[ 608 ] 
all the purpofes of convenience, and at the fame 
time were more beautiful j and being the manufac- 
ture (25) of Italy, might probably be purchafed at 
a lefs expence. Upon all which accounts it feems 
reafonable to conclude, that one of thefe inventions 
would naturally be introductory to the other : and 
confequently, that as window-lights of the lapis fpe- 
cularis began to be ufed within the memory of Se- 
neca, who died (26) under Nero, about anno Chrijii 
68. ( Ilelvic .), the original of thofe of glafs may have 
fair pretenfions to a place within the period affigned 
in the foregoing paragraph, viz. fome years before 
the deftruction (27) of Herculaneum, in whofe ruins 
the plate before us was buried. 
To conclude : I need not obferve to you, that all 
the evidence here produced to prove the ufage of 
glafs-windows to have been coasval with the frag- 
ment we are now confidering, is of the conjectural 
kind only: for, I muft confefs, I have not been able 
to trace it up by any pofitive authority higher than 
about 200 years fhort of the epocha la A: mentioned, 
viz. to the latter end of the third century (28), when 
it is exprefly mentioned by LaClantius in thefe words: 
Manifejiius ejt t mentem ej]'e> qua per ocutos ca t 
qua 
(25) Plin. Nat. Hilt. lib. xxxvi. c. 26. §. 66. 
(26) Vid. fupra. 
(27) Anno Chrifti 80. 
(28) In order to juftify my placing the teftimony of this Father 
fo high, I would obferve, that St. Jerome (De Scriptor. L'cc/ef.) 
lays, that L&aaxti\M~-Extrema feneftute magtfier Cafaris Crtfpi 
filii Conjiantini in Gallia fuit . He mull probably have excrcifed 
this 
