“Proposition 5.—Decoration should never be purposely constructed: that which is beautiful is true, that which is true is beautiful.
“Proposition 8.—All ornament should be based upon a geometrical construction.
“Proposition 9.—As in Architecture, so in the Decorative Arts, every assemblage of forms should be arranged on certain definite proportions; the whole and each particular member should be a multiple of some particular unit.
“Proposition 10.—Harmony of form consists in the proper balancing and contrast of the straight, the inclined, and the curved.”
Fig. 38.
Further on, from the same high authority, we receive as an axiom—“That there can be no perfect composition where either of the three primary elements is wanting—the straight, the inclined, and the curved, or where they are not so harmonized that the one preponderates over the other two.” In the crystals of snow we perceive these last conditions are implicitly fulfilled, inasmuch as they include the varieties, straight, angular, and curved, of which the angular has a decided preponderance.
