The Poetry of Architecture / Or, the Architecture of the Nations of Europe Considered in its Association with Natural Scenery and National Character

by John Ruskin

222. Now, a mountain of 15,000 feet high always looks lower than it really is; therefore the larger the buildings near it are rendered, the better. Thus, in speaking of the Swiss cottage, it was observed that a building of the size of St. Peter's in its place, would exhibit the size of the mountains more truly and strikingly. A mountain 7000 feet high strikes its impression with great truth; we are deceived on neither side; therefore the building near it should be of the average size; and thus the villas of the Lago di Como, being among hills from 6000 to 8000 feet high, are well proportioned, being neither colossal nor diminutive: but a mountain 3000 feet high always looks higher than it really is;[48] therefore the buildings near it should be smaller than the average. And this is what is meant by the proportion of objects; namely, rendering them of such relative size as shall produce the greatest possible impression of those attributes which are most desirable in both. It is not the true, but the desirable impression which is to be conveyed; and it must not be in one, but in both: the building must not be overwhelmed by the mass of the mountain, nor the precipice mocked by the elevation of the cottage. (Proportion of color is a question of quite a different nature, dependent merely on admixture and combination).

223. For these reasons, buildings of a very large size are decidedly destructive of effect among the English lakes: first, because apparent altitudes are much diminished by them; and, secondly, because, whatever position they may be placed in, instead of combining with scenery, they occupy and overwhelm it; for all scenery is divided into pieces, each of which has a near bit of beauty, a promontory of lichened crag, or a smooth swarded knoll, or something of the kind, to begin with. Wherever the large villa comes, it takes up one of these beginnings of landscape altogether; and the parts of crag or wood, which ought to combine with it, become subservient to it, and lost in its general effect; that is, ordinarily, in a general effect of ugliness. This should never be the case: however intrinsically beautiful the edifice may be, it should assist, but not supersede; join, but not eclipse; appear, but not intrude.

224. The general rule by which we are to determine the size is, to select the largest mass which will not overwhelm any object of fine form, within two hundred yards of it; and if it does not do this, we may be quite sure it is not too large for the distant features: for it is one of Nature's most beautiful adaptations, that she is never out of proportion with herself; that is, the minor details of scenery of the first class bear exactly the proportion to the same species of detail in scenery of the second class, that the large features of the first bear to the large features of the second. Every mineralogist knows that the quartz of the St. Gothard is as much larger in its crystal than the quartz of Snowdon, as the peak of the one mountain overtops the peak of the other; and that the crystals of the Andes are larger than either.[49] Every artist knows that the bowlders of an Alpine foreground, and the leaps of an Alpine stream, are as much larger than the bowlders, and as much bolder than the leaps, of a Cumberland foreground and torrent, as the Jungfrau is higher than Skiddaw. Therefore, if we take care of the near effect in any country, we need never be afraid of the distant.

225. For these reasons, the cottage villa, rather than the mansion, is to be preferred among our hills: it has been preferred in many instances, and in too many, with an unfortunate result; for the cottage villa is precisely that which affords the greatest scope for practical absurdity. Symmetry, proportion, and some degree of simplicity, are usually kept in view in the large building; but, in the smaller, the architect considers himself licensed to try all sorts of experiments, and jumbles together pieces of imitation, taken at random from his note-book, as carelessly as a bad chemist mixing elements, from which he may by accident obtain something new, though the chances are ten to one that he obtains something useless. The chemist, however, is more innocent than the architect; for the one throws his trash out of the window, if the compound fail; while the other always thinks his conceit too good to be lost. The great one cause of all the errors in this branch of architecture is, the principle of imitation, at once the most baneful and the most unintellectual, yet perhaps the most natural, that the human mind can encourage or act upon.[50] Let it once be thoroughly rooted out, and the cottage villa will become a beautiful and interesting element of our landscape.

226. So much for size. The question of position need not detain us long, as the principles advanced in § 104 are true generally, with one exception. Beautiful and calm the situation must always be, but—in England—not conspicuous. In Italy, the dwelling of the descendants of those whose former life has bestowed on every scene the greater part of the majesty which it possesses, ought to have a dignity inherent in it, which would be shamed by shrinking back from the sight of men, and majesty enough to prevent such non-retirement from becoming intrusive; but the spirit of the English landscape is simple, and pastoral and mild, devoid, also, of high associations (for in the Highlands and Wales almost every spot which has the pride of memory is unfit for villa residence); and, therefore, all conspicuous appearance of its more wealthy inhabitants becomes ostentation, not dignity; impudence, not condescension. Their dwellings ought to be just evident, and no more, as forming part of the gentle animation and present prosperity which is the beauty of cultivated ground. And this partial concealment may be effected without any sacrifice of the prospect which the proprietor will insist upon commanding from his windows, and with great accession to his permanent enjoyment.

227. For, first, the only prospect which is really desirable or delightful, is that from the window of the breakfast-room. This is rather a bold position, but it will appear evident on a little consideration. It is pleasant enough to have a pretty little bit visible from the bedrooms; but, after all, it only makes gentlemen cut themselves in shaving, and ladies never think of anything beneath the sun when they are dressing. Then, in the dining-room, windows are absolutely useless, because dinner is always uncomfortable by daylight, and the weight of furniture effect which adapts the room for the gastronomic rites, renders it detestable as a sitting-room. In the library, people should have something else to do, than looking out of the windows; in the drawing-room, the uncomfortable stillness of the quarter of an hour before dinner, may, indeed, be alleviated by having something to converse about at the windows: but it is very shameful to spoil a prospect of any kind, by looking at it when we are not ourselves in a state of corporal comfort and mental good-humor, which nobody can be after the labor of the day, and before he has been fed. But the breakfast-room, where we meet the first light of the dewy day, the first breath of the morning air, the first glance of gentle eyes; to which we descend in the very spring and elasticity of mental renovation and bodily energy, in the gathering up of our spirit for the new day, in the flush of our awakening from the darkness and the mystery of faint and inactive dreaming, in the resurrection from our daily grave, in the first tremulous sensation of the beauty of our being, in the most glorious perception of the lightning of our life; there, indeed, our expatiation of spirit, when it meets the pulse of outward sound and joy, the voice of bird and breeze and billow, does demand some power of liberty, some space for its going forth into the morning, some freedom of intercourse with the lovely and limitless energy of creature and creation.

228. The breakfast-room must have a prospect, and an extensive one; the hot roll and hyson are indiscussable except under such sweet circumstances. But he must be an awkward architect who cannot afford an opening to one window without throwing the whole mass of the building open to public view; particularly as, in the second place, the essence of a good window view is the breaking out of the distant features in little well-composed morceaux, not the general glare of a mass of one tone. Have we a line of lake? the silver water must glance out here and there among the trunks of near trees, just enough to show where it flows; then break into an open swell of water, just where it is widest, or where the shore is prettiest. Have we mountains? their peaks must appear over foliage or through it, the highest and boldest catching the eye conspicuously, yet not seen from base to summit, as if we wanted to measure them. Such a prospect as this is always compatible with as much concealment as we choose. In all these pieces of management, the architect's chief enemy is the vanity of his employer, who will always want to see more than he ought to see, and than he will have pleasure in seeing, without reflecting how the spectators pay for his peeping.

229. So much, then, for position. We have now only to settle the questions of form and color, and we shall then have closed the most tiresome investigation which we shall be called upon to enter into; inasmuch as the principles which we may arrive at in considering the architecture of defense,[51] though we hope they may be useful in the abstract, will demand no application to native landscape, in which, happily, no defense is now required; and those relating to sacred edifices will, we also hope, be susceptible of more interest than can possibly be excited by the most degraded branch of the whole art of architecture, one hardly worthy of being included under the name—that, namely, with which we have lately been occupied, whose ostensible object is the mere provision of shelter and comfort for the despicable shell within whose darkness and corruption that purity of perception to which all high art is addressed is, during its immaturity, confined.

230. There are two modes in which any mental or material effect may be increased—by contrast, or by assimilation. Supposing that we have a certain number of features or existences under a given influence; then, by subjecting another feature to the same influence, we increase the universality, and therefore the effect, of that influence; but by introducing another feature, not under the same influence, we render the subjection of the other features more palpable, and therefore more effective. For example, let the influence be one of shade, to which a certain number of objects are subjected. We add another feature, subjected to the same influence, and we increase the general impression of shade; we add the same feature, not subjected to this influence, and we have deepened the effect of shade.