cannot wonder that it helps us to enjoy the
perception. For our intelligence loves to perceive; water is
not more grateful to a parched throat than a principle of
comprehension to a confused understanding. Symmetry clarifies,
and we all know that light is sweet. At the same time, we can see
why there are limits to the value of symmetry. In objects, for
instance, that are too small or too diffused for composition,
symmetry has no value. In an avenue symmetry is stately and
impressive, but in a large park, or in the plan of a city, or the side
wall of a gallery it produces monotony in the various views rather
than unity in any one of them. Greek temples, never being very
large, were symmetrical on all their facades; Gothic churches were
generally designed to be symmetrical only in the west front, and in
the transepts, while the side elevation as a whole was eccentric.
This was probably an accident, due to the demands of the interior
arrangement; but it was a fortunate one, as we may see by
contrasting its effect with that of our stations, exhibition buildings,
and other vast structures, where symmetry is generally introduced
even in the most extensive facades which, being too much
prolonged for their height, cannot be treated as units. The eye is
not able to take them in at a glance, and does not get the effect of
repose from the balance of the extremes, while the mechanical
sameness of the sections, surveyed in succession, makes the
impression of an unmeaning poverty of resource.

Symmetry thus loses its value when it cannot, on account of the
size of the object, contribute to the unity of our perception. The
synthesis which it facilitates must be instantaneous. If the
comprehension by which we unify our object is discursive, as, for
instance, in conceiving the arrangement and numbering of the
streets of New York, or the plan of the Escurial, the advantage of
symmetry is an intellectual one; we can better imagine the relations
of the parts, and draw a map of the whole in the fancy; but there is
no advantage to direct perception, and therefore no added beauty.
Symmetry is superfluous in those objects. Similarly animal and
vegetable forms gain nothing by being symmetrically displayed, if
the sense of their life and motion is to be given. When, however,
these forms are used for mere decoration, not for the expression of
their own vitality, then symmetry is again required to accentuate
their unity and organization. This j