and all the ever-recurring deeds of nature; nor would the road or the river winding past our homes fail to tell us stories of the country-side, and men’s doings in field and fell.  And whiles we should fall to muse on the times when all the ways of nature were mere wonders to men, yet so well beloved of them that they called them by men’s names and gave them deeds of men to do; and many a time there would come before us memories of the deed of past times, and of the aspirations of those mighty peoples whose deaths have made our lives, and their sorrows our joys.

How could we keep silence of all this? and what voice could tell it but the voice of art:  and what audience for such a tale would content us but all men living on the Earth?

This is what Architecture hopes to be:  it will have this life, or else death; and it is for us now living between the past and the future to say whether it shall live or die.

Footnotes: 

{1} Delivered before the Trades’ Guild of Learning, December 4, 1877.

{2} Delivered before the Birmingham Society of Arts and School of Design, February 19, 1879.

{3} Now incorporated in the Handbook of Indian Art, by Dr. (now Sir George) Birdwood, published by the Science and Art Department.

{4} These were originally published in Fun.

{5} Delivered before the Birmingham Society of Arts and School of Design, February 19, 1880.

{6} As I corrected these sheets for the press, the case of two such pieces of destruction is forced upon me:  first, the remains of the Refectory of Westminster Abbey, with the adjacent Ashburnham House, a beautiful work, probably by Inigo Jones; and second, Magdalen Bridge at Oxford.  Certainly this seems to mock my hope of the influence of education on the Beauty of Life; since the first scheme of destruction is eagerly pressed forward by the authorities of Westminster School, the second scarcely opposed by the resident members of the University of Oxford.

{7} Since perhaps some people may read these words who are not of Birmingham, I ought to say that it was authoritatively explained at the meeting to which I addressed these words, that in Birmingham the law is strictly enforced.

{8} Not quite always:  in the little colony at Bedford Park, Chiswick, as many trees have been left as possible, to the boundless advantage of its quaint and pretty architecture.

{9} A Paper read before tile Trades’ Guild of Learning and the Birmingham Society of Artists.

{10} I know that well-designed hammered iron trellises and gates have been used happily enough, though chiefly in rather grandiose gardens, and so they might be again—­one of these days—­but I fear not yet awhile.

{11} Delivered at the London Institution, March 10, 1880.

{12} Indeed it is a new world now, when the new Cowley dog-holes must needs slay Magdalen Bridge!—­Nov. 1881.