Falkener, Edward: Ephesus and the temple of Diana (London, 1862)

INTRODUCTION. 3

what analogies it has with, other structures, how
it may explain some obscure text; he studies the
arrangement of these several buildings as a whole
and with each other; he considers how this
arrangement has been made to suit the peculiar
position of the city, how the natural advantages
have been improved, and natural defects remedied;
he attempts to ascertain the general type of
each structure, making allowance for the casual
modifications of particular instances; he endea-
vours to distinguish the epochs of the different
buildings, and to picture in his mind's eye what
must have been the appearance of the city at
some earlier epoch,—how, in some instances, the
original regularity of arrangement has been marred
by the addition of later buildings; how, in others,
the original simplicity has gradually given place
to prodigal magnificence; he observes the peculiar
habits and customs of different provinces, how one
form prevailed in some, and another in others.
But one of his highest sources of delight is to
walk over the prostrate ruins of some great city,
where all appears confusion and decay, where to
the eye of the ordinary observer all is a field or
mass of undistinguishable ruin; and such, indeed,