88 



ARCHITECTURE. 



BOOK I. 



It is chiefly this corrupted style of Grecian architecture 

 which Ave have copied and imported into this country ; not that 

 we did not know of the more chaste Grecian models, but that 

 those of Rome. were reckoned incomparably better * ! 



To this false taste we owe such huge masses of deformity and 

 incongruity in almost all our public buildings, as will long be 

 regretted by men of liberal sentiment, who are not biassed in 

 their opinions by the authority of great names-. As for private 

 buildings or streets, the columns, pilasters, and pediments, &c. 

 which are stuck on the doors of houses, shops, and ware-rooms, 

 are contemptible and unworthy of notice. » 



As an apology for such incongruities, it will probably be 

 urged, that where an ornamental or elegant edifice is desired, 

 nothing better can be done. Columns, it may be said, are the 

 noblest parts of architecture ; and as we have seldom any thing 

 to support with these columns, we must apply them close to 

 "the wall, that they may at least have the semblance of co-ope- 

 rating with it in supporting the roof. But this, though perhaps 

 the only rational apology that can be made, will never be suf- 

 ficient to satisfy men of taste, who are not deluded by the habit 

 of seeing such buildings, and hearing that they are copied from 



* See Chambers's Architecture, in which he extols the Roman style, and regrets 

 that some should have proposed to introduce that of Greece, which he endeavours 

 to decry and oppose. 



