'■The Bodily Temple 
THE BODILY TEMPLE. 1 
C ARLYLE says, “There is but one 
temple in the world, and that is the body 
of man.” If the body is, as he declares, a 
temple, it is not less true that a temple or 
any work of architectural art is a larger body 
which man has created for his uses, just as 
the individual self is housed within its 
stronghold of flesh and bones. Architectural 
beauty, like human beauty, depends upon a 
proper subordination of parts to a whole, 
a harmonious inter-relation between these 
parts, the 
expressiveness 
on the part 
of each of its 
functions, and 
when these 
functions are 
many and 
J 
diverse, their 
reconcilement 
one with 
another. For 
this reason a study of the human figure with 
a view to analyzing the sources of its beauty 
cannot fail to be profitable to the architectural 
designer. Pursued intelligently, such a study 
will stimulate the mind to a perception of 
those simple yet subtle laws, according to 
which nature everywhere works ; and it will 
educate the eye in the finest known school 
of proportion, training it to distinguish 
minute differences, in the same way that the 
hearing of good music cultivates the ear. 
In the ideally perfect human figure, those 
principles of natural beauty which formed 
the subject of the preceding essays are all 
exemplified. Though essentially a unit, there 
is a well marked division into right and left,— 
“ Hands to hands, and feet to feet, in one 
body grooms and brides.” There are two 
arms, two legs, two ears, two eyes, and two 
lids to each eye : the nose has two nostrils, 
the mouth two lips. Moreover, the terms of 
such pairs are masculine and feminine with 
regard to each other, one being active, and 
the other passive. Owing to the great size 
and one-sided position of the liver, the 
right half of the body is heavier than the 
i The fourth of Mr. Bragdon’s series of articles entitled :—“ The 
Beautiful Necessity : being Essays upon Architectural Esthetics,” begun 
in the January number of House and Garoen. 
left. 'I'he right arm is usually longer and 
more muscular than the left; the right eye is 
higher than its fellow. With one nostril the 
breath is inhaled, and with the other it is 
expelled. In speaking and eating the lower 
jaw and under lip are active and mobile with 
relation to the upper; in winking it is the 
upper eyelid which is the more active. 
That “ inevitable duality ” which is ex¬ 
hibited in the form of the body characterizes 
its motions also. In the act of walking, for 
example, a forward movement is attained by 
means of a forward and backward movement 
of the thighs on the axis of the hips. This 
leg motion becomes twofold again below the 
knee, and the feet move up and down inde¬ 
pendently on the axis of the ankle. A 
similar progression is followed in raising the 
arm and hand: motion is communicated first to 
the larger parts, through them to the smaller, 
and so to the extremities, becoming more 
rapid and complex as it progresses, so that 
all free and natural movements of the limbs 
describe invisible lines of beauty in the air. 
Co-existent with this pervasive duality, 
there is a threefold division of the figure into 
trunk, head, and limbs : a superior trinity 
of head and arms, and an inferior trinity of 
trunk and legs. The limbs are divided 
threefold into upper-arm, forearm and hand; 
thigh, leg, and foot. The hand flowers out 
into fingers and the foot into toes, each 
with a threefold articulation ; and in this way 
is effected that transition from unity to 
