Gothic architecture, in its purity, was characterized mainly by the pointed arch. This novel feature in architecture, which, probably, in the hands of artists of great mathematical skill, was suggested by the inefficiency of the Roman arch first used, has given rise to all the superior boldness and picturesqueness of this style compared with the Grecian; for while the Greek artist was obliged to cover his narrow openings with architraves, or solid blocks of stone, resting on columns at short intervals, and filling up the open space, the Gothic artist, by a single span of his pointed arch, resting on distant pillars, kept the whole area beneath free and unencumbered. Applied, too, to openings for the admission of light, which were deemed of comparatively little or no importance by the Greeks, the arch was of immense value, making it possible to pierce the solid wall with large and lofty apertures, that diffused a magical brilliancy of light in the otherwise dim and shadowy interior.
