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T :H E  N E W  P 1At T H.
VOL. IL]             JUNE, 1864.              [No. 2.
AN IMPORTANT GOTHIC BUILDING.
THE new building for the National
Academy of Design begins to attract
some of that attention which a build-
ing so important and so peculiar in
design might be expected to attract.
The outside walls are so nearly finished
that, by the time this number of the
NEW PATH is laid before its readers,
the exterior of the building can be
judged almost as if complete. We find
already that popular judgments are
passed upon it daily.
It has been thought strange that Ar-
chitectural Art should be so little regard-
ed in America, when an interest is shown
so general and so constantly increasing
in painting and sculpture. But the phe-
nomenon needs no recondite explana-
tion. The first few pictures painted in
this country excited, we know, little
enough attention. It ought to surprise
no one that the first attempts at Archi-
tecture have been disregarded.  It
may be thought that the general and
growing interest in one should excite
a similar interest in other arts. But-
and this is a point never to be lost
sight of-Architecture is not recog-
nized as a Fine Art by those who have
seen little of it.
Let it be understood that we use the
word Architecture throughout this ar-
ticle as meaning the fine art called by
that name. The purpose of this art is
to make buildings beautiful and in-
structive, by permanent appliances.
When any one tries to make a building
beautiful or instructive in a lasting
way, he is practicing the art of Archi-
tecture.
All the fine arts are injured by
subjecting them to Rules of Art;
none more than Architecture. It is
always hard to fix the point where the
observer of rules ceases to be an artist
and becomes a mere machine, but
there is such a point, and beyond that,
when once fixed, we may safely de-
clare, "not art, but artizanship." As
regards the art of Architecture,
without establishing such a point of de-
parture we are safe in asserting that
very few buildings in our day and gen-
eration are designed to be either beau-
tiful or instructive, and in concluding
thence that there is very little Archi-
tecture among us.
Had Church's Niagara been the first
picture of note painted in America, the
public would not have given it a
second thought, and the press would
never have named its name. The for-
gotten pictures before it had prepared
the world for better things than they;
as the bodies of the slain fill the ditch that
their comrades may follow and pass
on to victory.  So former buildings
have prepared the public to notice the
Academy of Design more than it
noticed them; the buildings are more
fortunate than the pictures in this, that
they remain in the sight of men to
share in the benefit of the awakening
which they have caused.
The building of which we speak has
evidently been designed in entire ac-