DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.6886#0170
138 HISTORY OF
works and repairs of the collegiate church of St. Peter, in Westminster, you were
pleased to give me this seasonable admonition: that I should consider my advanced
age; and though I had already made fair steps in the repairs of that ancient and
ruinous fabric, yet you thought it reasonable that I should leave a memorial of
what I had done, and what my thoughts are for carrying on the works for
the future.
In order to give an account of what I have already done, it may be proper,
in the first place, to describe the state of the fabric as I found it; which, being the
work of near five hundred years, through so many ages, and the reigns of so
many kings, it may be necessary to consider the modes of building in those
several ages: such, at least, as I am able at present to collect, I shall beg leave
to discourse a little upon.
That, in the time of the Romans, there was a temple dedicated to Apollo, in
Thorney Island (the place anciently so called where the church now stands), and
ruined by an earthquake in the reign of Antoninus Pius, I can hardly assent to.
The Romans did not use, though in their colonies, to build so slightly: the ruins of
much more ancient times shew their works even at this age: the least fragment of
cornice or capital would demonstrate their handy work. Earthquakes do not
break stones to pieces, nor would the Picts be at the pains : but I suppose, that
the monks of Westminster, finding that the Londoners made pretence to a temple
of Diana, where now the cathedral of St. Paul stands (many stags' horns
having been there found in the ruins), would not be behind hand with them in
antiquity : yet I must assert, that when I began to build the new church of St.
Paul, and on that occasion examined the old foundations, and rummaged all the
ground thereabouts, I could not perceive any footsteps of such a temple, and
therefore can give no more credit to Apollo than to Diana.
To pass over the fabulous account, that King Lucius founded a little church
here in the year of our Lord 170, out of the ruins of the temple of Apollo, it is
works and repairs of the collegiate church of St. Peter, in Westminster, you were
pleased to give me this seasonable admonition: that I should consider my advanced
age; and though I had already made fair steps in the repairs of that ancient and
ruinous fabric, yet you thought it reasonable that I should leave a memorial of
what I had done, and what my thoughts are for carrying on the works for
the future.
In order to give an account of what I have already done, it may be proper,
in the first place, to describe the state of the fabric as I found it; which, being the
work of near five hundred years, through so many ages, and the reigns of so
many kings, it may be necessary to consider the modes of building in those
several ages: such, at least, as I am able at present to collect, I shall beg leave
to discourse a little upon.
That, in the time of the Romans, there was a temple dedicated to Apollo, in
Thorney Island (the place anciently so called where the church now stands), and
ruined by an earthquake in the reign of Antoninus Pius, I can hardly assent to.
The Romans did not use, though in their colonies, to build so slightly: the ruins of
much more ancient times shew their works even at this age: the least fragment of
cornice or capital would demonstrate their handy work. Earthquakes do not
break stones to pieces, nor would the Picts be at the pains : but I suppose, that
the monks of Westminster, finding that the Londoners made pretence to a temple
of Diana, where now the cathedral of St. Paul stands (many stags' horns
having been there found in the ruins), would not be behind hand with them in
antiquity : yet I must assert, that when I began to build the new church of St.
Paul, and on that occasion examined the old foundations, and rummaged all the
ground thereabouts, I could not perceive any footsteps of such a temple, and
therefore can give no more credit to Apollo than to Diana.
To pass over the fabulous account, that King Lucius founded a little church
here in the year of our Lord 170, out of the ruins of the temple of Apollo, it is