The Antiquities of Orissa v1.c9.197.1

v1.c9.197.1

**Respective Symmetry :** Symmetry may be treated under three different heads : 1st. —*Proportion*, *or the adaptation of the dimensions of the several parts of a thing to each other*. 2nd.—*Respective Symmetry*, *or such disposition of parts as to make the opposite sides equal to each other*. 3rd.—*Uniform Symmetry*, or that disposition of parts in which the same ordinance reigns throughout the whole. Regarding the first, some remarks have already been made at the beginning of the second chapter. The second, at first sight, may appear to be an unnatural formality, and therefore not an essential element of beauty. Nature does not arrange a landscape by two exactly similar halves, producing the same thing twice over ; why should then man do so in building a house ? The argument, however, is fallacious. In a beautiful landscape there *is* a balancing of its different parts so as to secure a considerable amount of symmetry, and artists study it carefully in grouping their subjects on canvas. A landscape, however, is not a single entity, but a collection of many objects ; and for the purposes of comparison with a house or other art creation, it is necessary that individual objects of nature should be selected, and not collections. If this be done it will be found that nature is particularly mindful of respective symmetry in the formation of animated beings.