecture was essentially catholic and was overthrown p by protestantism & (what he considers as its accompaniment) the revived pagan element in art. And Scott maintaining exactly the contrary namely that gothic arose in spite of and not in consequence of popery, and that the corruption of art and the Renaissance were entirely due to Popery. This seems rather rem a remarkable theory at first sight but he supports it by some reasons, the fact being that the Renaissance originated in Italy & spread from Italy, and that its great patrons as applied to churches were the Jesuits, whilst gothic was elaborated by the northern nations of Europe. It does seem unlikely that an erroneous form of religion should have given rise to a particularly truthful & beautiful form of art. He also mentions which is curious that the building of St Peters precipitated the Reformation by necessitating the traffic in indulgences. I am also on my way through Chaucers Canterbury Tales, which seem to me to be well worth reading.
Your affect son
Charles.
“Don’t really depart without letting me know.”
P.S. No 2.
I should leave Town for Carlisle on Monday afternoon if I can find a Train to suit.
[envelope:]
H Fox Talbot Esq
Athenæum Club
London. S W
Notes:
1. Trinity College, Cambridge.
2. Purkiss (d. 1865). [See Doc. No: 08561 and Doc. No: 09019].
3. See Doc. No: 08561.
4. Rev Thomas Worsley (1797–1885), theologian & Master of Downing College, Cambridge; and his wife, Katherine, née Rawson, eldest daughter of Stansfield Rawson, of Wasdale Hall, Cumberland.
5. Cox’s Hotel. [See Doc. No: 07605].
6. Sir George Gilbert Scott (1811–1878), gothic revival architect.
7. John Ruskin (1819–1900).
8. John Ruskin, The Seven Lamps of Architecture ( 1855).
9. Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin (1812–1852); important in the revival of Gothic architecture in England with books such as The True Principles of Pointed or Christian Architecture (London: H.G. Bohn, 1853).