So convinced were the Egyptians and Greeks of this principle, that they never used any other constructive expedient than a perpendicular wall or prop, supporting a horizontal beam; and half the satisfactory effect of their buildings arises from their adhering to this simple though expensive mode of construction. They were perfectly acquainted with the use of the arch and its properties, but they knew that its employment would introduce complexity and confusion into their designs, and therefore they wisely rejected it. Even to the present day the Hindus refuse to use the arch, though it has long been employed in their country by the Mahometans. As they quaintly express it, “An arch never sleeps;” and it is true that by its thrust and pressure it is always tending to tear a building to pieces; in spite of all counterpoises, whenever the smallest damage is done, it hastens the ruin of a building, which, if more simply constructed, might last for ages.
The Romans were the first who introduced a more complicated style. They wanted larger and more complex buildings than had been before required, and they employed brick and concrete to a great extent even in their temples and most monumental buildings. They obtained both space and variety by these means, with comparatively little trouble or expense; but we miss in all their works that repose and harmony which is the great charm that pervades the buildings of their predecessors.
The Gothic architects went even beyond the Romans in this respect. They prided themselves on their constructive skill, and paraded it on all occasions, and often to an extent very destructive of true architectural design. The lower storey of a French cathedral is generally very satisfactory; the walls are thick and solid, and the buttresses, when not choked up with chapels, just sufficient for shadow and relief; but the architects of that country were seized with a mania for clerestories of gigantic height, which should appear internally mere walls of painted glass divided by mullions. This could only be effected either by encumbering the floor of the church with piers of inconvenient thickness or by a system of buttressing outside. The latter was the expedient adopted; but notwithstanding the ingenuity with which it was carried out, and the elegance of many of the forms and ornaments used, it was singularly destructive of true architectural effect. It not only produces confusion of outline and a total want of repose, but it is eminently suggestive of weakness, and one cannot help feeling that if one of these props were removed, the whole would tumble down like a house of cards.