out this most
interesting and extensive subject; but here is a single and very curious
example of the kind of flattery with which architectural teaching was
mingled when addressed to the men of rank of the day.

Sec. XLIV. In St. Mark's library there is a very curious Latin manuscript
of the twenty-five books of Averulinus, a Florentine architect, upon the
principles of his art. The book was written in or about 1460, and
translated into Latin, and richly illuminated for Corvinus, king of
Hungary, about 1483. I extract from the third book the following passage
on the nature of stones. "As there are three genera of men,--that is to
say, nobles, men of the middle classes, and rustics,--so it appears that
there are of stones. For the marbles and common stones of which we have
spoken above, set forth the rustics. The porphyries and alabasters, and
the other harder stones of mingled quality, represent the middle
classes, if we are to deal in comparisons: and by means of these the
ancients adorned their temples with incrustations and ornaments in a
magnificent manner. And after these come the chalcedonies and
sardonyxes, &c., which are so transparent that there can be seen no spot
in them.[14] Thus men endowed with nobility lead a life in which no spot
can be found."

Canute or Coeur de Lion (I name not Godfrey or St. Louis) would have
dashed their sceptres against the lips of a man who should have dared to
utter to them flattery such as this. But in the fifteenth century it was
rendered and accepted as a matter of course, and the tempers which
delighted in it necessarily took pleasure also in every vulgar or false
means, of taking worldly superiority. And among such false means
largeness of scale in the dwelling-house was of course one of the
easiest and most direct. All persons, however senseless or dull, could
appreciate size: it required some exertion of intelligence to enter into
the spirit of the quaint carving of the Gothic times, but none to
perceive that one heap of stones was higher than another.[15] And
therefore, while in the execution and manner of work the Renaissance
builders zealously vindicated for themselves the attribute of cold and
superior learning, they appealed for such approbation as they needed
from the multitude, to the lowest possible standard of taste; and while
the older workman lavished his labor on the minute niche and narrow
casement, on the doorways no higher than the head, and the contracted