the wrong word

A word may be mildly inapposite and do more damage to the piece than a word that is wildly out of keeping with the whole.

not one or whole

Few great medieval buildings are homogeneous, since they are the work of many generations of artists. This is widely recognized by historians, although theoreticians of culture have innocently pointed to the conglomerate cathedral of Chartres as a model of stylistic unity, in contrast to the heterogeneous character of stylelessness of the arts of modern society. In the past it was not felt necessary to restore a damaged work or to complete an unfinished one in the style of the original. Hence the strange juxtapositions of styles within some medieval objects. It should be said, however, that some styles, by virtue of their open, irregular forms, can tolerate the unfinished and heterogeneous better than others.

--Meyer Schapiro, “Style.” The Problem of Style (Fawcett Publications, 1966) edited by J.V. Cunningham.

ruined beauty

Classicism achieves its beauty as it is abraded and rubbed away, when it falls into ruin.

undoing the damage of haste

Art is the means we have of undoing the damage of haste. It's what everything else isn't.

—Theodore Roethke, On Poetry and Craft: Selected Prose of Theodore Roethke