THE STYLE OF THE EMPIRE. 



473 



CHARACTERISTICS OF THE EMPIRE STYLE. 



GENERAL TENDENCY. The general character of the style of the 

 Empire period, as above defined, is sufficiently described when it is 

 said that the most literal classicism of the Louis XVI. period was 

 carried yet further, and that it introduced into architectural design the 

 frigidity which characterises the sculpture of Canova and the painting 

 of David. Its lines, especially in decoration and furniture, are even 

 more exclusively straight, stiffer, more comfortless, its spirit more 

 grandiose and pre- 

 tentious, while much 

 of the refinement and 

 elegance which had 

 lent charm to pre- 

 revolutionary work 

 had evaporated. 



The report of a 

 commission ap- 

 pointed by Napoleon 

 to inquire into the 

 state of the arts, and 

 presented in 1810, 

 is significant of the 

 architectural ideas of 

 that generation. It 

 is clear from this 

 document that bald- 

 ness was in itself 

 regarded as a merit. 

 One passage eulo- 

 gises the architect 

 Mathurin Crucy for 

 having created a new 

 era by abandoning 

 the taste of the school of Blondel, which affected "coupled or superposed 

 columns, balusters distributed everywhere, multiplied pilasters placed 

 even behind columns, or on the angles of recesses and projections " ; 

 while from another passage it may be gathered that the highest commen- 

 dation that could be bestowed on a design was to recognise that it was 

 composed of elements directly copied from ancient examples ; thus the 

 new Hall of the Tribunate (destroyed in 1827) in the Palais Royal is 

 praised to the skies because the architect, Claude Etienne Beaumont, had 

 included in it sundry details borrowed respectively from the Roman Pan- 

 theon and from the temples of Peace, of Concord, and of Jupiter Stator. 



446. 



PARIS : MIRROR TOP IN HOTEL DE POLOGNE, 

 65 RUE DE TURENNE. 



