ltivated readers in
those nations that have inherited the Greek tradition, it is doubtful
whether he would not be acclaimed the greatest poet of the ages. Dante
has remained the first of Italian poets, as he was one of the earliest.
Chaucer, who wrote when our language was transforming itself from
Anglo-Saxon into English, has still lovers who are willing for his sake
to master what is to them almost a foreign tongue, and yet other lovers
who ask for new translations of his works into our modern idiom; while
Shakespeare, who wrote almost as soon as that transformation had been
accomplished, is universally reckoned one of the greatest of world
poets. There have, indeed, been true poets at almost all stages of the
world's history, but the pre-eminence of such masters as these can
hardly be questioned, and if we looked to poetry alone for a type of the
arts, we should almost be forced to conclude that art is the reverse of
progressive. We should think of it as gushing forth in full splendor
when the world is ready for it, and as unable ever again to rise to the
level of its fount.

The art of architecture is later in its beginning than that of poetry,
for it can exist only when men have learned to build solidly and
permanently. A nomad may be a poet, but he cannot be an architect; a
herdsman might have written the Book of Job, but the great builders are
dwellers in cities. But since men first learned to build they have never
quite forgotten how to do so. At all times there have been somewhere
peoples who knew enough of building to mould its utility into forms of
beauty, and the history of architecture may be read more continuously
than that of any other art. It is a history of constant change and of
continuous development, each people and each age forming out of the old
elements a new style which should express its mind, and each style
reaching its point of greatest distinctiveness only to begin a further
transformation into something else; but is it a history of progress?
Building, indeed, has progressed at one time or another. The Romans,
with their domes and arches, were more scientific builders than the
Greeks, with their simple post and lintel, but were they better
architects? We of to-day, with our steel construction, can scrape the
sky with erections that would have amazed the boldest of mediaeval
craftsmen; can we equal his art? If we ask where in the history of
architecture do its masterpieces appear, the answer m