orm of the Gothic Pendent. 451 
conducing to the great end in view. The supports of the towers 
and spires of churches are in many cases quite different from 
those which the eye of the spectator is taught to consider as 
the real sources of stability. 
We might say truly of the Gothic architects, “ Ars est celare 
artem” ; but we have at present rather to do with the cases in 
which it is displayed. Though we are very far from thinking 
that the principles of taste are in all cases referrible to prin- 
ciples of reasoning, we believe that in a vast majority of cases 
they are so, and frequently to mechanical principles by no 
means obvious. The ¢act,—as distinguished from definite 
knowledge,—which experience conveys, is one of the most cu- 
rious of our faculties, and we are often astonished on disco- 
vering upon what remote analogies or reasoning our home- 
liest conclusions are founded. That there is a point beyond 
which mere logic is unavailable, and where its application 
would be absurd, few will] deny: but we must commence with 
the clear conception of a design to be answered, and means 
conspiring to the given end; nor must our superstructure be 
inconsistent with that design, nor opposed to, if it does not 
conspire with, those means. The more obvious conditions 
of stability must be fulfilled; and any ornament interfering 
with them is not only superfluous but displeasing. Every 
conspicuous part must have its apparent use: no portion 
must have a greater share of duty assigned to it than it ap- 
pears, as well as is, able to sustain.. Some of the architects 
of the middle ages delighted in constructing paradoxes in 
stone. ‘They violated the rules of good taste, because they 
violated the rules of common sense. Every one sees that he- 
lical pillars, if they be what they appear to be, are incapable 
of bearing a heavy load. Short dumpy pillars seem dispro- 
portioned to the chance of their flexure; very slender ones, 
unless most skilfully grouped, look as if a touch of the finger 
would bend them at the middle of their length. Orders of archi- 
tecture of increasing heaviness as we ascend, stone staircases 
which seem hung in air, and leaning towers (if we could con- 
ceive that it ever occurred to an architect to execute such a 
monstrosity), would be equal violations of the canons of taste 
and reason. On the other hand, the most moderately expe- 
rienced eye cannot look at a well-balanced building, what- 
ever may be its order of architecture, or at a well-trussed 
roof, however simple its materials, without a degree of con- 
scious satisfaction, of the cause of which we are for a mo- 
ment ignorant. ‘Though we do not pretend that the eye can 
detect by mere general experience the concordance between 
parts which the more refined mechanical problems present, 
242 
