When we look at the architectural
improvements made within a generation, in London, in Paris, in New
York, we may, without being Utopians, hope for this transformation.
But the full consummation of such a hope can only be brought about in
unison with improvements in all the conditions and relations of life,
and the diffusion of such improvements among the masses.
It is to further-such diffusion that this Association has been
founded. Our purpose is to meet the growing demand for beauty in all
things; to bring into closer cooperation the artisan and the artist;
to make universally visible and active the harmony,--I almost might
say the identity,--there is between the useful and the beautiful.
Gentlemen, ever in the heart of the practical, in the very core of the
useful, there is enclosed a seed of beauty; and upon the
fructification, growth, and expansion of that seed depends,--aye,
absolutely depends,--the development of the practical. But for the
expansion of that seed, we should have neither the plough nor the
printing-press, neither shoes nor the steam engine. To that we owe
silver forks as well as the electric telegraph.
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