vertical columns: when the arch was introduced by the Romans, it was concealed, or kept in state of subordination: and the lateral support which it required was supplied latently, masked by some artifice. But the struggle between the mechanical and the decorative construction", ended in the complete disorganization of the classical style. The inconsistencies and extravagancies, of which we have noticed the occurrence, were results and indications of the fall of good architecture. The elements of the ancient system had lost all principle of connexion and regard to rule. Building became not only a mere art, but an art exercised by masters without skill, and without feeling for real beauty (o).

When, after this deep decline, architecture rose again, as it did in the twelfth and succeeding centuries, in the exquisitely beautiful and skilful forms of the Gothic style, what was the nature of the change which had taken place, so far as it bears upon the progress of science? It was this:-the idea of true mechanical relations in an edifice had been revived in men's minds, as far as was requisite for the purposes of art and beauty: and this, though a very different thing from the possession of the idea as an element of speculative science, was the proper preparation for that acquisition. The notion of support and stability again became conspicuous in the decorative construction, and universal in the

5

See Mr. Willis's admirable Remarks on the Architecture of the Middle Ages, chap. ii.

forms of building. The eye which, looking for beauty in definite and significant relations of parts, is never satisfied except the weights appear to be duly supported, was again gratified. Architecture threw off its barbarous characters: a new decorative construction was matured, not thwarting and controlling, but assisting and harmonizing with the mechanical construction. All the ornamental parts were made to enter into the apparent construction. Every member, almost every moulding, became a sustainer of weight; and by the multiplicity of props assisting each other, and the consequent subdivision of weight, the eye was satisfied of the stability of the structure, notwithstanding the curiouslyslender forms of the separate parts. The arch and the vault, no longer trammelled by an incompatible system of decoration, but favoured by more tractable forms, were only limited by the skill of the builders. Everything showed that, practically at least, men possessed and applied, with steadiness and pleasure, the idea of mechanical pressure and support.

The possession of this idea, as a principle of art, led, in the course of time, to its speculative developement as the foundation of a science; and thus architecture prepared the way for mechanics. But this advance required several centuries. The inter

"Willis, pp. 15-21. I have throughout this description of the formation of the Gothic style availed myself of Mr. Willis's well-chosen expressions.

val between the admirable cathedrals of Salisbury, Amiens, Cologne, and the mechanical treatises of Stevinus, is not less than three hundred years. During this time, men were advancing towards science, but in the meantime, and perhaps from the very beginning of the time, art had begun to decline. The buildings of the fifteenth century, erected when the principles of mechanical support were just on the verge of being enunciated in general terms, exhibit those principles with a far less impressive simplicity and elegance than those of the thirteenth. We may hereafter inquire whether we find any other examples to countenance the belief, that the formation of Science is commonly accompanied by the decline of Art.

The leading principle of the style of the Gothic edifices was, not merely that the weights were supported, but that they were seen to be so; and that not only the mechanical relations of the larger masses, but of the smaller members also, were displayed. Hence we cannot admit as an origin or anticipation of the Gothic, a style in which this principle is not manifested. I do not see, in any of the representations of the early Arabic buildings, that distribution of weights to supports, and that mechanical consistency of parts, which elevates them above the character of barbarous architecture. Their masses are broken into innumerable members, without subordination or meaning, in a manner suggested apparently by caprice and the love of

the marvellous. mosques, it was a favourite artifice of the Arabs to sustain immense and ponderous masses of stone by the support of pillars so slender, that the incumbent weight seemed, as it were, suspended in the air by an invisible hand." This pleasure in the contemplation of apparent impossibilities is a very general disposition among mankind; but it appears to belong to the infancy, rather than the maturity of intellect. On the other hand, the pleasure in the contemplation of what is clear, the craving for a thorough insight into the reasons of things, which marks the European mind, is the temper which leads to science.

"In the construction of their

6. Treatises on Architecture.-No one who has attended to the architecture which prevailed in England, France, and Germany, from the twelfth to the fifteenth century, so far as to comprehend its beauty, harmony, consistency, and uniformity, even in the minutest parts and most obscure relations, can look upon it otherwise than as a remarkably connected and definite artificial system. Nor can we doubt that it was exercised by a class of artists who formed themselves by laborious study and practice, and by communication with each other. There must have been bodies of masters and of scholars, discipline, traditions, precepts of art. How these associated artists diffused themselves over Europe, and whether history enables us to trace them in a distinct form, I shall not here discuss. 7 Mahometanism Unveiled, ii. 255.

But the existence of a course of instruction, and of a body of rules of practice, is proved beyond dispute by the great series of European cathedrals and churches, so nearly identical in their general arrangements, and in their particular details. The question then occurs, have these rules and this system of instruction anywhere been committed to writing? Can we, by such evidence, trace the progress of the scientific idea, of which we see the working in these buildings?

We are not to be surprized, if, during the most flourishing and vigorous period of the art of the middle ages, we find none of its precepts in books. Art has, in all ages and countries, been taught and transmitted by practice and verbal tradition, not by writing. It is only in our own times, that the thought occurs as familiar, of committing to books all that we wish to preserve and convey. And, even in our own times, most of the Arts are learned far more by practice, and by intercourse with practitioners, than by reading. Such is the case, not only with Manufactures and Handicrafts, but with the Fine Arts, with Engineering, and even yet, with that art, Building, of which we are now speaking.

We are not, therefore, to wonder, if we have no treatises on Architecture belonging to the great period of the Gothic masters;—or if it appears to have required some other incitement and some other help, besides their own possession of their practical skill, to lead them to shape into a literary form the precepts of the art which they knew so