When Charles II. was restored to his inheritance in 1660, he evidently contemplated indulging in the royal pastime of fine building. At this time John Webb was not only the veteran of architecture, but the most notable exponent of the art then living in England. His claims on the favour of the king were founded on his long and intimate connection with Inigo Jones, a name to conjure with both in relation to architecture and to the less stable factor of court influence. They were supported on the practical side by the work he had done, although fruitlessly, for Charles’s father in the preparation of the great schemes for the palace at Whitehall, and by the assistance he had given both in architecture and the artistic hobbies of the time to many of the nobility and gentry. They were supported on the human side by personal services rendered to the late king, especially in furnishing to him, while at Oxford, full designs and particulars of all the fortifications round London, with instructions how they might be carried; and in conveying to the king, whilst at Beverley, his majesty’s jewellery, which he took, concealed in his waistcoat, through the enemy’s quarters, suffering, in consequence of the fact being discovered, close imprisonment for a month.

These claims, as we have seen, failed to gain for him the coveted post of surveyor to the king’s works, but Charles employed him in resuscitating the idea of a new palace at Whitehall, which never came to fruition, and in actually erecting a considerable part of the projected palace at Greenwich.

Webb never succeeded in obtaining the official appointment for which he longed, for which he appears to have had the best qualifications, and of which he was actually promised the reversion on the death of Sir John Denham, who was preferred before him at the Restoration. The reasons for his failure are obscure, but it may be that his active employment during the Commonwealth told against him, for his clients of that period were obviously not such devoted adherents of the royal cause as to be in exile, or suffering other great hardships. It may be that he lacked the support and patronage of John Evelyn, whose influence with Charles II. in all matters of culture was enormous. It may be that his age was against him, for when Wren was appointed on the death of Denham, Webb was fifty-seven years old. But whatever the cause, his failure was complete, and he eventually retired to his home at Butleigh where he died in 1672. Although he missed the goal of his ambition, although the men who have had the ear of the world have not sounded his name in high notes, he was a remarkable man. The work conceded to him by general consent is noteworthy, and he probably did more to influence domestic architecture in England than any other man of his time, Inigo Jones not excepted. For any student, divesting himself of established prejudices, who will examine his original drawings, can hardly fail to come to the conclusion that it was his imagination and his hand which developed and prepared most of the designs which, published as the work of Inigo Jones, had so wide an effect upon English houses in the eighteenth century.

Charles II.’s interest in the pastime of building was but fitful. The Whitehall Palace got little further than Webb’s old designs, nor did that at Greenwich go beyond the one block called after the king. He was preoccupied with matters of more personal interest, and what money he had for his own purposes was spent in directions other than that of architecture. Nevertheless incidental to the kingly rôle was the patronage of the arts, and when the necessity arose he bestowed his attention upon them and upon those, who were engaged in their pursuit. It was in this way that Wren was brought to his notice, and thereby obtained that official position which led to the development of his extraordinary powers. That Charles had no special acquaintance with architecture nor any consuming love for it, is sufficiently proved by his sanction of that design of Wren’s for St Paul’s Cathedral known as the “warrant” design, and by the spasmodic way in which he sought to house himself in regal fashion; for another abortive attempt at a palace was made in 1683, this time at Winchester and with the help of Wren.

Wren is even better known to the public as an architect than Inigo Jones, largely owing to the fact that he left behind him many more buildings which can be seen to-day than did his predecessor. But the admiration he has received, whether founded on knowledge or not, is no more than his due, for he was a truly remarkable man. He had achieved a European reputation as a man of science before he was thirty, and although, when he became officially connected with building for the first time, he had apparently received no practical training in architecture, he soon made up his deficiencies on the scaffold itself, amid the ring of the trowel and the thud of the hammer.

He came of good and cultured stock. His father, Dr. Christopher Wren, was Dean of Windsor; his uncle, Matthew, was Bishop of Ely. His father was a man of considerable attainments in literature and science, and had a superficial knowledge of architecture. Christopher, who was born in 1632, was his only son, and received a good education. His natural abilities enabled him to profit by his opportunities to such a degree that at the age of thirteen he invented a new astronomical instrument and a pneumatic engine, both of which he introduced to his father in elegant Latin, the one in verse, the other in prose. A year later he was entered as a gentleman-commoner at Wadham College, Oxford, where he continued to distinguish himself. It would be tedious to recount his juvenile essays in astronomy, mathematics, gnomonics, and Latin, but so great a reputation did he achieve that when Evelyn (who took a genuine interest in anything remarkable) went to Oxford in 1654, he made a point of going to see “that miracle of a youth, Mr. Christopher Wren, nephew of the Bishop of Ely.”

The youth was then twenty-two, and was already a Master of Arts and a Fellow of All Souls; three years later he was chosen Professor of Astronomy at Gresham College in London, and subsequently, in 1661, Savilian professor of the same subject in the University of Oxford. In the same year he was made D.C.L. by both Oxford and Cambridge. During these years he was one of the most active of those “virtuous and learned men of philosophical minds” who, along with Dr. Wilkins, Warden of Wadham, laid the foundations of the Royal Society. A whole page of the “Parentalia”—memoirs written by his son, and the chief source of information concerning his life—is occupied with a catalogue of the New Theories, Inventions, Experiments, and Mechanic Improvements exhibited by Mr. Wren at the meetings in connection with the great movement. One or two examples will serve to show the wide range of his investigations: a weather clock; an artificial eye, with the humours truly and dioptically made; several ways of graving and etching; divers improvements in the art of husbandry; divers new musical instruments; easier ways of whale-fishing; ways to perfect coaches for ease. Indeed there seems to have been nothing in the heavens above, or the earth beneath, or the waters under the earth, about which he did not know something.

These things may be regarded as the by-products of a great imagination, an imagination which made him a skilled astronomer and a profound mathematician. He had an extraordinary aptitude for scientific research, and he was the first who experimented in the infusion of foreign liquid into the blood of animals, a process which, modified to the transfusion of blood from one person to another, has had remarkable results in medicine. He also established, by experiment, before the Royal Society in 1668, the Third Law of Motion; and no doubt his study of the laws of motion subsequently stood him in good stead in his daring feats of architectural construction.

The remarkable thing about these studies and experiments is that, amid all their variety, not a word is said about architecture. He was a fair draughtsman, but he was primarily a man of science and a virtuoso, in other words, a man accomplished in the arts and sciences, but who had no need to bring his knowledge to any practical test involving responsibility. He was, however, soon to become more than a virtuoso, for in the year 1661 he was appointed deputy surveyor of his majesty’s works and buildings under Sir John Denham, and, after the latter’s death in 1668, he succeeded him in the office to the exclusion of the more experienced Webb.

Wren’s early efforts in architecture show, as might be expected, considerable immaturity. One of his first was the Sheldonian Theatre at Oxford, on which he was engaged between 1663 and 1668. It is interesting as the work of a man young in design, but it cannot be regarded as a masterpiece; its shape is ungraceful, and its detail crude. One of its principal claims to attention was its roof, which covered (with a flat ceiling) what was then considered a very wide span, namely, 70 ft. Here Wren’s scientific training must have helped him; he was also probably helped by his carpenter, one R. Frogley. The roof itself has been renewed, but drawings of it were published by Dr Plot in his “Natural History of Oxfordshire,” and were reproduced in “Parentalia.” Its most remarkable feature was the long tie-beam of the principals, which being too long for one piece of timber, was made up of three pieces ingeniously jointed, or “scarfed,” together. There are still tie-beams to the roof, but they are hidden in the thickness of the attic floor, and it is impossible to say whether they are Wren’s or not. But as the disposition of all the visible timbers is quite different from those shown by Plot, the inference is that there is nothing left of Wren’s ingenious roof. With the old roof went Wren’s ugly dormers as well as his turret, which was replaced by that which exists to-day.

The other work at Oxford, attributed to Wren, rests its claims, except in the case of the Tom Tower of Christ Church, on little or no evidence. Even in the case of Trinity College, where letters show him to have been consulted, he appears to have done nothing beyond sending, in 1664, to his friend, Dr. Bathurst, the president, a letter with alternative plans and an elevation; and in criticising, in 1692, a design for the chapel. There is no evidence that he actually carried out any work here in the formal capacity of architect. About so notable a feature of Oxford as the Tom Tower it would be rash to say anything in disparagement. But this much may perhaps be said without offence. It is at least doubtful whether the designer of the lower part, which is the original Gothic work, would have been satisfied with Wren’s completion. The scale is different, the detail is different; the whole conception is out of harmony with Gothic ideas. Yet it is still less allied to anything classic; the fact is that Wren was working in a style which he did not understand, and which he frankly disliked. We get much nearer to the heart of the man by studying another aspect of his work at Oxford, his drawings preserved in the library at All Souls. There are four large volumes of them, comprising designs for various works, including alterations to one or two large houses; but the most interesting are those connected with St Paul’s Cathedral. In these volumes can be seen his weakness and his strength, and, taken in conjunction with other of his drawings preserved at St Paul’s, they show how he felt his way in architectural design. They also indicate that the old system still survived under which the architect relied in great measure upon his subordinates for the detail of his work; at the same time they prove that Wren worked out his general conceptions much more thoroughly than such men as John Thorpe and Smithson had done a century earlier.

The history of the reparation and rebuilding of St Paul’s is too long and intricate to be set out in detail in this place, apart from the fact that it is outside the category of domestic architecture; but it stands for so much in Wren’s life that a few words about it may, perhaps, be allowed.

During the years following the restoration of Charles II. much consideration had been given to the old cathedral, which was in a neglected and ruinous condition. The commissioners, of whom Wren was one, were divided in opinion as to the course to be pursued; some were for preserving it, others for rebuilding. Inigo Jones had already put a new classic west front to the Gothic building; it was held to be one of the finest pieces of architecture of modern times. Wren’s idea was to continue the classic casing and to replace the lofty spire by a classic dome. Some of the drawings at All Souls embody this idea, which fortunately was never carried out. Then came the great fire in 1666, and the problem was simplified, for the fire had left but little to deal with, and it was decided to rebuild.

The fire wrought a great change in Wren: he was no longer the professor, the virtuoso, but the architect; for to him fell the duty of rebuilding not only the cathedral, but the numerous city churches which had been destroyed. It is fortunate that old St Paul’s was so completely shattered as to compel its demolition, for although the force necessary to remove the ruins was such as would have elicited vigorous protests in the present day (gunpowder had to be employed, to the terror of adjacent occupants), yet it resulted in providing Wren with a vacant site whereon he could place a new building, instead of attempting either a mixture of Gothic and classic such as he had formerly contemplated, or his own version of Gothic which would have been even more unpalatable.

The new St Paul’s is one of the finest and most impressive buildings of its kind in Europe; its dome is unrivalled for purity of outline and aptness of composition. How did a man, who had no practical acquaintance with architecture until he was thirty years old, conceive such a masterpiece within a few years from that time? Probably nobody but Wren could have done it: he had an extraordinary aptitude for mastering any subject to which he turned his attention. But even he did not produce this great result at one stroke; he felt his way through many attempts. There were two complete preliminary designs, neither of which had much in common with the other or with the building as erected, beyond the fact that the dominating feature was to be a dome. The first of these is known as Wren’s favourite design, the other as the “warrant” design.

The first was worked out with much care and completeness, and a large model of it was made, which is now preserved in one of the towers of the cathedral (Fig. 97). The plan, however, was so great a departure from the type sanctioned by tradition, that it was rejected by the king and his advisers. Wren thereupon produced the “warrant” design, one of the most extraordinary ever made by a serious man, and one of the worst to which a great architect ever set his name. This is a mystery to which no satisfactory solution has yet been found. That a man with the capacity of producing St Paul’s as we see it, should have produced the “warrant” design, and seriously submitted it for acceptance, is astonishing; but apparently Wren knew his clients, for it was approved and ordered to be carried out under the warrant of the king, dated the 14th May 1675, wherein it is described as “very artificial, proper, and useful.” The slight change which time has introduced into the meaning of the first of these adjectives lends, for modern ears, a spice of humour to the description.

Fortunately, nothing more was heard of this design; it reposes among the drawings in the All Souls library, and there is nothing to show that any attempt was made to develop it. How Wren managed to drop it completely has not been explained. He had the king’s leave to vary it in minor points; he varied it altogether. It is probable that, the matter being left in his hands, he quietly proceeded, as the years went by, to improve upon his early ideas. The dome of the “warrant” design is its ugliest feature; among Wren’s drawings are many sketches of domes, none of them so bad as this, nor any so good as the final one, nor is there any special sequence of steps to show how the ultimate result was obtained. But it is easy to see that the result was his own work, and that it was only after numerous trials that he at last achieved it.

The building of St Paul’s took many years. The first stone was laid on 21st June 1675; the last stone of the cupola was laid by his son in the old man’s presence in 1710. During this period of thirty-five years Wren practically rebuilt the city churches, and was thus continually gaining experience. The great cathedral will always be his chief monument, but the fifty-three churches which he carried out would themselves have made his reputation. The sites were mostly irregular, but of so much value that it was essential to utilise them completely. Wren covered them to the last inch, and yet contrived to get that classic treatment in which symmetry plays so important a part. In many hands symmetry would have meant extravagance in space and materials. The problem in planning was new in another respect, for the churches were all designed for the Protestant form of worship, requiring an arrangement different from that of mediæval churches, and, among other things, a suitable auditorium.

To his skill in planning he added a constant variety of treatment, both inside and out; and, given a departure from the simple straight lines of a Gothic spire, nothing could exceed the happy ingenuity and fertility of design exhibited in Wren’s steeples.

Wren did not pass his whole time in designing ecclesiastical buildings. He had the chief share in the shaping of Greenwich Hospital which, originally intended for a palace, was begun and continued in a palatial manner, although diverted from its first purpose and made into a home for worn-out sailors (Fig. 98). He also began the rebuilding of Hampton Court, but happily did not proceed, as was at one time contemplated, to sweep away the whole of the older portions of that fascinating place. These are both in a sense domestic work, but they are not domestic in the way that appeals to the ordinary person. People who live in palaces may well afford some sacrifice to grandeur. Wren’s was the grand manner. His churches involved fairly simple planning. Their requirements lent themselves to this treatment much more readily than those of an ordinary house with its complicated demands, where an uncomfortable plan is not atoned for by splendour of appearance. If it be asked how Wren would have faced the difficulties of ordinary domestic planning, there is but little material for an answer. The work he did in the Temple does not help us much. Several houses in different parts of the country are attributed to him, but without much reliable evidence. At All Souls, however, there are a few drawings, either of new houses or of alterations to old ones, and these do not go to prove that he had his usual masterful grip of the subject. Doubtless, had the necessity arisen, he would have acquired it, but his energies took another direction, and he has left no solution of how to build a house at once convenient, comfortable, and grand.

He lived to be an old man—he was ninety-one when he died in 1723—yet he lived a strenuous life till within a few years of his death. He not only devised his own buildings, but superintended their erection, and it was largely on the scaffold that he gained his experience. This did much to sober his judgment and make his work reasonable and sensible, more so than that of his immediate successors. Although at first an amateur, he became practical through being in constant touch with his work: they remained amateurs all the way through.

A slight but vivid picture of him at work was drawn by the lively Duchess of Marlborough, who, when expostulating with Vanbrugh for demanding £300 a year for looking after Blenheim, declared that Wren had been “content to be dragged up in a basket, three or four times a week to the top of St Paul’s, and at great hazard, for £200 a year.”

All through his busy years as an architect he maintained his interest in science, and was not only President of the Royal Society in 1680, but continued to submit all sorts of inventions and suggestions for the consideration of its members. Curiously enough, these things had but little practical value, not even that one which showed how smoky chimneys might be cured: indeed none but futile specifics have yet been offered to the public with this end in view.

His later years were clouded by the intrigues of his opponents at court, who not only contrived to oust him from his office of surveyor to the royal works, but endeavoured to attack his character for probity. The latter attempt failed of course; but when he was already eighty-six and had held his office for nearly fifty years, he was superseded by an unknown and incompetent person.

Wren’s influence on architecture was powerful while he lived, but he can hardly be said to have founded a distinctive school of domestic architecture which long survived him. Soon after his death new publications, amongst which the most influential was Kent’s “Designs of Inigo Jones,” changed the trend of design. His influence, however, continued to be felt in the treatment of interior decoration, particularly in regard to panelling and ornamental woodwork, down to the middle of the century. The exteriors of many small Georgian houses may owe something to him, but such houses as are obviously reminiscent of his manner were built during his lifetime.

Most of his successors, while carrying on the style in which he worked, failed to impart to their work that vigour and reasonableness which distinguished his. The rules and regulations which served as guides to him became masters to them, and we look in vain among them either for his scientific equipment or his intuitive perception of what was fitting. The grandeur of manner which suited admirably the buildings with which he had to deal, was out of place when applied to ordinary houses; and the artificiality which sprang from the way in which architecture was then regarded, but which his genius enabled him to avoid, settled down heavily after his death.

Among the drawings at All Souls are the examples of house design illustrated here (Figs. 99–102). They are not named, and have not been identified; it is not even certain that they were ever carried out. But they give some idea of Wren’s notions as to the appearance he would have given to houses. In general disposition they conform to the type adopted by Jones and Webb, but they have touches about them reminiscent of French architecture,[46] more particularly those in Figs. 99, 101. The others are two rough sketches for the front of a building (probably a house), drawn on a piece of waste paper, and apparently they show two methods of treating the same façade (Fig. 102). They are characteristic of Wren’s manner as displayed at Hampton Court (see Fig. 6), more so than the other examples illustrated, and they are certainly more pleasing in their proportions and in the simplicity of their handling. The design for part of a front for the new palace at Whitehall (Fig. 103) is interesting in two respects; it is a specimen of Wren’s treatment of domestic architecture on a grand scale; and it proves that Charles II. still harboured the idea of a great new palace at Whitehall, an idea which fructified as little under Wren’s direction as it had done under Webb’s. As a piece of design this is no advance upon what had already been tried before. There is a weediness and crudity of ornament about it which is out of keeping with Wren’s actual work; but of him it may be said, as of Inigo Jones and other great architects, that his designs are less happy on paper than in execution. Indeed a study of all the important collections of architectural drawings inclines one to take the negative side in the interesting controversy, “Is fine drawing necessary to fine architecture?”

The indications of French feeling alluded to above may be accounted for by the fact that in the early days of Wren’s connection with architecture, in 1665, he went to France for a few months. He was already enthusiastic in his new vocation, and like many an enthusiast in the same cause before him and after him, he wanted to see what was being done in foreign lands. He spent his whole time there in interviewing eminent architects and in visiting the most noteworthy buildings of Paris and its neighbourhood. He made so many sketches that he said in one of his letters that he bid fair to bring back “almost all France on paper.” He had indeed caught the architectural fever; and every architect knows that thenceforward it would never leave his veins.

Among the houses attributed, on insufficient grounds, to Wren is Belton House, near Grantham, one of the seats of Earl Brownlow (Fig. 104); it was built in the year 1689 for Sir John Brownlow. There is nothing particularly novel about it; it follows the type of what may be called the Webb house, both as to plan (Fig. 105) and external treatment. It has the bold cornice, the hipped roof, and the balustraded flat out of which rises a cupola, which Webb had rendered familiar. In spite of its good proportions, however, it hardly hits the mark so fully and truly as Webb’s work, and it lacks in many respects the masculine vigour of Wren’s. Nevertheless it is a notable building, and an admirable example of a dignified yet unpretentious country house, quite comfortable to live in.

The screen of ironwork which runs from the house to a subsidiary range of buildings contains a fine gateway (Fig. 106) and encloses a court of some architectural interest and one which strikes a pleasing note, as it brings some of the minor accommodation into close relationship to the house. It is approached through an archway in the side opposite to what is now the front door. Being enclosed on one side by the open screen already mentioned, it has a cheerful outlook over the park. The present front door, with its porch, has been squeezed in among the windows; it probably replaces an original exit of small importance which led into the court for the sake of convenience. The principal entrance was formerly up the broad flight of steps in the middle of the façade; but the present access, although not so stately, is better adapted to modern requirements.

The interior has excellent decorative work of the period. In addition to the panelling there is a considerable amount of carving attributed to Grinling Gibbons (Fig. 107); and there are a few ceilings executed in high relief, with admirably modelled detail, of which the treatment corresponds with that associated with Gibbons’ name. So charming are the figures and foliage that they prompt a desire to see them at close quarters, instead of on the inaccessible heights of a ceiling.

The chapel (Fig. 96) is interesting as an example of classic treatment applied to sacred purposes, and as one among the last survivals of the mediæval idea that it was necessary for a large house to have a chapel within it. In the days when a household might be cut off for weeks from the parish church and when a daily exercise of religious observances was of the first importance, a chapel always accessible and close at hand was necessary. But the time was approaching, if it had not already arrived, when the religious fervour of distinguished people could easily be satisfied by attendance at places of public worship.