j«Q2. on taste in architecture. 235 



sensibility, and enlightened by the torch of truth, for 

 discovering the grand outlines of an art which grew 

 originally out of the necefsities, the superstitions, 

 and the vanities of mankind, under which three, heads 

 I fliall arrange the subject of my discourse. 



§ I. Concerning the architecture of necefsity, I am 

 foolilh enough to believe, in the end of the eighteenth 

 century, that man was originally the tenant of a gar- 

 den, that God was his friend and master, and reason, 

 with dire necefsity, his instructors. 



The circle is the most capacious of all figures, 

 and an arbour, formed in that figure, the most obvi- 

 ous and commodious of all dwellings; in which form 

 we find the huts of the people whom we are pleased 

 to call savages, in all countries ; ind of such forms are 

 the old Pictifh dwellings, the remains of which are 

 yet to be seen in Rofslhire, Sutherland, and Caith- 

 nefs in Scotland, and every where on the northern 

 continent of Europe. " Naturam licet expellasf urea 

 tamen usque recurrat." A predilection for the cir- 

 cular form, and the dome in the archittcture of the 

 most poliihed nations, still whispers from whence 

 arose the primary idea of beauty and (belter. 



The fire, where necefsary, was kindled in the center 

 of the area ; and, from the top,, the fumes of the fuel 

 were emitted, while all the family had an equal ihare 

 ©f the light and heat of the chearcr of the rigid 

 winter. As life began to be a little more opprefsed 

 with care, and the wants of men more numerous, a 

 place would be found wanting to prepare food, and 

 would give rise to a sort of peristyle, or adject, to the 

 circular hut, where the Sarah of the woods would 



