GOTHIC CHURCH, ABERDEEN. 
I N the flourifhing periods of the Ecclefiadical State in North Britain, when 
the fplendor of the catholic eftablifhments were the pride and glory of the no- 
bility, ample donations of lands were made to the Church for public buildings, for 
the aggrandizement of the altars, and thofe who minillred at them. The pious 
and charitable purpofes to which thefe donations were evidently appropriated, were 
flattering to the devotion .and beneficence of the donors; and they were per- 
fuaded that, by thefe facrifices in fupport of a religion with which the maintenance 
of the poor was intimately connefited, they would not fail to conciliate the divine 
approbation and favor. 
By the revolutions of religious principle which pervaded Scotland two centuries 
ago, that facred zeal completely evaporated ; at lead, its direction was altogether 
changed. 
When by a remarkably ferious combination of circumltances, the greater fim- 
plicity of worfhip adopted, rendered fuperfluous the numerous buildings that had 
been erefiled for the dignified clergy, the lands devoted to them were again re- 
fumed by the knights and nobles, as the reward of the afitive part they took in the 
Reformation. Thus the palaces of degraded bifhops, deanrics, &c. deprived of 
their exiled prote£lors, were left to irretrievable ruin : The finances which had 
fupported their date, foon as underdood to be applicable to fecular purpofes, be- 
came attainable prizes in the lottery of life, and were feized on through various 
pretences, and irrevocably retained by all thofe who had fufficient power in arms, 
or intered with adminidration, to make good the judice of their claim. 
It was, but in a little more moderate manner, accomplifhing a devadation and 
rapine, fimilar to what has of late been perpetrating in France. Such are the re- 
volutions to which all human inftitutions are liable. 
The barbarous policy adopted as a moll efficient council, of dedroying the 
buildings, that they might the more completely reform the worfhip, prevailed to 
the deltruftion of abbies, monafteries, and many cathedrals. The popular proverb 
of the Prefbyterian preachers was, “ deflroy the nelts, and the rooks will fly 
“ away." The revenues of the Church, however, once allocated, fome of the 
places" of worfhip were allowed to remain undemolifhed, and efcaped the general 
ruin. 
The external dru&ure of the fine Gothic building, reprefented by the annexed 
plate, is preferved in a great meafure entire, though long ago defpoiled of its 
internal decorations. 
The plate, paintings, flatues, tapeftries, and all the fplendid enrichments of the 
altar, offered to facrilegious hands a ready prey, and were alienated on the fpecious 
pretext of having favoured fuperllitions, no longer held confident with the pure 
homage to be offered to the Supreme. 
This majedic Edifice would be looked on as a venerable fane in any country, 
or in any age : Its charafiler is that of plain magnificence ; not loaded with deco- 
rations of fculpture ; its grandeur and fimplicity at once awe and charm the fpec- 
tator. The lofty projeftion of the eaft end, which encompaffed the grand altar; 
atid is the front of the prefent view, dill imparts, by its maffy greatnefs, fome idea 
of the folemnity with which it was the defire of the builders thefe fancluaries 
fhould fill the mind. 
It was a noble and exalted opinion at the time, that fwayed the councils of the 
learned and the wife : That the folemnities of the altar became a renewal of the ma- 
nifedations of the Divine Presence in the world ; and that, therefore, the Sanc- 
tuary, wherein was preferved the memorials of this holy light, the Tabernacle of 
the living bread that came down from Heaven, the repofitory of the record of 
the 
