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* flender pillar, is taken from the groves facred to religion, of 
“ which the great patriarch Abraham was the inventor.” This 
hypothefis was adopted by Dr. Warburton, who has fet it 
forth to full advantage in his notes on. Pope’s Effays. See Ep. 4. 
Againft which however there lie fome objections that do not 
admit of very obvious anfwers. 
ft, Wuen worfhipping in buildings of wood and ftone fuc- 
ceeded to the cuftom of worfhipping in groves, if the fafhion of 
thefe buildings had been fuggefted by the images prefented in 
groves, as this opinion fuppofes, then the moft ancient ftyle of 
religious buildings would have been Gothic. But this is con- 
tradicted by fact, for in the Eaft, where worfhipping in groves 
firft prevailed, the architeQure is not of this primitive {pecies, 
but is a corruption of the Grecian, in which the circular form 
of the arch is retained. And it is a known truth, that the moft 
ancient religious buildings, of which we have any account, were 
not in that ftyle which is called Gothic. But if fo, this hypo- 
thefis muft be abandoned; for it is wnreafonable to fuppofe, that 
the arches in the firft religious buildings which immediately fuc- 
ceeded the period of worthiping in groves, fhould not bear any re- 
femblance to thofe which are reprefented by the interlacing branches 
of trees, when the minds of the archite&ts were fo ftrongly im- 
preffed with the images of thofe « Leafy Cathedrals,” and yet, 
that the form of the arches, which were introduced ages after 
that cuftom, and all its concomitant fcenery had funk into utter 
oblivion, fhould be derived from them. 
adly, 
