1847.] 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECTS JOURNAL. 



165 



GLANCE AT SOME OF THE ATTRIBUTES OF 



ARCHITECTURE. 



By Frederick Lush. 



O noble Art I to honour whom unite, 



Beauty, with Grandeur and Simplicity, 



And bright. eheeli'd Colour, lovely child of Light, 



Link'd by the fairy hand of Symmetry. 



O noble Art ! how much we owe to thee. 



Of calm and holy thought, of feelings high. 



When in some splendid pile thy power we see; 



Whether the broad-brow'd tower that dares the iky. 



The hall by Commerce, or by Science trod. 



The palace home of kings, or solemn bouse of God. 



Anne A. Friuont. 



Sensible of the influence of the beautiful, all highly civilised 

 nations have surrounded themselves with it as much as possible. The 

 Greeks continually placed before their eyes the statues of their most 

 famous sculptors and the creations of their most famous painters; art 

 and nature reciprocally acted upon each other; — the lover of art, 

 quick in his perception of beauty, grew inwardly like what he 

 beheld ; whilst the natural symmetry of the sons of Greece, the grace 

 of the female form, and the proportions of their athlelas, filled the 

 soul of the artist with those vivid conceptions which we see em- 

 bodied to a great degree in the Apollo, the Venus de Medicis, the 

 Gladiator, and other well known statues of antiquity; and in the 

 highest degree iu the works of Phidias. So Michael Angelo imbued 

 his mind with grandeur by the incessant contemplation of the re- 

 nowned Torso ; — so the pictures of the Venetian masters seem as 

 though steeped in their city's rosy twilights and splendid sunsets. 

 Still, beauty will not incorporale itself with the feelings of man, nor 

 shape his works, if he be insensible to its charms. A country has 

 boasted the finest productions of art, whilst her people remained 

 unexcited by an admiration for them. At a period when Italy, for 

 instance, was in possession of her exquisite monuments of taste, and 

 abounded in all the luxuries of its climate, her people sank deeper 

 and deeper into barbarism. 



The loss of the advantages derivable from magnificent scenes, 

 owing to a perverted temper of mind through which they are re- 

 garded, is eloquently described by Sterne: — "The learned Smelfungus 

 travelled from Boulogne to Paris; from Paris to Rome, and so on ; 

 but he set out with the jaundice, and everything he saw was dis- 

 coloured and distorted : when he returned, he wrote an account of his 

 travels ; but 'twas nothing but the account of his miserable feelings." 

 It is not unusual to meet with those who presume to be critics, but 

 show themselves to be only cynics. These are men with hearts too 

 much hardened, and with eyes too much blinded, to enable them to 

 recognise the intrinsic greatness of an object. But the beautiful 

 cannot be justly appreciated, if the mind be not in harmony with it. 

 We can only form a judgment of a work whilst we are in similar 

 disposition with its author; and in possession of the same, or a 

 superior, taste and intelligence to that which it displays. Criticism, 

 as it relates to the fine arts, requires the exerc se of the finest, the 

 kindest, the most generous, and the most exalted sentiments and 

 attributes of our nature. It depends upon a knowledge of our in- 

 ternal nature, — upon a habit of turning the mind inwardly upon its 

 own operations, with a frequent observance of external objects. The 

 ancient metaphysicians threw great light on the theory and practice 

 of art,— grounding it on the philosophy of the human mind, as the 

 moderns — especially the Germans— have done; — and a theory that 

 would repose in security, must rest upon such a basis. Our notions 

 of what is good in art are to be built upon certain great truths, and 

 upon unchangeable principles: for the proof of the goodness of all 

 principles consists in their durability ; and such laws and elements of 

 beauty can we only consider fixed and settled as are deducible from, 

 and conformable to, the nature of the human mind. 



Truth— Utility— Adaptation.— Ttixlh is defined the standard of 



No. 117.— Vol. X.— June, 1847. 



right reason, the perfection and the end of mind. It is as important 

 in art as it is in morals. We prefer real to fictitious m iter! a's, the evi- 

 dence of a pure taste to what is only the semblance and affectation of 

 it, because "true and just things are in their nature b ■tt>'r than false 

 and unjust."* Rochefoucault says,—" La vente est le/undtment et la 

 raison de la perfection et de la beaute ; une chose, de quelq'ie nature 

 qii'elle soil, ne s^aiiroil etre belle et par/aite, si elle n'est ventahlement 

 tout ce qu'elle doit iHre et si elle n'a tout ce qu'elle doit avoir." [Maxim 

 294.] Truth and beauty do not differ but concur in one; the real and 

 the ideal, of which they are types, supply the one the means and ma- 

 terials to a work of art, the other the spirit which informs it; the 

 former selects what is most suitable and appropriate to its purposes ; 

 the latter gives to the production the utmost perfection of which it is 

 capable. 



It was always considered that whatever is useful in architecture, 

 should be rendered pleasing, and what is beautiful should be necessary. 

 The uses of a building must be studied before its ornaments; and 

 ornaments, however small or subordinate, must contribute to the 

 general effect, and arise out of, or be grafted upon, the construction 

 itself. Beauty of architecture is greatly dependent upon construc- 

 tion. The figures that give such sublimity to our churches and all 

 our vast edifices, are vaults and domes ; and these, at the same time, 

 confer upon them their most essential and most noble attributes. A 

 building may admirably fulfil its intentions in respect of utility, but it 

 would be cold without the additional charms of painting and sculp- 

 ture ; — yet these arts, and all decoration, should never screen any 

 imperfections, but should heighten the general character and mark 

 its destination. It requires for its perfection the introduction and 

 union of all the arts ; and such a skilful management of these, that 

 the effect of one shall not impair the effect of another, — but each aid 

 the other and add to the great impression of the whole. In a perfect 

 cathedral, we see the most successful achievements of the grand 

 requirements of architecture — the profound significance and meaning 

 of everything — the highest utility and beauty combined; — materials 

 invested with all the magic hues of poetry, and in their forms and 

 colours so beautifully symboUing forth the religion, as to be called by 

 Coleridge "petrifactions of Christianity." 



The architect first adapts the plan and design to its site, and to 

 other circumstances; because the want of good arrangement, of con- 

 venience, accommodation, or of stability, and other important requi- 

 sites, can never be compensated by any pictorial effect. Fanum est 

 quod non ad Jinem valet. Besides, these defects and deficiencies 

 always betray the absence of the necessary qualifications on the part 

 of the designer. Without the fulfilment of the first requisites of 

 art — without that knowledge of statics which is essential to the 

 security and duration of a structure, the character of durability can 

 never be impressed upon it. What makes the churches of Sir C. 

 Wren so beautiful but their poetry ?— he proved himself nevertheless 

 to be a great master-builder. Whatever may be the style of archi- 

 tecture, or however various the treatment and execution of its mate- 

 rials; whatever perfection of forms it may exhibit; whether it pre- 

 sent itself in the manly simplicity of the Grecian, or the rich profusion 

 of the Gothic ; its claims upon our admiration will be in proportion to 

 its durability ; — eternity being its sovereign attribute. What woufd 

 be the long colonnades of antiquity, and the groining and aisles of a 

 York Minster, if the great stones were not indissoluble and the arches 

 in perfect equilibrium? This is their principal source of sublimity. 

 But every work of man that is feeble and perishable suggests feelings 

 similar to those we experience in looking on a human body that is 

 consuming away, and in that process indicating a dissolution of that 

 symmetry and harmony in its fabric which is the cause of its health 

 and strength. 



Symmetry— Proportion.— Symmetry produces at regular or propor- 

 tioned distances of an edifice a unity of features, maintaining order 

 and congruity, amidst, it may be, the greatest variety. The rules of 



ArlAtotle. 



22 



