IMPORTANCE OF METHOD

We must not shrink from recognising the fact that in architecture, shackled as we are by prejudice and traditions, and accustomed to confusion, both ideas and principles are wanting to us. The more our buildings are loaded with details, and the richer they are through the variety of their constituent elements, the more do they betray forgetfulness of great principles and the absence of ideas in the artists who contribute to their erection.

. . .

Since the Revolution of the last century we have entered on a transitional phase;

we are investigating, searching into the past, and accumulating abundance of materials, while our means and appliances have been increased. What then is wanting to enable

us to give an original embodiment and form to so many various elements? Is it not simply method that is lacking? In the arts, as in the sciences, the absence of method, whether we are engaged in investigating or in attempting to apply the knowledge we have acquired, occasions an embarrassment and confusion proportional to the increase of our resources; the abundance becomes an obstruction. Every transitional period however must have a limit; it must tend towards an aim of which we get a glimpse only when, weary of searching through a chaos of ideas and materials brought from every quarter, we set to work to disentangle certain principles from this disorderly mass,—to develop and apply them by the help of a determinate method. This is the work that devolves upon us, and to which we should devote ourselves with uncompromising persistency—

struggling against those deleterious elements which are invariably engendered during all transitional periods, just as miasmas exhale from matter in a state of fermentation.

The arts are diseased; architecture is dying in the midst of prosperity, notwith-standing the presence of energetic vital principles; it is dying of excesses and a debilitating régime. The more abundant the stores of our knowledge, the more strength and rectitude of judgment is needed to enable us to make a productive use of them, and the more necessary is it to recur to rigorous principles. The disease from which architectural art suffers dates from a remote period; it has not been developed in a single day; we see it increasing from the sixteenth century to our own times; from the time when, after a very superficial study of the architecture of ancient Rome—certain of whose externals were made objects of imitation—our architects ceased to make the alliance of the form with the requirements and the means of construction the chief consideration. Once out of the way of truth, architecture has been more and more misled into degenerating paths.

Endeavouring at the commencement of the century to reproduce the forms of classical antiquity, without taking any trouble to analyse and develop their principles, it has been incessantly hastening to its decay. Then, in the absence of the light which reason alone can furnish, it has endeavoured to connect itself with the Middle Ages and the Renaissance;

but still only superficially adopting certain forms without analysing them or recurring to their causes, seeing nothing but the effects, it has become Greek, Roman, Neo-Gothic; it has sought its inspiration in the caprices of the age of Francis I., the pompous style of Louis XIV., and the decadence of the seventeenth century; it has become the slave of fashion to such a degree, that in the bosom of the Académie des Beaux Arts,—that classic domain, as it is esteemed,—we have seen designs made presenting the most grotesque medley of styles, fashions, epochs, and means of construction, but not suggesting the least symptom of originality. The reason is that originality is impossible apart from truth. Originality results from the direct irradiation of truth on an individual mind; and though the truth be one, the medium which receives has a refraction happily as infinitely varied as humanity itself. So that whatever efforts may have been made in recent times to bring together such a number of styles and influences, and to satisfy all the caprices of the moment, that which strikes us most in all our modern public buildings is their monotony.

There are in architecture—if I may thus express myself—two indispensable modes in which truth must be adhered to. We must be true in respect of the programme, and true in respect of the constructive processes. To be true in respect of the programme is to fulfill exactly, scrupulously, the conditions imposed by the requirements of the case. To be true in respect of the constructive processes is to employ the materials according to their qualities and properties. What are regarded as questions purely belonging to art, symmetry and external form, are only secondary conditions as compared with those dominant principles. . . .

It is therefore of essential importance to apply a rigorous method to this knowledge of the arts of the past; and I do not know that we can do better in this matter than to abide by the four principles of Descartes, and which he deemed sufficient, “provided,” he remarked, “that I made a firm and constant resolution not to neglect them in a single instance.” The first, he adds, “was never to receive anything as true which I did not clearly know to be so, i.e. carefully to avoid precipitancy and prepossession, and not to include more in my conclusions than what presented itself so clearly and distinctly to my mind that I had no reason to doubt it.”

“The second, to divide each of the problems I was investigating into as many portions as possible, or as should be requisite for a complete solution.”

“The third, to follow a certain order in my thoughts, beginning with those objects which are simplest and most easy to understand, and ascending as by gentle degrees to the knowledge of the most composite,—supposing an order even in the case of those which do not appear naturally consecutive.”

“The last, to make such complete enumerations and general reviews in every field of inquiry as that I should be certain of omitting nothing.”

No wiser precepts have been uttered, nor any more applicable to the present subject. If we follow these precepts in the study and practice of art, we shall discover an architecture appropriate to our age, or at least we shall prepare the way for those who follow us; for an art is not made in a day. In fact, if we bring to the study of the arts of the past a spirit of examination sufficiently earnest and enlightened to distinguish the false from the true, and to deduce primordial principles from traditions, we shall in the first place have cleared those arts from the various influences that have successively modified their expression, and we shall succeed in finding those expressions which best accord with immutable principles; we shall then consider these expressions—or forms, if we prefer the term—as those which are nearest the truth. . . .

From a large collection of examples . . . it becomes possible to ascertain what are the forms suitable to such or such a structure; we no longer run the risk of getting into that confusion of styles, methods, and forms which renders most of our modern edifices incomprehensible and repulsive. A certain school, weary of the more or less faithful imitations that have been produced of the various styles of architecture anterior to our age, considers it possible to compose a new architecture by selecting from all of them what has appeared good; this is a dangerous error. A macaronic style cannot be a new

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style. Its adoption gives proof of nothing more than dexterity, intelligence, and acquire-ments of no great profundity; it is never the manifestation of a principle or an idea.

Compositions of this kind, even the most successful, remain isolated, sterile works, incap-able of being the origin of a new epoch in the arts. Only simple principles are productive;

and it may be remarked that the simpler they are the more beautiful and varied are their products. . . .

PRECEPT 1

Let us return to the precepts given by Descartes: “Never to receive anything as true unless it has been evidently recognised as such.” If this precept is applicable to Philosophy, it is still more so to an art such as architecture, which rests on laws of matter or laws purely mathematical. It is true that a great hall, a very long, wide, and lofty interior, ought to be lighted by windows larger than those which suffice for an ordinary room; the contrary is false. It is true that a portico supported by arcades or columns, is built for the purpose of sheltering persons from rain, sun, and wind; the relations between the height and width of this portico ought therefore to be such as will afford protection against atmospheric agencies; the contrary is false. It is true that a door ought to be made for the purpose of going into a building or going out of it; the width of such door ought therefore to be accommodated to the greater or smaller number of persons who have occasion to go in or out; but however dense a crowd may be, the persons composing it are always under seven feet in height; or, supposing them to carry lances, banners, canopies, or flags, even with these accessories, they will not require a height of much more than five or six yards;

to make a door five yards wide and ten high is therefore absurd. It is true that a column is a support,—not a decoration, like a frieze or an arabesque; if then you have no occasion for columns, I cannot understand why you furnish your façades with them. It is true that a cornice is intended to keep the water from the face of the wall: if therefore you put a projecting cornice in an interior, I cannot but say that it is unmeaning. It is true that a staircase is necessary for reaching the upper stories of a building: that this staircase is not a place of rest but of passage, and that if you give it a relative importance out of proportion to the apartments to which it leads, you may produce a magnificent flight of steps, but you commit an absurdity. It is true that the thing which supports should be proportioned to the thing supported, and that if you build a stone wall or pier two or three yards in thickness to carry floors that would be easily supported by a wall one yard in thickness, you produce a work that cannot be justified by reason, which satisfies neither my eyes nor my understanding, and wastes costly materials. It is true that vaulting ought to be maintained by buttresses, whatever form you give them; but it is a falsity to introduce salient pilasters, engaged columns, and buttresses, if there are no thrusts to which resistance must be opposed. It is needless, I think, to continue this parallelism. Following this simple method of reasoning, of which anyone may see the force without being versed in architectural art, and passing in review the styles of architecture adopted by the ancients, in the Middle Ages, and in modern times, it will be easy to assign them their true value.

We shall see that the Greeks (taking into account their social condition and the climate in which their buildings were erected) remained faithful to those primitive principles which originated in mere good sense; that the Romans often deviated from them; that the lay architects of the French school of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries rigorously observed them and that we have almost abandoned them. We may therefore class the various styles of architecture and the studies relating to the monuments produced by them according to that first precept, which is based on the true expression of the requirements and necessities of the structure. Thus a house at Pompeii of insignificant dimensions, the gate of a city, a fountain or a well, may sometimes possess a value superior in point of art to that of a palace. Being thus able to separate the true from the false, we shall succeed after mature examination in recognising the various modes of expressing it employed by our predecessors: for in architecture truth is not sufficient to render a work excellent;

it is necessary to give to truth a beautiful or at least appropriate form,—to know how to render it clear, and to express it felicitously;—indeed, in the arts, although we make use of the most rigorous and logical reasoning, we often continue obscure and unpleasing, we may, in fact, produce what is ugly. But while conceptions based on the soundest reason sometimes produce only repulsive works, true beauty has never been attainable without the concurrence of those invariable laws which are based on reason. To every work that is absolutely beautiful there will be always found to correspond a principle rigorously logical.

PRECEPT 2

Having first directed our course of study in conformity with this primary principle, let us pass to the second: “to divide,” says Descartes, “each of the problems I was investigating into as many portions as possible, or as should be requisite for a complete solution.” We remain here still on the domain of speculative study; we are engaged with analysis pushed to its extreme limits. In fact, if we examine ancient buildings, we find them to be complete, finished, composite works. We are obliged, if we would understand them in all their parts, to proceed in an order the reverse of that in which they were produced. Their author proceeded from his primitive conception to the execution in its final form,—from the programme and the means at disposal to the result; we must start from the ultimate result and ascertain successively the design and the programme and means of execution; we must dissect the edifice, as it were, and verify the more or less complete relations that exist between that apparent result which first engages our attention and the hidden methods and reasons that have determined its form. This second part of our studies, which is long, irksome and arduous, is the best exercise we could engage in if we would learn to design, to create. To arrive at synthesis we must necessarily pass through analysis. . . . Since our modern civilisation is very complicated, while it is desirable to commence our studies with the analysis of the simplest works of classical antiquity, we must not stop there; we must certainly go on to analyse more complete works, and learn how in former ages architects succeeded in solving problems more and more extensive in their bearing,

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encumbered with details and replete with difficulties; and in raising buildings possessing, if I may so express myself, an organism much more delicate, and especially more complicated.

To insist on limiting the studies by which architects are to be trained, to certain monuments of classical antiquity which have not even come down to us in their complete state, or to more or less successful imitations of those monuments, is not the way to obtain what is asked for everywhere—an architecture of the nineteenth century. It is better to take account of that long series of efforts which have developed new principles and methods, and to consider all human labour as a chain whose links are connected in logical order.

PRECEPT 3

The third precept introduces us to the application of principles, for its import is that we should “follow a certain order in our thoughts, beginning with those objects which are simplest and most easy to understand, and ascending as by gentle degrees to the knowledge of the most composite,—supposing an order even in the case of those which do not appear naturally consecutive.” In fact, if by analysis we have proceeded from the compound to the simple—from the complete work—the apparent result to the means and causes that have produced this result,—it will become easier, when we are desirous of designing in our turn, to proceed in order, and to give precedence to fundamental considerations with a view to reach the consequences that will follow from them. The fundamental points of consideration in architecture,—those which decide everything else,—are none other than the programme and the material means of execution. The programme is only the statement of the requirements. As regards the means of execution, they are various; they may be restricted or extensive; whatever they are, we must know them and take account of them: the same programme may be complied with by the use of very different means, according to the locality, the materials, and the resources at our disposal.—Great Assembly Halls to hold two thousand persons have to be built in different localities. But at A we are furnished with materials of superior quality; considerable sums are placed at our disposal; we have durable stone—marble or granite. At B we can procure only brick and wood; our resources are at a minimum. Shall we give these two halls the same superficial extent? Evidently we must, since we have to accommodate two thousand persons at both A and B. Shall we make them alike in appearance? Certainly not, since the means at our disposal at B are not the same as we have at A. While thus complying with the same programme we shall have to adopt two very different methods of architecture, for if, having only brick and deal, we simulate a structure of stone or marble, by means of stucco and paint; we make a very sorry use of art. Compliance with a programme and the determining of a plan of structure are not enough to produce a work of art; a form is also requisite. The programme as well as the structure will exert an influence on the form; but while scrupulously respecting the first, and paying attention to the second, we may nevertheless adopt very diverse forms. And which is the one most

appropriate to our civilization? Probably that which is most supple and pliable; that which will lend itself the most readily to the infinitely varied details of our excessively complicated life. . . .

Applying the third precept of Descartes in designing, the programme being satisfied and the structure determined, what have we to do in proceeding from the simple to the compound? 1st, We must know at the outset the nature of the materials to be employed;

2dly, We must give these materials the function and strength required for the result, and

2dly, We must give these materials the function and strength required for the result, and