New Masonic Hall In Jersey.

the Dean and some of the Clergy , the Bauiff , John Hammond , Esq ., with the Royal Court , and other local notabilities , will attend and take part in the proceedings . No doubt many of the Guernsey brethren will join in the celebration , and it is hoped that some may even come over from England for the purpose . There will be a temporary erection on the spot , providing seats capable

of accommodating six or eight hundi-ed spectators . The programme for the procession and ceremony is arranged , and is such as is likely to prove a great attraction to the Jersey public . No doubt the general effect will he to enhance the estimation of the Craft in the island , ivhich has otherwise been gradually and steadily rising during the last few yearsnotwithstanding several adverse

cir-, cumstances . A full report of the ceremonial and of the addresses both on the occasion and at the subsequent banquet , will in due course appear in the pages of the MAGAZINE , and a brother is preparing a set of drawings , including elevations and plans of the three floors , to -accompany it . The cost of the land is £ 300 . That of ¦ the building will be about £ 1500 . A further outlay will

, he requisite for iron railing to enclose the ground , and : also for the furniture of the rooms , for which proper provision will be made . It may be added that none but Masons are allowed to take shares in the company , and that in the laws for its regulation , means are adopted to prevent their transfer at a future time to persons not helonging to the Craft . —H . H .

Architectural Development.

ARCHITECTURAL DEVELOPMENT .

THE INTERNAL EVIDENCE . During the Norman period Architecture assumed an ¦ expression of strength and security characteristic of the feudalism of the time . The crusades gave a irigour of faith , life , and religious impulse to Christian energies and art , which the chivalry of the age augmented . From the Holy Landthrough the wars ofthe Crusades

, , the pointed arch and other features were introduced and adopted ; and that exubrance of fancy so prevalent in the East was also imported . Thus , Pointed Architecture , in England at least , began to take root , simultaneously with the rise of literature in the 12 bh century , ~ and , towards the end of the Plantagenet period , attained its consummation .

During this period the national character had been growing up , nourished by a rich , dominant , universal , and united Church , possessing a ritual and symbolism of unsurpassed splendour . All this blended in common unity of aim , gave a corresponding expression to architecture . Aided hy organized fraternities of artists , it was elaborated feature after feature , year after year ( mark , not

by sudden transitions ); Christian truths were proclaimed;—the Atonement , by the cruciform plan : the Resurrection , by the height : the Holy Trinity by the triple division , the trefoiled window , and the triangular gable , of the Christian Church : besides many other doctrines ofthe Cross shadowed for thin the lesser details . As the various elements and nationalities approached

maturity , so architecture developed itself , till the most elaborated phase it ever assumed was attained during the reign of Edward III . We must also notice that this maturity of growth in Ecclesiastical Architecture was arrived at just when the animosities of the Saxon , Norman , and Briton were dying away , and a common feeling animated them ; when literature was brightened by

Chaucer , and when our constitution had become developed . The gradual decline apparent from this time , proceeded in the same ratio with the continuance of strife between the rival houses of Lancaster and York , by the ceaseless wars of the Roses , and the stagnation of social progress and virtues . The stiff perpendicular and flattened Tudor gave signs of the approaching return to classicaism .

During the 15 th century , the invention of printing augmenting the revival of ancient literature and art , began to spread that thirst for foreign and Italian innovations , and a distaste for past national or vernacular associations , which the civil Avars had strengthened , and which the new Protestantism still more encouraged . Thus fosteredthe Italian revival of art of the 16 th

, century in this country began , first amalgamating with the Tudor Gothic in the Elizabethan period , and after-Avards throwing aside all attempts at combination which the spirit of the Puritanical age of the Commonwealth ignored . National unity was noAV lost , alike in religion as in architecture .

Such were the many conspiring elements which turned the attention of the nation from internal development , and which nipped in the blossom an art which has ever flourished only when individual faith and character has predominated . Speaking of the Renaissance , Jarves , in his " Art Hints , " remarks : — " Classicalism believed in its mythologytherefore its works were sincere .

, Hedieevalism believed in its symbolical Christianity , therefore it wrought likewise in sincerity . The Renaissance believed in neither , therefore it had no religious character . " The main impulse , which before energised and gave vitality to art , was gone , and the lifeless rules of Yitruvius and Palladio were substituted for that inner

life which all along promoted architecture , and spoke through it . Such men as Ghiberti , Brunelleschi , Raphael , Titian , Rubens , Michael Angelo , Inigo Jones , Wren , Holbein , and others , in art ; Bacon , Sir Isaac Newton , Shakspeare , Milton , Spenser , and Dryden , in philosophy and literature , certainly redeemed the Renaissance , and shed a lustre on the school which will never be tarnished .

Learning , indeed , says Hallam , was not effectual till after the expiration of the 15 th century , when the morning of-literature appeared . In Eranee , the introduction of the Italian taste ,, which took place in the latter part of the 15 th century , Avas accompanied by the same combining spirit which was noticeable in this country . Amongst the earlier

examples , the Chateau de Gaillon , built by Era Giocondo for Cardinal d'Amboise , may be cited as an illustration of this combination of Gothic and classic elements , as well as the town-halls of Arras and St . Quentin , the Palace de Justice at Dijon , & c . Unlike the latter phase of Italian in this country , that in France showed itself by a mannerism and

raeretriciousness of ornament characteristic of the age of Louis XIT ., whose gross taste and extravagant vices have such an analogy to this debased art as to be sufficient alone to brand it as Louis Quartorze . Throughout we see that

the foreign elements and principles each nation acquired or adopted required a certain time to become nationalized and matured , before either a national literature or architecture could possibly be developed . Each style , then , needs as much time for generalizing or maturing those elements of thought and character , which make up the inner life of a people , as it does for generalizing external

features , or selecting and adapting the elements of proceeding styles . This time is as much required as it is in individualizing or nationalizing various distinct races , habits , languages , and literatures . Thus , we see in the structure of our own language , various languages : the Celtic , Anglo-Saxon , Norman , or French , ' Latin , and Greek , these latter chiefly since the 16 th century ,

gradually combining and mixing , till they become a naturalised language : —this distinctiveness not appearing till about a century ago when the Avrittings of Addison , Johnson , Burke , Scott , and others , may be said to have fixed our language . But though now tolerably homogenous , these various elements and idiomatic differences readily betray their varied derivationalthough we cannot assert -from

, this , that our language is not indigenous or national . Thus it would be absurd to say a national style is not indigenous because it be compounded of foreign features . Another fact which the history of styles gives , is , that