DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.61894#0083
a. in.
THROUGH ITALY.
73
owned that.the outside of the Pantheon and of
Diocletian’s baths by no means corresponds with
their internal magnificence. In succeeding ages
the disproportion became more striking, and no-
thing can be more contemptible than the external
show of some of the noblest basilicse : as that of
St. Paul’s for instance, of St. Laurence, and also
that of St. Sebastian, which exhibits more the ap-
pearance of a neglected barn than of a patriar-
chal church. The same remark might have been
applied to Santa Maria Maggiore till the reign of
Benedict XIV. who cased it with Tiburtine
stone, adorned it with a portico or a colonnade in
front, and gave it an exterior of some dignity,
though not perfect nor altogether worthy of its
grand and splendid interior.
Moreover, while the traveller expects, and not
without reason, to find some specimens of the best
taste and purest style of architecture among the
Roman churches, he must not be surprised if he
should frequently meet with instances of the very
reverse in both respects, and have reason too
often to lament that the finest materials have been
thrown away in the construction of shapeless
and deformed edifices. To explain this sin-
gular combination of good and bad taste, the
reader has only to recollect, that in Rome, as in
other great cities, different fashions have prevail-
ed at different periods, and that architects, even
THROUGH ITALY.
73
owned that.the outside of the Pantheon and of
Diocletian’s baths by no means corresponds with
their internal magnificence. In succeeding ages
the disproportion became more striking, and no-
thing can be more contemptible than the external
show of some of the noblest basilicse : as that of
St. Paul’s for instance, of St. Laurence, and also
that of St. Sebastian, which exhibits more the ap-
pearance of a neglected barn than of a patriar-
chal church. The same remark might have been
applied to Santa Maria Maggiore till the reign of
Benedict XIV. who cased it with Tiburtine
stone, adorned it with a portico or a colonnade in
front, and gave it an exterior of some dignity,
though not perfect nor altogether worthy of its
grand and splendid interior.
Moreover, while the traveller expects, and not
without reason, to find some specimens of the best
taste and purest style of architecture among the
Roman churches, he must not be surprised if he
should frequently meet with instances of the very
reverse in both respects, and have reason too
often to lament that the finest materials have been
thrown away in the construction of shapeless
and deformed edifices. To explain this sin-
gular combination of good and bad taste, the
reader has only to recollect, that in Rome, as in
other great cities, different fashions have prevail-
ed at different periods, and that architects, even