I found this excerpt from the Author's Preface well written and instructional:
This serves at least to prove that the subject is one of perennial and surprising interest; and we have tried to look at this architectural side of golf from several different standpoints. There is, for example, the traditional - what might be termed the classical view: and being ourselves catholic in feeling on the matter, we notice with regret the extent to which modern design tends to depart from the original scottish models - a practice that may have injurious results on the intention and spirit of the game.
Then again, a golf course is a field of manoeuvre and action, employing, as it were, the military and engineering side of the game. It opens up a series of tactical and strategical opportunities, the implications of which it would be well for every golfer to grasp, whether he happens to approve of disapprove of the the conclusions we have ventured to put forward. It is important to emphasise the necessity for the golfer to use his head as much as his hands; or, in other words, to make his mental agility match his physical ability.
Thirdly, there is the artistic side. No reason exists why a golf course should not decorate a landscape rather than disfigure it. As in any other work of art, the strictest economy of means should be propertly used; over-elaboration is destructive of unity.
Vitality is another quality that is essential. Instinctively we feel that one course is alive, another dead and insipid, lacking energy of expression. We look for the unexpected note and a pleasantness of line. Every curve should have a spring in it, and no straight line should ever be quite straight. Generally the detection of these slight differences is purely a matter of feeling which once experienced is not likely to be forgotten.
-The Architectural Side of Golf
H.N. Wethered & T. Simpson
I'd call this the golf course architectural quadrilateral.
Mike