“When we build, let us think that we build for ever.”
Source: The Seven Lamps of Architecture (1849), Chapter VI: The Lamp of Memory, section 10.
Quotes from book
The Seven Lamps of Architecture
The Seven Lamps of Architecture is an extended essay, first published in May 1849 and written by the English art critic and theorist John Ruskin. The 'lamps' of the title are Ruskin's principles of architecture, which he later enlarged upon in the three-volume The Stones of Venice. To an extent, they codified some of the contemporary thinking behind the Gothic Revival. At the time of its publication, A. W. N. Pugin and others had already advanced the ideas of the Revival and it was well under way in practice. Ruskin offered little new to the debate, but the book helped to capture and summarise the thoughts of the movement. The Seven Lamps also proved a great popular success, and received the approval of the ecclesiologists typified by the Cambridge Camden Society, who criticised in their publication The Ecclesiologist lapses committed by modern architects in ecclesiastical commissions.
Source: The Seven Lamps of Architecture (1849), Chapter II: The Lamp of Truth, section 1.
Source: The Seven Lamps of Architecture (1849), Chapter III: The Lamp of Power, section 13.
Source: The Seven Lamps of Architecture (1849), Chapter VII: The Lamp of Obedience, section 1.
Source: The Seven Lamps of Architecture (1849), Chapter IV: The Lamp of Beauty, section 19.
