This passage is adapted from John Ruskin, The Seven Lamps of Architecture, originally published 1849. Here, Ruskin describes the first principle of architecture.
Architecture is the art which so adorns the structures raised by man for whatever uses that the sight of them contributes to his mental health, power and pleasure. It is very necessary, in the outset of all inquiry, to distinguish carefully between Architecture and Building.
To build is by common understanding to put together and adjust the several pieces of any structure of a considerable size. The persons who profess that art are builders, but building does not become architecture merely by the stability of what it erects.
Let us, therefore, at once confine the name of Architecture to that art which impresses on its form certain characters venerable or beautiful, but otherwise unnecessary. Thus, I suppose, no one would call the laws architectural which determine the height of a doorframe or the kind of wood in a beam. But if to the stone facing of that doorframe be added an unnecessary feature, as a cable molding, that is Architecture. If projecting masses be carved beneath into rounded shapes, which are useless, and if the headings of the intervals be arched and engraved, which is useless, that is Architecture. This useless nature embodies the first principle of Architecture: sacrifice.
It may not be always easy to draw the line so sharply and simply, because there are few buildings which have not some pretense or color of being architectural; neither can there be any architecture which is not based on building, nor any good architecture which is not based on good building. However, it is perfectly easy and very necessary to keep the ideas distinct, and to understand fully that Architecture concerns itself only with those characters of a structure which are above and beyond its usefulness.
Architecture's spirit of sacrifice prompts us to the offering of precious things merely because they are precious, not because they are useful or necessary. It is a spirit, for instance, which of two equally beautiful sorts of marble, both applicable and durable, would choose the more costly because it was so. Of two kinds of decoration, equally effective, this spirit of sacrifice would choose the more elaborate because it was so. It is therefore most unreasoning and enthusiastic, and perhaps best defined as the opposite of the prevalent feeling of modern times, which desires to produce the largest results at the least cost.
Of this spirit of sacrifice, there are two distinct forms: the first, the wish to exercise self-denial for the sake of self-discipline merely, a wish acted upon in the abandonment of things loved or desired, there being no direct call or purpose to be answered by so doing; and the second, the desire to honor or please someone else by the costliness of the sacrifice.
Nearly all old work has been hard work, work of sacrifice. It may be the hard work of children, of barbarians, of rustics; but it is always their utmost. Our work looks as though we have stopped short wherever and whenever we can. It has the appearance of lazy compliance with low conditions; never of a fair putting forth of our strength. Let us have done with this kind of work at once. Cast off every temptation to it!
Do not let us degrade ourselves voluntarily, and then mutter and mourn over our short comings. It is not even a question of how much we are to do, but of how it is to be done; it is not a question of doing more, but of doing better. If we have only so much to be spent in decoration, let us go to the craftsman, whoever he may be, and bid him carve for us a single statue or capital, or as many as we can afford, compelling upon him the one condition, that they shall be the best he can do. Place them where they will be of the most value, and be content. Our other capitals may be mere blocks, and our other niches empty. No matter. Better our work unfinished than all bad. It is more honest and unpretending.
