186 THE SEVEN LAMPS OF ARCHITECTURE

have fallen out in many places, giving the black shadows, as seen under the horseman’s arm and bird’s neck, and in the semi-circular line round the arch, once filled with some pattern. It would have illustrated my point better to have restored the lost portions, but I always draw a thing exactly as it is, hating restoration of any kind; and I would especially direct the reader’s attention to the completion of the forms in the sculptured ornament of the marble cornices, as opposed to the abstraction of the monochrom figures, of the ball and cross patterns between the arches, and of the triangular ornament round the arch on the left.¹

§ 42. I have an intense love for these monochrom figures, owing to their wonderful life and spirit in all the works on which I have found them; nevertheless, I believe that the excessive degree of abstraction which they imply necessitates our placing them in the rank of a progressive or imperfect art, and that² a perfect building should rather be composed of the highest sculpture, (organic form dominant and sub-dominant,) associated with pattern colours on the flat or broad surfaces. And we find, in fact, that the cathedral of Pisa, which is a higher type than that of Lucca, exactly follows this condition, the colour being put in geometrical patterns on its surfaces, and animal forms and lovely leafage used in the sculptured cornices and pillars. And I think that the grace of the carved forms is best seen when it is thus boldly opposed to severe traceries of colour, while the colour itself is, as we have seen, always most piquant when it is put into sharp and angular arrangements. Thus the sculpture is approved and set off by the colour, and the colour seen to the best advantage

¹ [For other descriptions of San Michele, see Vol. III. p. 206 n. A facsimile of another drawing by Ruskin of part of the church is Plate XXI. in Stones of Venice, vol. i., where (Appendix 8) he discusses the sculptures at length, and refers to Plate VI. here as giving “a more faithful impression of the present aspect of the work, and especially of the seats of the horsemen.”]

² [The MS. reads:-

“and that the more, because as they refuse perfection of form on the one hand, so they refuse vividness of colour on the other, for that would render them indistinct and confused, if not ludicrous. I think that a perfect building...”]

[Version 0.04: March 2008]