KT 
80 ; A 
Gal 
1 
MC Ai, 
LECTURE I. 
1. The rejn’esentation of vegetable forms must always 
be considered from two different points of view, the 
actual and the conventional. Nor indeed is it ever 
expedient to confound them; for though the conven¬ 
tional is based upon the actual, they are in their 
nature entirely different. 
2. I observe that some distinguished men who have 
previously addi'essed you in this theatre have ex¬ 
pressed an opinion that “ Flowers or other natural 
objects should not be used as ornament, but con 
ventional representations founded upon them, suffi¬ 
ciently suggestive to convey the intended image to 
the mind, without destroying the unity of the 
object they are employed to decorate : ” that “ In 
surface decoration all lines should flow out of a 
parent stem, every ornament, however distant, being 
traceable to its branch and root; ” and that, “ beauty 
of form is produced by lines growing out one from 
another in gradual undulations, there being no ex¬ 
crescences.” 
3. At first sight it appears difficult to reconcile 
these statements with another well-known axiom, that 
“ Whatever is beautiful is trueor, if you please, 
that “Whatever is untrue is not beautiful;” because, if 
you are to represent natural objects in a conventional 
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