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The civil architecture of Vitruvius : comprising those books of the author which relate to the public and private edifices of the ancients : with an introduction, containing an historical view of the rise and progress of architecture amongst the Greeks / transl. by William Wilkins
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admire smoothness in a building, we admire it as an effect,which we naturally associate with the causes that haveproduced it. In this instance, the secondary quality,considered separately and in itself, produces no sentimentof pleasure; it is agreeable, only as it is the result of skilland art. This is evident from our equal admiration of thoseparts of architecture which are covered with a profusion ofminute and elaborate ornament, the general effect of whichis an appearance only of roughness, and whose forms, whenviewed in detail, being sharp and angular, cannot impart anagreeable sensation by any organic affection of the eye itself.

It must be evident, I think, that the properties andqualities considered by Mr. Burke as essential to everyspecies of Beauty, have been principally, if not entirely,collected from the female form. Now, although they arehere connected with all that is most lovely, yet the realsource of their attractions appears to have been overlooked,and this is probably to be discovered in the sexual affectionsand sympathies implanted in our nature. Had it, therefore,been practicable by classing the charms of the most beautifulwork of the creation, to invest in these charms every otherobject, the choice would have been judicious; we mighteven have desired the success of such an enterprise ; and yet,according to the present order of things, it would seem alittle whimsical to maintain, that feminine graces, femininedelicacy, and feminine proportions, ought to constitute beautyin a tree or a house. The ruleswhich Mr. Burke has laid downmay be found to be just when applied to the female form,but to extend them to every form in nature seems little less

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