460 RENAISSANCE ARCHITECTURE IN FRANCE. 



this rise the colonnaded drum, the attic, the outer dome and lantern. 

 The orders throughout the building are Corinthian. 



Interior Criticised. Taken as a whole the Pantheon must be 

 pronounced one of the finest domed buildings in the world. Yet it 

 is impossible to see it without being conscious of faults, for which it 

 would be easy, now that it is built, to suggest remedies. The plan, 

 while presenting some features of great beauty the junction, for 

 instance, of four colonnaded halls with raised aisles round a central 

 space, is a graceful idea is marred by the fact that they are too large 

 to be the mere adjuncts of the dome-space, or in other words, that 

 the dome is not important enough to be the dominant feature, as 

 it is at the Invalides, or in Wren's abandoned design for St Paul's. 

 Again, while the clear view along the aisle from end to end of the 

 church is effective, the projection of the dome-supports inside the 

 colonnades, and the consequent contraction of the nave-openings, 

 and also the cross views obtainable from one hall to another behind 

 these piers are confusing. Finally, the nave vaults, while they have 

 both the slender supports and the intricacy of a mediaeval system, 

 lack their appearance of combined lightness and solidity, and the 

 unity derived from a long succession of similar bays, which are among 

 the secrets of the beauty of a Gothic nave. 



The detail and carved stone decoration of the interior is designed 

 throughout in a pure and refined taste, but lacks variety, and is not 

 exhibited to advantage in the cold white light, which pours down 

 from the dome and clearstorey and pervades every corner of the 

 building. The omission of the lesser clearstorey windows would have 

 mitigated the glare, and given alternations of shade in the roof, and 

 at the same time simplified the vaulting system, while the introduction 

 of colour into the remaining windows would give a warmth which 

 is sadly lacking. The building up of the windows, with which the 

 aisle walls were originally pierced, was no doubt an advantage inter- 

 nally, since their light is not required, and the unbroken wall makes 

 an effective background to the colonnade. 



The dome itself has several excellent features. The relative, but 

 not excessive, slenderness of the piers, the easy transition from octagon 

 to circle, the honesty of the relation between the interior and exterior 

 of the drum, are points in which it has the advantage of its great 

 Parisian predecessors, but it is less happily proportioned internally than 

 any of them, its height being considerably greater in proportion to 

 its width. 



Exterior Criticised: Dome. Externally, while effective when seen 

 from a distance which is often the case since it occupies the summit 

 of a hill it loses on a closer view. In reposeful majesty it lags far 

 behind, not only St Peter's, but its own neighbours at the Val-de-Grace, 



