At the Restoration, Bishop Ward, after a great thunderstorm in 1668, when fears were entertained for the safety of the spire, called in Sir Christopher Wren, who, after examining the tower, expressed his belief "that a spire was not contemplated by its builders;" that "out of fear to overburden the four piers of the tower, its inside was carried for 40 feet above the nave with a slender hollow work of pillars and arches, nor hath it any buttresses; the spire itself is but 9 inches thick, though the height be above 150 feet." This work of pillars and arches led him to conclude that the architect laid his first floor of timber 40 feet higher than the vault beneath. Dr. Walter Pope, in his "Life of Bishop Seth Ward," 1697, describes the restorations accomplished by this excellent prelate: "There being, therefore, not much to be done as to reparation, he employ'd himself in the Decoration of the Cathedral: First, at his proper charges Paving the Cloyster. I mean that side of it which leads out of his garden into the church. At his exhortation, and more than proportinable (_sic_) expence the Pavement of the Church was mended where it was faulty, and the whole Quire laid with white and black squares of marble. The Bishops, Deans, and all the Prebendaries Stalls made New & Magnificent, and the whole church was kept so clean, that anyone who had occasion for Dust to throw on the Superscription of a Letter, he would have a hard task to find it there.... His next care was to repair, I might almost say rebuild his Palace, which was much ruined, the Hall being pulled down, & the Greater part of the House converted to an Inn ... what remained of the Palace was divided into small Tenements and let out to poor Handicraft-men. This dilapidation was the work of one Van Ling, a Dutchman, by trade a Taylor, who bought it of Parliament when Bishop's lands were exposed to sale."