give light, and attics which had a value as the means of
illumination from above, could not with any propriety be applied to
the covering of blank dead spaces in the interiors of buildings.

The vestibule of the Laurentian Library illustrates his method of
procedure. It is a rectangular box of about a cube and two thirds, set
length-way up. The outside of the building, left unfinished, exhibits
a mere blank space of bricks. The interior might be compared to a
temple in the grotesque-classic style turned outside in: colossal
orders, meaningless consoles, heavy windows, square recesses, numerous
doors--the windows, doors, and attics having no right to be there,
since they lead to nothing, lend view to nothing, clamour for bronze
and sculpture to explain their existence as niches and receptacles for
statuary. It is nevertheless indubitably true that these incongruous
and misplaced elements, crowded together, leave a strong impression of
picturesque force upon the mind. From certain points and angles, the
effect of the whole, considered as a piece of deception and
insincerity, is magnificent. It would be even finer than it is, were
not the Florentine _pietra serena_ of the stonework so repellent in
its ashen dulness, the plaster so white, and the false architectural
system so painfully defrauded of the plastic forms for which it was
intended to subserve as setting.

We have here no masterpiece of sound constructive science, but a freak
of inventive fancy using studied details for the production of a
pictorial effect. The details employed to compose this curious
illusion are painfully dry and sterile; partly owing to the scholastic
enthusiasm for Vitruvius, partly to the decline of mediaeval delight
in naturalistic decoration, but, what seems to me still more apparent,
through Michelangelo's own passionate preoccupation with the human
figure. He could not tolerate any type of art which did not concede a
predominant position to the form of man. Accordingly, his work in
architecture at this period seems waiting for plastic illustration,
demanding sculpture and fresco for its illumination and justification.

It is easy, one would think, to make an appeal to the eye by means of
colossal orders, bold cornices, enormous consoles, deeply indented
niches. How much more easy to construct a box, and then say, "Come,
let us cover its inside with an incongruous and inappropriate but
imposing parade of learning," than to lift some lig