i68 The Art of Landscape Gardening 



undoubtedly one of the most striking appendages of 

 a palace. But the moment one side of the quadrangle 

 is opened to the adjacent country, it shrinks from the 

 comparison, and the long fronts of opposite offices seem 

 extended into the vast expanse, without any line of 

 connexion. This comparative insignificancy of art is 

 nowhere more strongly exemplified than in the large 

 wet docks of Liverpool and Hull : while the margins 

 of the river are left dry by the ebbing tides, we look 

 with astonishment at the capacious basins filled with 

 a vast body of water, but when the tide flows to the 

 same level, and the floodgates are thrown open, the 

 extent and importance of the river convert these arti- 

 ficial basins into creeks or mere pools. It is, therefore, 

 only by avoiding a comparison with the works of 

 nature that we can produce the effect of greatness in 

 artificial objects; and a large court surrounded by build- 

 ings can have no pretensions to be deemed a natural 

 object. 



After removing the wall which formed the front 

 of the court, a doubt arose whether the present gate 

 and porter's lodge should or should not remain, 

 and how to approach the house to the greatest 

 advantage. 



There is a certain point of distance from whence 

 every object appears at its greatest magnitude: but in 

 cases where symmetry prevails, the distance may be 

 rather greater, because exact correspondence of parts 

 assists the mind in forming an idea of the whole. I 

 should therefore conceive that the efl^ect of surprise, 

 of magnificence, and of the sublime, in this efibrt of art, 

 is greatly injured by seeing the interior of this ample 

 court before we arrive at the entrance gate; because 

 that is nearly the spot where the eye is completely filled 



