File:Suggestions on the Arrangement and Characteristics of Parish Churches Figure 06.png

English: Figure 6 of Suggestions on the Arrangement and Characteristics of Parish Churches. Original description by J. J. McCarthy on p. 11: Sometimes we find arrangements so far outraging all ecclesiastical propriety and architectural principles, even to the rendering of the buildings incommodious for the worshippers, that they cannot be reduced to any general class or description. Figures 5 and 6 will illustrate one of these strange vagaries. The idea of the designer was, to cover in a great area with one roof, unsupported by pillars of any sort, so that the altar, placed against the side wall, would be conspicuous from all parts of the building, three sides of which were to be encumbered by enormous galleries. He succeeded, of course, in placing the altar in the wrong position; but the enourmous span of the roof is now causing it to sink, and the much-dreaded columns must be introduced, to prevent its fall and the utter ruin of the fabric.