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384 the windows become larger and have foliated circles, &c. in the head, yet this difference alone is not sufficient to form a separate style. 7. "Geometric Middle Pointed," and 8. "Complete Middle Pointed." Between these two supposed styles no real line of distinction can be drawn, either in the mouldings or the tracery. It is true that the geometrical forms of tracery are generally earlier than the flowing forms, but by no means always; they are often continued to a late period in the Decorated style, and sometimes in the same building the windows have their tracery geometrical and flowing alternately, without any other distinction, the mouldings and derails being the same, and the two evidently built at the same time. This is fatal to the attempt to divide the Decorated into two styles. 9. "Third Pointed," 10. "Florid Third Pointed." The length of time over which the Perpendicular style extended, makes it more desirable to divide it into early and late, but no line of distinction can be drawn, at least none sufficiently marked for common use; very early Perpendicular buildings have frequently been mistaken for very late ones, by persons supposed to be good judges. It is allowed by all that there was a continual progress, a gradual change in all the styles, but this was not always simultaneous, there were new fashions and old fashions at all periods: however numerous we may make the styles, we must still allow ' for a transition period between one and the other, so that the only result of such numerous divisions must be increased confusion, and consequent difficulty, to students and persons who have not time to study the subject very deeply.

Mr. Paley may be able to make all these nice distinctions himself, but few will be able to follow him, and those who have studied the subject a much longer time, and perhaps quite as deeply as Mr. Paley, do not agree with him as to the expediency of these divisions, nor yet as to the precise point where each should begin and end, neither will history bear him out as to the dates which he has assumed. He acknowledges that, "With respect to the dates of each it is quite impossible to lay down more than a very general scheme," and quotes with approbation these sensible observations. "Professor Willis is of opinion that in each style we must presume the existence of Imitation and Transition specimens, and that at the same period of time, and in the same country, buildings may have been in progress, some in the old style, some in the new, others in every possible gradation between them. For when any new style is invented in the