( 92 ) 



The difpofitions and different artifices mentioned 

 in the preceding pages, are thofe which are chiefly 

 practifed in China, and fuch as be ft characterize their 

 ftyle of Gardening. But the artifts of that country are fo 

 inventive, and fo various in their combinations, that no 

 two of their oompofitions are ever alike : they never copy 

 nor imitate each other ; they do not even repeat their 

 own productions ; faying, that what has once been feen, 

 operates feebly at a fecond inflection ; and that whatever 

 bears even a diftant refembla-nce to a known object, 

 feldom excites a new idea. The reader is therefore not to 

 imagine that what has been related is all that exifts; on 

 the contrary, a confiderable number of other examples 

 might have been produced : but thofe that have been 

 offered, will probably be fufficient; more efpecially as 

 moft of them are like certain compofitions in mufick, 

 which, though fimple in themfelves, fuggeft, to a fertile 

 imagination, an endlefs fucceffion of complicated va- 

 riations. 



To the generality of Europeans many of. the. foregoing 



i defcriptions 



