OF BUILDING.                              239
 

XLV.

OF BUILDING.

Houses are built to live In, and not to look on.
Therefore let use be preferred before uniformity ;
except where both may be had. Leave the goodly
fabrics of houses for beauty only, to the enchanted
palaces of the poets, who build them with small cost.
He that builds a fair house upon an ill seat, com-
mitteth himself to prison. Neither do I reckon it an
ill seat only, where the air is unwholesome, but
likewise where the air is unequal, as you shall see
many fine seats set upon a knap of ground, en¬
vironed with higher hills round about it, whereby the
heat of the sun is pent in, and the wind gathereth as
in troughs ; so as you shall have, and that suddenly,
as great diversity of heat and cold as if you dwelt in
several places. Neither is it ill air only that maketh
an ill seat, but ill ways, ill markets ; and, if you will
consult with Momus, ill neighbours. I speak not of
many more, want of water, want of wood, shade, and