In the exterior of both
this and Strasbourg I was disappointed; but in the interior, who could
be?
There is a majesty about those up-springing arches - those columns
so light, so lofty - it makes one feel as if rising like a cloud. Then
the innumerable complications and endless perspectives, arch above
arch and arch within arch, all lighted up and colored by the painted
glass, and all this filled with the waves of the chant and the organ,
rising and falling like the noise of the sea; it was one of the few
overpowering things that do not _satisfy_, because they transport
you at once beyond the restless anxiety to be satisfied, and leave you
no time to ask the cold question, Am I pleased?
Ah, surely, I said to myself, as I walked with a kind of exultation
among those lofty arches, and saw the clouds of incense ascending, the
kneeling priests, and heard the pathetic yet grand voices of the
chant - surely, there is some part in man that calls for such a
service, for such visible images of grandeur and beauty. The wealth
spent on these churches is a sublime and beautiful protest against
materialism - against that use of money which merely brings supply to
the coarse animal wants of life, and which makes of God's house only a
bare pen, in which a man sits to be instructed in his duties.
Yet a moment after I had the other side of the question brought
forcibly to my mind.
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