4io 



RENAISSANCE ARCHITECTURE IN FRANCE, 



large contributed to the mould- 

 ing of a new style. Among 

 these was the popularity of the 

 writings of Jean Jacques Rous- 

 seau. He preached the doc- 

 trine of a healthy mode of life 

 in accordance with the dictates 

 of nature, and freed from the 

 artificialities of an over-refined 

 civilisation. He proclaimed 

 the virtues of an open-air exist- 

 ence and of rural pursuits. He 

 opened men's eyes to the 

 beauties of wild landscape, 

 and to the picturesque and 

 romantic aspects of nature, 

 and inaugurated the age of 

 sensibility. The tastes thus 

 created found expression in 

 design by a greater simplicity 

 in the architectural line, by 

 the introduction in decoration 

 of sentimental emblems (Fig. 

 391) and rustic objects (Fig. 

 390), and by the substitu- 

 tion of informal for formal 

 gardening. 



ENGLISH INFLUENCE. 

 Another influence was the 

 Anglomania which had in- 

 vaded French society, precisely 

 perhaps because English ideas 

 tallied in so many points with 

 those which were in the air in 

 France. The puristic bias of 

 English classical architecture, 

 the tearful sentiment of Rich- 

 ardson's Clarissa, the English 



cult of country life, and the English invention of the so-called landscape 

 garden were among these points of contact. 



RESULTING STYLISTIC DEVELOPMENT. Under these various influ- 

 ences persistent efforts were made to expel what were regarded as the 

 excesses and bad taste of the rococo fashion, and to make architecture 

 and decoration simpler, severer, more classical. Architects exhibited 



ARABESQUE BY J. P. CAUVET. 



