Chartres Cathedral

“ The Cathedral is truly a Bible in stone. And just as in the sculptured porches the mediæval masons carved in a symbolic type, which the illiterate could read, the story of the Pentateuch and the Gospels; just as in their jewelled windows the monkish glaziers told again the same Bible story for all to see and understand, so it would seem that here in Chartres, the architects also, but by fortune rather than design, have symbolised in stone the Old Testament and the New. ”

“ There lay their romance, thither pointed their veriest thinking, thither drew their utter yearning.
Is it possible that the Middle Ages should speak to us, as through a common humanity? Their mask is by no means dumb: in full voice speaks the noble beauty of Chartres Cathedral. Such mediaeval product, we hope, is of the universal human, and therefore of us as well as of the bygone craftsmen. Why it moves us, we are not certain, being ignorant, perhaps, of the building’s formative and earnestly intended meaning. ”

“ To live for a day in a world that built Chartres Cathedral, even if it makes the living in a world that creates the "Black Country" of England or an Iron City of America less a thing of joy and gladness than before, equally opens up the far prospect of another thirteenth century in the times that are to come and urges to ardent action toward its attainment. ”

“ They have no bodies; it is the soul alone that dwells in the wrought sheath of their raiment; they are in perfect harmony with the cathedral, which, divesting itself of its stones, soars in ecstatic flight above the earth.
The crowning achievement of mystical architecture and statuary are here, at Chartres; the most rapturous, the most superhuman art which ever flourished in the flat plains of La Beauce. ”

“ Be the contrast what it may, it does not affect the fact that no other church in France has two spires that need be discussed in comparison with these. Indeed, no other cathedral of the same class has any spires at all, and this superiority of Chartres gave most of its point to a saying that "with the spires of Chartres, the choir of Beauvais, the nave of Amiens, and the facade of Rheims," one could make a perfect church—for us tourists. ”

“ When one dropped one's eyes from these ethereal harmonies, the dark masses of masonry below them, all veiled and muffled in a mist pricked by a few altar lights, seemed to symbolize the life on earth, with its shadows, its heavy distances and its little islands of illusions. All that a great cathedral can be, all the meanings it can express, all the tranquillizing power it can breathe upon the soul, all the richness of detail it can fuse into a large utterance of strength and beauty, the cathedral of Chartres gave us in that perfect hour. ”

“ The church itself is one of the most remarkable in existence, and would doubtless be better known had Chartres no Cathedral. As it is, the magnificence of Notre-Dame obscures the excellence of the smaller church, and obliterates from the memory its striking characteristics. ”

“ The name of the architect of Chartres is unknown, but its unity of plan is proof that it emanated from the brain of one man. The choir had double aisles, the nave a single one. It is believed that to the absence of side chapels in the nave is due the exceptionally good acoustic properties of this church in which the preacher’s voice carries to every part. Unknown, too, is the architect of the tower built in the dawn of Gothic art, two generations before the present cathedral. The veriest amateur as he gazes at it is conscious that he has before him one of the supreme things of France. ”

“ One need not take it more seriously than one takes the baby itself. Our amusement is to play with it, and to catch its meaning in its smile; and whatever Chartres maybe now, when young it was a smile. To the Church, no doubt, its cathedral here has a fixed and administrative meaning, which is the same as that of every other bishop's seat and with which we have nothing whatever to do. To us, it is a child's fancy; a toy-house to please the Queen of Heaven,— to please her so much that she would be happy in it,—to charm her till she smiled. ”

“ It is rather a pity that from no suitably near-by point can one obtain a full view of the effect of the western façade. One poor little house seems ever to thrust itself into the ensemble, though it is to-day apparent that certain others, which must have cut into the front still more, have been cleared away. Clearly, with all its charm and beauty of detail, it is for its great and general excellencies that the cathedral at Chartres most impresses itself upon the memory. ”

“ Now, it may be thought that any one who can shake the fist of disapprobation at the Cathedral of Chartres, is beyond the pale of human sympathy. But when you are dragged relentlessly thither in the icy dark of every winter morning, and the bitter gloom of every winter evening, to say nothing of sporadic attendances during the daytime, you may be pardoned if your æsthetic perceptions are obscured by the sense of outrage inflicted on your personal comfort. To many generations of men the Cathedral has been a symbol of glories, revelations and eternities. ”

“ A splendid picture of the beautiful devotion of the people of a region in the erection of a magnificent cathedral is found in Chartres, France. That wonderful edifice was begun in 1194 and completed in 1240. To construct a building that would beautify their city and satisfy their religious aspirations the citizens contributed of their strength and property year after year for nearly half a century. Far from home they went to the distant quarries to dig out the rock. Encouraged by their priests they might be seen, men, women, and children, yoked to clumsy carts loaded with building materials. ”

“ The cathedral of Notre Dame at Chartres, magnificent and strongly built, attracts the visitor by its two tall but unequal bell-towers and spires. It is vast and elegant, and excels in painted glass and its three rose windows. The tower and spire are the finest of their period in France, the steeple being 3391⁄2 feet high without the cross. ”

“ No other cathedral in France or in Europe has an interior more refined—one is tempted to use even the hard-worn adjective, more tender—or more carefully studied. One test is crucial here and everywhere. The treatment of the apse and choir is the architect's severest standard. This is a subject not to be touched lightly; one to which we shall have to come back in a humble spirit, prepared for patient study, at Chartres; but the choir of Coutances is a cousin to that of Chartres, as the facades are cousins ”

“ Last and not least permanent of the effects of the Crusades was the influence exercised by the East upon art. The Porche Royal of the Cathedral, and the stained glass windows which are the glory of Chartres, would not have been as they are had Peter the Hermit never led his hundred thousand pilgrims to destruction, or if Bohémond, Prince of Antioch, had not taken the Cross in the sanctuary of Notre-Dame. ”

“ It is not of technique that one thinks when standing face to face with the windows of Chartres. “Create in me a new heart, O God!” one murmurs when gazing at them. When at noon the sun renders the colors dazzling and bewildering, the cathedral seems to be chanting “Sanctus! Sanctus! Sanctus!” with the seraphim proclaiming that the whole earth is full of the glory of the Lord. Live coals from heaven’s high altar are the windows of Chartres, then, cleansing us of our iniquities ”

“ Perhaps the French critics might deny that they make any such absolute claim; in that case you can ask them what their exact claim is; it will always be high enough to astonish the tourist.
Astonished or not, we have got to take this southern spire of the Chartres Cathedral as the object of serious study, and before taking it as art, must take it as history. The foundations of this tower— always to be known as the "old tower"—are supposed to have been laid in 1091, before the first crusade. The fleche was probably half a century later (1145-70) . ”

“ The Cathedral of Notre Dame de Chartres jumps full into view immediately on leaving the railway station, though here it is to be noted that no delineation has ever been made by modern hand which shows its façade in its entirety. The roofs of the houses and shops around its base indicate no special squalor or poverty, as is the case with regard to some Continental churches, and there is a picturesque grouping of firs and poplars to the left which adds considerably to an already pleasing prospect. ”

“ The cathedral is faithful to its name, loyal to its dedication. The Virgin is Lady over all. She fills the whole interior, and appears outside even on the western and southern portals, which are not especially Hers, above a door, on a capital, high in air on a pediment. The angelic salutation of art has been repeated without intermission by the painters and sculptors of every age. The cathedral of Chartres is truly the Virgin's fief. ”

“ At the end of the 12th century Chartres cathedral was begun, perhaps its most notable constructive feature being the high development that the flying buttresses have here attained. It was followed in the early years of the 13th century by Rouen cathedral, which derived much from its prototype. St Omer, a fine early church, in turn, followed Rouen. The second stage of Gothic, introducing the traceried window, was opened by the building of the cathedral of Reims, begun in 1211. This is in every way one of the most perfect of cathedrals, as well for its sculpture and glass as for its structure. ”

“ Let us take the present opportunity in our history then to visit the crypt, [11] to behold the first beginnings of the Cathedral, the statue of Notre-Dame-de-Sous-Terre and the new-found ancient well of the martyrs.
‘The crypt,’ says Raoul Boutrais, in his Latin poem in praise of Chartres (1624) , ‘lies darkling in a hollow of the earth, resting on many an arch, as long and as wide as is the whole church above it. A dim religious light struggles through the deep-set windows. Enter and behold a sacred altar. Your being is filled with a mysterious awe as you descend. ”

“ The Church, which tries to find beings absolutely ingenuous and immaculate to wait upon the altar, had succeeded at Chartres in moulding souls and transforming ordinary boys on their admission to the sanctuary into exquisite angels. There must certainly be, above and besides their special training, some blessing and goodwill from Our Lady, to mould these little rogues to the service, to make them so unlike others, and endow them in the middle of the nineteenth century with the fire of chastity and primitive fervour of the middle age. ”

“ The interior proportions of Rheims are harmonious; the side aisles are relatively right with the central vessel, and the nave leads up well to the sanctuary, which, inside and out, is beyond criticism. As a whole, however, the interior of this cathedral has not the slender upwardness of Amiens nor the ascetic holiness of Chartres. It stands more than it soars. It praises the deity in another fashion than does the mystic cathedral. The keynote here is a right-minded human splendor. ”

“ For anything more detestably out of place than this soulless mass of Carrara marble in the old Gothic sanctuary it is impossible to discover without going to Westminster Abbey. It is the work of Antoine Bridan, the King’s sculptor, and the Chapter were so pleased with it that they settled a pension on him and his wife, and cheerfully destroyed more windows in order to throw more light upon the monument.
Vandals, alas, are of all time and of all countries. Even the beautiful Clôture, the great horse-shoe wall{203}
Ambulatory, Chartres Cathedral. ”

“ For the student of early Gothic architecture in France, Chartres is a most profitable field. The older forms of the arch, the foliated window-circles, the boldly decorated doorways, the twelfth-century decorative details, and the massive, as well as the light, buttress can be seen here in perfection. Few, if any, cathedral portals in Europe can excel in richness those of Chartres. Here is to be seen the noblest examples of twelfth-century sculpture. ”

“ CHAPTER VI THE VIRGIN OF CHARTRES We must take ten minutes to accustom our eyes to the light, and we had better use them to seek the reason why we come to Chartres rather than to Rheims or Amiens or Bourges, for the cathedral that fills our ideal. The truth is, there are several reasons; there generally are, for doing the things we like; and after you have studied Chartres to the ground, and got your reasons settled, you will never find an antiquarian to agree with you; the architects will probably listen to you with contempt ”

“ But the Cathedral of Chartres was in the end allowed to stand. For a curious reason. It was found that the difficulty of getting rid of the vast masses of débris would be insuperable. No citizen would undertake to allow the fragments of the building to be cast upon his land, and, seeing that the town would be endlessly encumbered by them, it was decided that the Cathedral should not be destroyed. ”

“ If you would know the soul of this mystic cathedral, gather at dawn with the silent worshipers who choose that hour to kneel daily in the secluded intimacy of Notre-Dame-sous-Terre. The true hour for Chartres is not at noontime, when the tourists flock to the empty church, but in the morning with the dawn. [108]
Fulbert’s Romanesque cathedral was finished in the same XI century by St. Ives of Chartres, another born leader of the nation, who righted many abuses. ”