235 



At one period, the architects throughout 

 Europe, were exttemely fond of waving 

 lines. I recollect many pubhc edifices at 

 Rome and at Naples i^ that style, the false 

 taste of which struck me at the time; for it 

 is obvious that the first principle in all ar- 

 chitecture, whatever its style, must be the 

 appearance, as well as tlie reality of firm- 

 ness and stability ; and whatever gives an 

 idea of a false or uncertain bearing, contra- 

 dicts that first principle. On that account, 

 twisted columns have very justly been ob- 

 jected to : and though some of the greatest 

 masters, and not only those whose style of 

 painting has been distinguished as the or- 

 namental style, but even the painters of tlie 



his telling me, that one day Hogarth, talking to him with 

 great earnestness on his favourite subject, asserted, that no 

 man thoroughly possessed with the true idea of the line of 

 beauty, could do any thing in an ungraceful manner : *' I 

 ** myself," added he, '* from my perfect knowledge of it, 

 *♦ should not hesitate in what manner I should present any 

 " thing to the greatest monarch." *' He happened," said 

 ** my father, " at that moment, to be sitting iq the most 

 " ridipuloBsly awkward posture I ever beheld*" 



