When I lately stood with a friend before [the cathedral of]
Amiens, . . . he asked me how read more

When I lately stood with a friend before [the cathedral of]
Amiens, . . . he asked me how it happens that we can no longer
build such piles? I replied: "Dear Alphonse, men in those days
had convictions (Ueberzeugungen), we moderns have opinions
(Meinungen) and it requires something more than an opinion to
build a Gothic cathedral.

There was King Bradmond's palace,
Was never none richer, the story says:
For all the windows and read more

There was King Bradmond's palace,
Was never none richer, the story says:
For all the windows and the walls
Were painted with gold, both towers and halls;
Pillars and doors all were of brass;
Windows of latten were set with glass;
It was so rich in many wise,
That it was like a paradise.

The architect
Built his great heart into these sculptured stones,
And with him toiled his children, and read more

The architect
Built his great heart into these sculptured stones,
And with him toiled his children, and their lives
Were builded, with his own, into the walls,
As offerings unto God.

The hand that rounded Peter's dome
And groined the aisles of Christian Rome,
Wrought in a sad read more

The hand that rounded Peter's dome
And groined the aisles of Christian Rome,
Wrought in a sad sincerity;
Himself from God he could not free;
He builded better than he knew;
The conscious stone to beauty grew.

Grandeur . . . consists in form, and not in size: and to the eye
of the philosopher, the read more

Grandeur . . . consists in form, and not in size: and to the eye
of the philosopher, the curve drawn on a paper two inches long,
is just as magnificent, just as symbolic of divine mysteries and
melodies, as when embodied in the span of some cathedral roof.

Anon, out of the earth a fabric huge
Rose, like an exhalation.

Anon, out of the earth a fabric huge
Rose, like an exhalation.

Old houses mended,
Cost little less than new, before they're ended.

Old houses mended,
Cost little less than new, before they're ended.

A man who could build a church, as one may say, by squinting at a
sheet of paper.

A man who could build a church, as one may say, by squinting at a
sheet of paper.

Nor did there want
Cornice or frieze with bossy sculpture graven.

Nor did there want
Cornice or frieze with bossy sculpture graven.