The Artist's Repository, Or, Encyclopedia of the Fine Arts (Band 1): The Human Figure (London, 1808)

lect. iii.] history of art. 07

of tasting, also, thinks no regale elegant with-
out variety; and the same viands, for ever, if con-
sistent with necessity, is inconsistent with elegance !
so the eye, confined to the continued sight of the
same walls, the same blank walls! the same dead
walls! longs for some diversity, and wishes for some
relief from its surrounding prison,

But Variety may be deprived of its effect by ex-
tending it to extremes: an heterogeneous assemblage
of parts, without correspondence, or relation—(to
which excessive variety tends), is not less disgusting
than unvaried sameness. To check therefore the
wildness and eccentricity of this principle, when ill
understood, or misapplied, we introduce in th e next
place uniformity, or symmetry, as a third in-
gredient in Beauty. By this term, we mean a regu-
lar, analogous, and harmonious, coincidence of parts
to each other ; so that the whole appears to be the
result of skill, and contrivance, well emploved.

Let us examine, with this idea in our mind, the
labours of the Architect : a well-composed building
usually exhibits a center, with wings on each side :
the resemblance of the wings to each other is so ne-
cessary (where both may be seen at once) that no
structure, in which it is neglected, appears complete,
or finished ; but the eve receives a painful sensation
arising from the felt deficiency : I say, from the de-
ficiency of uniformity in its parts. And so accurate
is the judgment of the eye on this principle, that
many objects, which by accident are more inclined
to one side than to the other, or are not truly in the
same plane, displease by their departure from exact -

K 2 nests;