ARCHITECTURE (Lat, architecture, from the Gr. architecton, the chief fabricator, the architect), the art of building or constructing. In this country, A. is usually divided into civil, military, and naval. In the present article we shall confine ourselves to the first, the two latter being treated of, the former under the head of FORTIFICATION, the latter under that of SIIIP-BUILDING. Civil A., when taken in the widest sense, may be regarded either from an artistica], a scientific, or a utilitarian point of view. In the first case, as a means of giving external form and sensible expression to mental conceptions or ideas, it is a branch of aesthetics, or of the fine arts properly so called (see ART), and takes rank with sculpture and painting; in the second case, it consists in a knowledge of certain laws of physical nature, and a consequent power of calling them into play, or counteracting their operation, and is consequently a branch of that wider department of science to which the name of mechanics (q.v.) is given; whereas in the last it becomes a practical art, which liaS for its object the application of the principles, both artistic and scientific, which A. embraces, to the elevation of national and individual character, and the increase of the physical comfort and well-being of mankind. But though it admits of being thus analyzed pr separated in thought, it must not be imagined that A. can exhibit in practice any one of these principles to the exclusion of the others. The abstract conception of all-pervading deity, as embodied in the Greek temple—the religious aspiration after a personal god, as shadowed forth in the Gothic cathedral—can be., realized only in accordance with the principles of mechanics, and the most rigorous adaptation of means to ends; whereas, in an opposite direction, the kraal of the Hot tentot, the hut of the Indian in the American wilderness, or even the vulgar chimney stalk in the dingy manufacturing suburb, if properly constructed for their respective purposes, will be found to have obeyed such msthctical principles as they may have conic in contact with. Nature is not self-contradictory; and art and science, beauty and utility, when rightly understood, .are never in conflict. A celebrated German writer and thinker (F. Schlegel) has described A. as "frozen music;" and the comparison is in accordance with the remarks which wo have made; for music, though apparently the freest and most lawless, is in reality the most rigorously scientific of the arts. But though a strict adherence to all the principles of A. be indispensable to every genuine architectural structure, whatever be its object, it by no means follows that equal promi nence must be given to each of these principles on every occasion. If a building has for its primary object the expression and commemoration of such feelings as grief, gratitude, devotion, or the like, this object manifestly will be best attained by subordinating the scientific and utilitarian to the msthetic principles of A.; and the reverse will be the case where mere convenience, and also, though in a lesser degree, where convenience, in combination with beauty or magnificence, is sought. It is in a great measure by the prominence which they have given to one or other of these principles, that different nations have displayed their diversities of character in their A. The speculative and poetical character of the Greeks was exhibited in their temples, whilst their preference of the state to the individual appeared in the fact that these structures were designed for the worship of the protecting divinity of the city by the citizen, not for the worship of a personal god by the individual man. Amongst the Romans, again, terrestrial power and material aggrandizement were the exclusively national aspirations, and consequently their A. had their own honor and glory primarily in view. The basilicas, amphi
theaters, and triumphal arches of the Romans were their own; but the temples w4ich they raised in honor of the gods were little else than imperfect copies from the Greek, with scarcely any assignable national characteristics. Then, when we come to medieval times, though, on the revival of spiritual tendencies, aesthetic principles again become prominent, they exhibit themselves under totally different forms; and the distinctions between heathen and Christian thought could scarcely be more distinctly stated in words than they are exhibited to the eye in the difference between a Greek temple and a Gothic cathedral. Even the relation which subsists between Christian and Mohammedan A. (Gothic A. and Arabian A.; q.v.) strikingly reminds us of the fact that Mohammedanism was but a sort of bastard Christianity. Domestic life again appeared in full purity and vigor only in modern times; and then only do we see the utilitarian principles of A. finally prevailing over the aesthetic. But apart from the mental characteristics and tendencies of a people, there are many other circumstances which modify their A. Of these, one of the most important is climate, Arrangements for the permanent and com modious residence of the family within doors could not be expected to attain much perfection amongst a race like the Greeks, whose life was spent in the open air; and the climate of Holland, as well as the genius of the people and the character of their occu pations, has bad much to do with the fact that the Dutch have rarely risen above a town-house. Following thus the peculiarities of national character and circumstances, it is obvious that the more widely these differ in any two nations, the more dissimilar will be the styles of A. which they produce respectively. Moreover, it is apparent that the higher the stage of national development, the more marked will be the character which the A. of a people will assume. A. thus bears a strict analogy to language. Both are an expression of thought, and in the one and in the other, the richness, variety, and precision of the expression will be in proportion to the quantity and quality of the thought to be expressed. Lastly, in the fact that all genuine A. is the expression of the ruling national ideas and forms of thought of some one particular people, we perceive the reason why a building compounded of several styles should be characterless and unpleasing; and why this should be more and more the case, the more characteristic the styles compounded, and the greater the equality preserved amongst them. The Doric pillar in itself, and still more, perhaps, the Roman adaptation of it, is the simplest and most rudimentary of all pillars; and what we are in the habit of calling Saxon, is the simplest and most rudimentary of all the styles of Gothic A.; and hence the introduction of a few Tuscan pillars considerably modified into a Saxon or Romanic church, does not awaken feelings of very decided repugnance, whereas an attempt to combine equally the beauties of the Parthenon and of Cologne cathedral in the same building would be unspeakably revolting. The limits of the present article preclude us from presenting to the reader a consecutive account of the origin and development of the different styles of A. These will be treated :under separate heads (see EGYPTIAN A., Ls;niAN A., OREF:1( A., Gornto A., ARABIA'S A.; see also Allen, AitenrrnAvE, etc.); and all that can be here attempted is to trace the earlier stages through which A, passed in the historical nations, before it reached the point at which it afforded the means of express ing the feelings or supplying the wants of mankind.