PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION 13

columns rose sublimely against the twilight at the extremity of the longer reach of the stream, and presented at once a monument to the art and the religion of the children of Thames; being no less beauteous a work of peace than the new gasometer of (I presume) the Brentford Gas Company, limited.

4. Three days afterwards, I was sleeping in the Greyhound Inn at Croydon,¹ and my bedroom window commanded in the morning what was once a very lovely view over the tower of Croydon Church to the woods of Beddington and Waddon. But no fewer than seven newly erected manufactory chimneys stood between me and the prospect, and the circular temple of the Croydon Gas Company adorned the centre of the pastoral and sylvan scene.

5. There is not the remotest possibility of any success being obtained in any of the arts by a nation which thus delights itself in the defilement and degradation of all the best gifts of its God; which mimics the architecture of Christians to promote the trade of poisoners; and imagines itself philosophical in substituting the worship of coal gas for that of Vesta.

6. I republish this book, therefore,² merely for the little

¹ [Ruskin was familiar with Croydon from his boyhood: see Præterita, i. ch. i. The drawing, given as frontispiece to Vol. I. in this edition, is, it will be remembered, of a Croydon subject. Beddington Park (Waddon station), about a mile from West Croydon, was sold in 1864 for building purposes.]

² [The MS. here reads:-

“I republish this book therefore merely for my own gain, (being offered a certain sum for a new edition by my bookseller), and having arrived at an age and temper in which I am somewhat tired of endeavouring in vain to be useful to other people, and intend to try if I cannot henceforward be more serviceable to myself. I am sure at all events that the re-issue of the book can do no more mischief; Venetian architecture cannot be further misapplied or caricatured than it has been already; the succeeding style will probably be Californian or Polynesian; nor is it of the smallest consequence what it may be to any rational being.

“For the readers, few and uninfluential, who still read books through and wish to understand them, it may be well that I state the main contents of this book.

“The first volume contains an analysis of the possible structure of all stone and brick building ...” (The rest of the MS. is here wanting).

The “bookseller” in this case was Mr. George Smith (Smith, Elder & Co.), for though Ruskin had begun in 1872 to publish many of his books with Mr. George Allen, he did not finally leave his old publishers till 1878.]

[Version 0.04: March 2008]