The subject of the main composition covers the cupola, and contains upwards of a hundred figures considerably over life-size. The picture illustrates the miracle ascribed to St. Anthony of Padua, who restored to life the corpse of a murdered man in order that he might reveal the name of his assassin and rescue an innocent man who was about to be executed as the perpetrator of the crime. The scene is enclosed by a painted railing which surrounds the entire composition. We see the saint standing on an eminence against a luminous background. His life-giving words have just restored the corpse to consciousness. The man leans forward, supported in the arms of a companion, with his hands clasped in an attitude of profound veneration, his expressive face looking fixedly upon the saint with a gaze of surprise and gratitude. The central figures are surrounded by a motley crowd of men, women, and children, some of whom express their astonishment by eloquent gestures, while others appear indifferent to the miracle that is being performed, and one or two frolicsome boys are seen astride the figured railing. On the spandrils, the intrados, the curvilineal triangles of the arches, and behind the high altar, are groups of angels and cherubs. The angels are beautifully clothed and almost wanton in their human loveliness, the babes are entirely without the illusion of divine origin. It has been said that in this composition Goya perfectly interpreted the spirit of the Church de la Florida; certain it is that these angels with ‘the skin of a camellia, eyes of fire, and the beauty of a harlot,’ which move with audacious freedom of attitude, ‘not in pure spheres of blessedness, but in an atmosphere of atoms of gold illuminated by an Asiatic sun, are the strangest and most beautiful creatures that ever adorned a consecrated house.’