VIII

The P R E F A C E.

upon these Imitations and Resemblances, that the Grace and 'Beauty of allthese Things depends 3 for if it were so their greatest Beauty would consistin the most exalt Imitation . Now we do not find that the Proportions andFigure, which all these Things ought to have to make them agreeable > andwhich cannot be chang d, without giving Distaste, are taken exaSily fromthe Proportions and Figure of the Things they represent and imitate . Forit is certain that the Capital, which is the Head of that Body, the wholeColumn represents, has not the Proportion which the Head ought to haVe toa Body, fince the more squat the Body is, the fewer times doth it contain theLength of the Head, and on the contrary, the thickest Columns have the lowestCapitals, and the slenderest have the highest in proportion to the whole Co-lumn. In the fame manner, those Columns are generally distOsd, whichnearest Resemble the Bodies of Trees, which were the Posts of the first Hutsthat were built 3 and we commonly chuse to have them swelling in the mid-dle, which is never seen in the Trunks of Trees, for they are gradually ta-pering to the Top. Nor would Cornices give greater SatisfaBion, did their,Members more exaElly represent the Figure and Disposition of the Pieces ofCarpentry, from whence they were first devis’d : for then the Dentels oughtto be above the Modillions, which in Cornices, at the EaVes, represent theEnds of Rafters 3 and the Modillions, which, in the Cornices of Pediments,express the Ends of Purlins, ought to lye square to the stoping Line of thePediment, as the Purlins do to the Declivity of the Roof, and not perpen-dicular to the Entablature, as is generally praftis'd 3 and lastly, were theQuarter-rounds to hear a greater Likeness to Chefnuts in their prickly Shell,the Ogees to the Waves of a River, and the Astragals to a Heel, theywould be never the better relish’d by the judicious. *Twere also requisite,did Reason alone direft our Judgment, that the Ionic Cornices should be rich-er, and more adorn d than the Doric 3 it being but just, that a more deli-cate Order should have more Ornaments than that which is more maffive 3 andm fine, we should never he able to suffer, as they did formerly, the Columnsto he set leaning os one fide, had not Custom made tolerable a Thing in it-self so contrary to Reason.

Neither the Imitation of Nature, nor Reason, nor good Sense, are thenthe Foundation os those Beauties, which we fancy we fee in the Proportion,Order, and Disposition of the Parts of a Column 3 and it is impossible to assign

any