on one
grand detached shaft; as much trust being thus placed in the pillars
here, as is withdrawn from them elsewhere. The northern portico has only
one detached pillar at its outer angle, which sustains three shafts and
a square pilaster; of these shafts the one at the outer angle of the
group is the thickest (so as to balance the pilaster on the inner
angle), measuring 3 ft. 2 in. round, while the others measure only 2 ft.
10 in. and 2 ft. 11 in.; and in order to make this increase of diameter,
and the importance of the shaft, more manifest to the eye, the old
builders made the shaft _shorter_ as well as thicker, increasing the
depth both of its capital and the base, with what is to the thoughtless
spectator ridiculous incongruity, and to the observant one a most
beautiful expression of constructive genius. Nor is this all. Observe:
the whole strength of this angle depends on accuracy of _poise_, not on
breadth or strength of foundation. It is a _balanced_, not a propped
structure: if the balance fails, it must fall instantly; if the balance
is maintained, no matter how the lower shaft is fastened into the
ground, all will be safe. And to mark this more definitely, the great
lower shaft _has a different base from all the others of the facade_,
remarkably high in proportion to the shaft, on a circular instead of a
square plinth, and _without spurs_, while all the other bases have spurs
without exception. Glance back at what is said of the spurs at p. 79 of
the first volume, and reflect that all expression of _grasp_ in the foot
of the pillar is here useless, and to be replaced by one of balance
merely, and you will feel what the old builder wanted to say to us, and
how much he desired us to follow him with our understanding as he laid
stone above stone.

And this purpose of his is hinted to us once more, even by the position
of this base in the ground plan of the foundation of the portico; for,
though itself circular, it sustains a hexagonal plinth _set obliquely to
the walls of the church_, as if expressly to mark to us that it did not
matter how the base was set, so only that the weights were justly
disposed above it.

10. PROPER SENSE OF THE WORD IDOLATRY.

I do not intend, in thus applying the word "Idolatry" to certain
ceremonies of Romanist worship, to admit the propriety of the ordinary
Protestant manner of regarding those ceremonies as distinctively
idolatrous, and as separating the Romanist from the Prot