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however, was to a considerable extent needful, even for abstract beauty, for 

 contrast with the curve : there were straight lines in the human face, 

 and they were essential to beauty, in which quality a face whose profile 

 was all curve would be deficieut. Curved lines, however, were more 

 obviously natural : the Romanesque arch would be suggested, as the 

 crowning shape of gates and doorways, by the arched termination of the 

 human figure, the vaulted roof of the brain. The pointed arch was the 

 most natural and beautiful modification that could have been made of 

 the circular one, to meet and harmonize with the vertical expression 

 introduced in the twelfth century. It was the Roman arch inspired 

 with a new life — drawn heavenward, by the vertical growth of the style 

 in which it was used. Not only the elementary curves of architectural 

 decoration, but their combination with regard to contrast, harmony, and 

 variety, were learnt from nature. The forms he educed from nature, 

 the architect was capable of variously applying, according to different 

 circumstances, in which operations invention might be said to consist. 

 Elements gathered from various and distant departments, kingdoms or 

 families of creation, were so variously distributed in his imagination, 

 under the laws of intellect, that in the higher works, as those of the 

 Greeks, the resemblance was only perceived by subtle thought, kindred 

 to that of the designer himself. But into these forms and combinations 

 nothing could enter that had not its origin in nature ; and even in the 

 minutest divisions and sub-divisions of architectural form, down to 

 finish and texture, nature had been the prompter. 



Indeed, decoration proper was chiefly obtained from direct imitation of 

 natural foliage and flowers ; those images of beauty, that delighted us 

 in our temples and palaces, our halls and mansions, were derived from 

 organic life, from the leaves and flowers of the field, through all the 

 various tribes of animals up to man himself ; and the highest object of 

 architectural decoration imitated from nature was the human figure ; for 

 when the Greeks and Medievalists assayed to go further and embellish 

 with gods, or angels, their pediments or niches, nature was still their 

 type and source : the Greek divinities were the apotheosis of mortal 

 beauty ; and, in the middle ages, angels were human figures with the 

 wings of the peacock or eagle, or, in the case of evil ones, of the bat. 

 But the Assyrians before their time had done the same: to embody 

 their idea of the power, wisdom, and omnipresence of the Creator, they 

 added the human head and wings of a bird to the body of a lion. The 

 sphinx (composed of the face of a virgin and body of a Uon,) occurs 

 among the sculptures both of Egypt and Assyria. The Assyrian marbles, 

 moreover, presented frequent repetitions of the eagle, or vulture-headed 

 god, — a human form conjoined with the head of a bird of prey. Archi- 

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