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LECTURES ON ARCHITECTURE
AND PAINTING
LECTURE I
ARCHITECTURE1
Delivered November 1, 1853
1. I THINK myself peculiarly happy in being permitted to address the citizens of Edinburgh on the subject of architecture, for it is one which, they cannot but feel, interests them nearly. Of all the cities in the British Islands, Edinburgh is the one which presents most advantages for the display of a noble building; and which, on the other hand, sustains most injury in the erection of a commonplace or unworthy one.2 You are all proud of your city; surely you must feel it a duty in some sort to justify your pride; that is to say, to give yourselves a right to be proud of it. That you were born under the shadow of its two fantastic mountains,-that you live where from your room windows you can trace the shores of its glittering Firth, are no rightful subjects of pride. You did not raise the mountains, nor shape the shores; and the historical houses of
1 [The following was Ruskin’s Synopsis of the Lecture in the preliminary announcement:-
“General Construction of Domestic Buildings.
General Aspect of Edinburgh-Dependent on its Houses more than its Public Buildings. Interest of its Citizens in Domestic Architecture. Faults of Modern Houses. General Laws of Construction, with respect to Exterior Appearance-Roofs-Windows-Doors and Porches. The Duty of Building with regard to Permanence.”]
2 [Compare Ruskin’s early essay on the site for the Scott Monument, Vol. I. p. 258; and see two letters of his addressed to the Edinburgh Witness in 1857 (Arrows of the Chace, 1880, vol. i. pp. 214-222.]
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[Version 0.04: March 2008]
