act of his life, can hardly utter two words of innocent
speech, or move his hand in accordance with those words, without
involving some reference, whether taught or instinctive, to the laws of
proportion. And in the fine arts, it is impossible to move a single
step, or to execute the smallest and simplest piece of work, without
involving all those laws of proportion in their full complexity. To
arrange (by invention) the folds of a piece of drapery, or dispose the
locks of hair on the head of a statue, requires as much sense and
knowledge of the laws of proportion, as to dispose the masses of a
cathedral. The one are indeed smaller than the other, but the relations
between 1, 2, 4, and 8, are precisely the same as the relations between
6, 12, 24, and 48. So that the assertion that "architecture is _par
excellence_ the art of proportion," could never be made except by
persons who know nothing of art in general; and, in fact, never _is_
made except by those architects, who, not being artists, fancy that the
one poor aesthetic principle of which they _are_ cognizant is the whole
of art. They find that the "disposition of masses" is the only thing of
importance in the art with which they are acquainted, and fancy
therefore that it is peculiar to that art; whereas the fact is, that all
great art _begins_ exactly where theirs _ends_, with the "disposition of
masses." The assertion that Greek architecture, as opposed to Gothic
architecture, is the "architecture of proportion," is another of the
results of the same broad ignorance. First, it is a calumny of the old
Greek style itself, which, like every other good architecture that ever
existed, depends more on its grand figure sculpture, than on its
proportions of parts; so that to copy the form of the Parthenon without
its friezes and frontal statuary, is like copying the figure of a human
being without its eyes and mouth; and, in the second place, so far as
modern Pseudo-Greek work _does_ depend on its proportions more than
Gothic work, it does so, not because it is better proportioned, but
because it has nothing _but_ proportion to depend upon. Gesture is in
like manner of more importance to a pantomime actor than to a tragedian,
not because his gesture is more refined, but because he has no tongue.
And the proportions of our common Greek work are important to it
undoubtedly, but not because they are or even can be more subtile than
Gothic proportion, but because that work has