Bayham Abbey, function and character

Although it is obvious that every building ought 'to tell its own tale,' and not to look like anything else, yet this principle appears to have been lately too often violated: our hospitals resemble palaces, and our palaces may be mistaken for hospitals; our modern churches look like theatres, and our theatres appear like warehouses. In surveying the public buildings of the metropolis, we admire St. Luke's Hospital as a mad-house, and Newgate as a prison, because they both announce their purposes by their appropriate appearance, and no stranger has occasion to inquire for what uses they are intended.