ABSTRACT
Once the philosophy of Rationalism had been developed, it is hardly surprising that before long aestheticians should try to translate it into design principles. One of the first to do so was an Abbé of the French Church, Marc-Antoine Laugier whose Essai sur l’Architecture was first published in 1753. Just like Descartes, Laugier claims to have drawn on the methods of the Natural Sciences and especially the ideas of Isaac Newton.
