confinement: the circle is the consequence not
of the energy of the body, but of its being forbidden to leave the
centre; and whenever the whirling or circular motion can be fully
impressed on it we obtain instant balance and rest with respect to the
centre of the circle.

Hence the peculiar fitness of the circular curve as a sign of rest, and
security of support, in arches; while the other curves, belonging
especially to action, are to be used in the more active architectural
features--the hand and foot (the capital and base), and in all minor
ornaments; more freely in proportion to their independence of structural
conditions.

Sec. XXI. We need not, however, hope to be able to imitate, in general
work, any of the subtly combined curvatures of nature's highest
designing: on the contrary, their extreme refinement renders them unfit
for coarse service or material. Lines which are lovely in the pearly
film of the Nautilus shell, are lost in the grey roughness of stone; and
those which are sublime in the blue of far away hills, are weak in the
substance of incumbent marble. Of all the graceful lines assembled on
Plate VII., we shall do well to be content with two of the simplest. We
shall take one mountain line (_e g_) and one leaf line (_u w_), or
rather fragments of them, for we shall perhaps not want them all. I will
mark off from _u w_ the little bit _x y_, and from _e g_ the piece _e
f_; both which appear to me likely to be serviceable: and if hereafter
we need the help of any abstract lines, we will see what we can do with
these only.

Sec. XXII. 2. Forms of Earth (Crystals). It may be asked why I do not
say rocks or mountains? Simply, because the nobility of these depends,
first, on their scale, and, secondly, on accident. Their scale cannot be
represented, nor their accident systematised. No sculptor can in the
least imitate the peculiar character of accidental fracture: he can obey
or exhibit the laws of nature, but he cannot copy the felicity of her
fancies, nor follow the steps of her fury. The very glory of a mountain
is in the revolutions which raised it into power, and the forces which
are striking it into ruin. But we want no cold and careful imitation of
catastrophe; no calculated mockery of convulsion; no delicate
recommendation of ruin. We are to follow the labor of Nature, but not
her disturbance; to imitate what she has deliberately ordained,[64] not
what she has violently suffered, or strangely perm