Editing Panthéon (section)

===The Revolution – The "Temple of the Nation"===
<gallery mode="packed" heights="180">
File:Tomb of Jean-Jacques Rousseau (01).jpg|The Tomb of [[Jean-Jacques Rousseau]]
File:Panthéon 1795.jpg|The Panthéon in 1795. The façade windows were bricked up to make the interior darker and more solemn.
File:Tombeau et statue de Voltaire, Paris 8 juin 2014.jpg|Tomb and statue of [[Voltaire]]
File:Malapeau Claude-Nicolas Translation de Voltaire au Panthéon.jpg|Transfer of ashes of [[Voltaire]] to the Pantheon (1791)
</gallery>
The Church of Saint Genevieve was nearly complete, with only the interior decoration unfinished, when the [[French Revolution]] began in 1789. In 1790, the Marquis de Vilette proposed that it be made a temple devoted to liberty, on the model of the Pantheon in Rome. "Let us install statues of our great men and lay their ashes to rest in its underground recesses."<ref name="Lebeurre 2000, p. 16">{{harvnb|Lebeurre|2000|p=16}}</ref> The idea was formally adopted in April, 1791, after the death of the prominent revolutionary figure, [[Honoré Gabriel Riqueti, comte de Mirabeau|The Comte de Mirabeau]], the President of the [[National Constituent Assembly (France)|National Constituent Assembly]] on April 2, 1791. On April 4, 1791, the Assembly decreed "that this religious church become a temple of the nation, that the tomb of a great man become the altar of liberty." They also approved a new text over the entrance: "A grateful nation honors its great men." On the same day the declaration was approved, the funeral of Mirabeau was held in the church.<ref name="Lebeurre 2000, p. 16"/>

The ashes of [[Voltaire]] were placed in the Panthéon in a lavish ceremony on 11 July 1791, followed by the remains of several revolutionaries, including [[Jean-Paul Marat]], replacing Mirabeau and of the philosopher [[Jean-Jacques Rousseau]]. In the rapid shifts of power of the Revolutionary period, two of the first men honored in Pantheon, Mirabeau and Marat, were declared enemies of the Revolution, and their remains were removed. Finally, the new government of the [[French Convention]] decreed in February, 1795 that no one should be placed in the Pantheon who had not been dead at least ten years.<ref name="Lebeurre 2000, p. 17">{{harvnb|Lebeurre|2000|p=17}}</ref>

Soon after the church was transformed into a mausoleum, the Assembly approved architectural changes to make the interior darker and more solemn. The architect [[Quatremère de Quincy]] bricked up the lower windows and frosted the glass of the upper windows to reduce the light, and removed most of the ornament from the exterior. The architectural lanterns and bells were removed from the façade. All of the religious friezes and statues were destroyed in 1791; it was replaced by statuary and murals on patriotic themes.<ref name="Lebeurre 2000, p. 17"/>