Gothic architecture in its best development is the expression at
once of law and of liberty. The exactest principles of proportion are
combined in it with the freest play of fancy. Its spaces are divided
mathematically by the rule and the square, its main lines are
determined with absolute precision,--but within these limits of order
the imagination works out its free results, and, because limited by
mathematical laws, reaches the most perfect freedom of beauty.
But the system of Gothic decorations, "which," says Mr. Ruskin, "took
eight hundred years to mature, gathering its power by undivided
inheritance of traditional method," is not an easy thing to revive
under new and difficult conditions. A single example of what has been
attempted in this way in the Oxford Museum must suffice to show the
spirit which pervades its construction. The lower arcade upon the
central court is supported by thirty-three piers and thirty shafts; the
upper arcade by thirty-three piers and ninety-five shafts. "The shafts
have been carefully selected, under the direction of the Professor of
Geology, from quarries which furnish examples of many of the most
important rocks of the British Islands.
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