PART VI. ORNAMENTAL GARDENING. 327 



When, on viewing sublime productions of architecture, the 

 mind is rapt in wonder, astonishment, or awe, statues often 

 come in well, and increase and prolong the emotion; as in 

 contemplating the west front of St. Paul's Cathedral, York 

 Minster, or Westminster Abbey ; but they can seldom raise 

 the emotion of sublimity when they become principal in any 

 composition of architecture ; as when they are employed as co- 

 lumns or for other useful purposes, as in the order of carya- 

 tides*; and of scenery, as when they are used among trees, 

 flowers, or shrubbery. If placed among scenery to be ad- 

 mired as works of art — as fine pieces of sculpture, they will 

 never sufficiently interest any but such contracted connoisseurs 

 as would not enjoy the other objects, and would much distract 

 the attention of men of true taste. Witness the bad effect 

 of the very excellent statues placed near to, and in, the green- 

 house at Shuckborough. 



Inscriptions, merely as such, are in general despicable re- 

 sources, and only indicate conceit and want of mind. If the 

 inscription be apposite, we are much better pleased to feel or 

 recollect the coincidence on reading than to be told it by others; 

 if it be foreign, ox far fetched, it argues a gross defect in those 

 who placed it there, and serves to excite ridicule; if it be 



* This is exemplified in Liverpool Exchange. 



I 



