a delicate instrument which may catch and
perpetuate in imperishable notation unheard harmonies: a staff to lean
upon through the journey of life: a candid friend who never deceives us:
perchance a divining rod, which may ultimately reveal to us that Beauty
and Truth are one--as they certainly are, or ought to be, in the world
of art.

[Illustration (f035): Radiating Line in Architectural Construction:
Vaulting of Chapter House, Westminster.]

CHAPTER III

Of the Choice and Use of Line--Degree and Emphasis--Influence of
the Photograph--The Value of Emphasis--The Technical
Influence--The Artistic Purpose--Influence of Material and
Tools--Brush-work--Charcoal--Pencil--Pen.

Recognizing the great range and capacity of line as a means of
expression, and also the range of choice it presents to the designer and
draughtsman, the actual exercise of this choice of line, with a view to
the most expressive and effective use in practice, becomes, of course,
of the first consequence.

In this matter of choice we are helped by natural bias, by personal
character and preferences, for which it would, as I have said, be
difficult fully to account; but beyond this a kind of evolution goes on,
arising out of actual practice, which controls and is controlled by it.
Draw simply a succession of strokes with any point upon paper, and we
find that we are gradually led to repeat a particular kind of stroke, a
particular degree of line, partly perhaps because it seems to be
produced with more ease, and partly because it appears to have the
pleasantest effect.

[Choice of Line]

By a kind of "natural selection," therefore, influenced no doubt by many
small secondary causes, such as the relation of the particular angle of
the hand and pencil-point to the surface--the nature of the point
itself and the nature of the surface--we finally arrive at a choice of
line. This choice, again, will be liable to constant variation, owing
to the nature of the object we are about to draw, or the kind of design
we want to make.

[Use of Line]

The kind of line which seems appropriate to representing the delicate
edges of a piece of low-relief sculpture, for instance, would require
greater force and firmness if we wanted to draw an antique cast in the
round, and in strong light and