ludicrous is its tendency to take on an ideal connotation, to mark off what we deem worthy of laughter. There, as in the case of the other objects of an aesthetic sentiment, there is a half-disguised reference to the regulative principles of art." The Tragic, again, produces pleasure coupled with a feeling of pity: it is a pleasure tempered with something like pain, yet there is pleasure in it, because our moral sentiment plays a part in it. The study of Esthetics has to treat of all these sensations. Hence Esthetics is also the science of feelings, sentiments, and emotions. It defines the concepts of the Beautiful and Ugly, of the Sublime, the Comic, and the Ludicrous. It tries to discover the reason which makes a thing appear beautiful or ugly. It also treats of beauty in nature as well as of beauty in the works of man, i.e. art, of beauty in concrete as well as in abstract things. It is therefore the connecting link between Philosophy and Art. Philosophically it is a part of Psychology. § 5. Whence do the aesthetic feelings arise? Is there anything like beauty in itself, or do the æsthetic feelings depend upon what we find in the objects, upon how the things appear to us individually, so that an object or sound may please one but displease or jar upon another? What are the features of an object and the movements of a sound that make it appear beautiful and harmonious, producing an impression of delight? Is there one particular ingredient common to all things that are beautiful? Such are some of the questions with which a study of Esthetics occupies itself. "The first ideas of beauty," says Professor Bain, in "Emotions and Will," "formed by the mind are in all probability derived from colours. Long before the infants receive any pleasure from the beauties of form or of motion, their eye may be caught or delighted with brilliant colouring, or with splendid imagination. I am inclined, too, to suspect that, in the judgment of a peasant, this ingredient of beauty predominates over every other, even in his estimate of female form." This accounts for the fact that primitive races or individuals that are still very low in the scale of mental development are attracted by gaudy colours in inanimate or animate objects. Minds little developed, that have not yet come to their self-consciousness, that have not yet reached the phase of turning their gaze into themselves, are attracted either by strong (red and yellow) colours, or by the variety, whilst the refined and cultured are drawn towards uniform shades and milder hues. It is the unity of the idea in the variety of appearances that they admire. Das einfach Schoene wird der Kenner loben, -SCHILLER. This power of distinction and appreciation of beauty is what we commonly call "taste." It is the capacity of man to feel æsthetic pleasure, a faculty with which man is more or less gifted and which culture and civilization develop in the individual as well as in the social group, in a lower or higher degree. § 6. The same sound, shape, or form does not produce the same effect upon every listener or spectator. It is due, in the first place, to the fact that the nervous fibres are not equally constructed in every individual and that the variety of temperament, education, customs, and habits is immense; and in the second place to the divergence in the phase of mental evolution. Beauty appeals not only to the imagination but also to the intellect. The unaided senses perceive the movements, lines, sounds, or colours, but only in their singularity; thought and consciousness unite them to a harmonious whole. Here also lies the difference between man and animal. The animal sees the aggregation of colours in Raphael's Madonna, it hears the sound of a poem, but it perceives no love, feels no passion in it. This is the reason why one man grasps or understands the beauty of a thing in nature or in art, a symphony or a canvas, while the other remains indifferent, why one is enthusiastic and the other bored. One audience will enjoy a play of Ibsen or Maeterlinck, whilst another will feel highly gratified by the spectacle of a Drury Lane pantomime. It is also for the same reason that the lady of aristocratic society prefers mild colours and dark, or at least uniform shades, whilst her negro servant has a predilection for red and yellow. The one has taste, the other has not, or what she has is still at a very low degree of differentiation and evolution. § 7. The æsthetic pleasure manifests itself very often in an active, creative manner. There is a desire deeply rooted in the breast of man to express what he feels in line or sound or form. He must speak, he must produce. A man who cannot speak, write, or compose will often attempt to do so; he thinks he feels the need of doing so without, however, possessing the power; but a man who has the power must exercise it. "There is no mute and inglorious Milton," Carlyle said; and one may add : There is no silent, passive Beethoven or Mozart, no contemplative but unproductive Michael Angelo or Raphael. The impression-physical, intellectual, or moral— received and thus expressed in a few lines, words, or sounds, in painting, sculpture, architecture, poetry, or music, is Art. Art is the faculty of expressing a sentiment or a feeling in an external form. Thus the aesthetic feeling, passive in the ordinary man, is active in the artist ; the superabundance of strength results in action, in a reflex power of creation. By means of stone or colours, of language or sound, the artist expresses also that which is invisible to us; he expresses the ideal. Speaking to our mind by aid of the senses, he elevates our soul and ennobles us, calling forth the highest sentiments and actions. Art not only speaks to the heart, but also to the mind—in a word, to the inmost recesses of the soul, to all human faculties. The artist gathers the characteristics of a sentiment, idea, or a physiognomy, putting clearly and vividly before us what we could not understand before. The artist sees more than the ordinary man; he conceives an ideal and produces it. Now, is art imitative only, reproducing as faithfully as possible sensible appearances? Has it any object or aim, or is it only for its own sake: l'art pour l'art (art for art's sake)? Is it independent of the moral sense, or must it be in harmony with it? Such are the questions that occupy philosophers and have given rise to various theories-Realism or Naturalism, and Idealism. § 8. Naturalism is the theory which maintains that the aim and purport of art consist in the imitation of nature, or at least in trying to approach as nearly as possible to nature. Others, again, think that if the artist imitates nature, he must, however, not do it too literally. He conceives an ideal and produces it, blending reality with his own thoughts and sentiments. He copies but also modifies nature at the same time; he selects and recombines, thus bringing out immanent meanings and interpretations. This theory is called Idealism. A work of art thus manifesting some essential feature, or salient character, or great idea becomes clearer than reality, and consequently also more impressive upon the mind than reality. ↑ Penetrated with a sentiment, the artist tries to transform it into a reflex power of action, and creates a work not as it is, but as he conceives it. Another question is whether art has to serve ethical purposes, or whether it stands above morality. Some, like Ruskin, maintain that art has only to be moral. The great and generous task of the artist consists in making us participate in his noble sentiments. Morality alone and nothing else can be demanded of a work of art. Others, again, maintain that a work of art need only be beautiful. Beauty lies in form; the content is a matter of indifference: it may be vice or crime. Some of these æsthetes even go so far as to affirm that "Esthetics are higher than Ethics." "To discuss the beauty of a thing is the finest point to which we can arrive. Even a colour-sense is more important in the development of the individual than a sense of right and wrong.' § 9. The study of Esthetics is older than its name. Etymologically the word has a narrower sense than is given to it. It was first made use of by Baumgarten (1714-1762), a disciple of Wolff, the German philosopher, who was the originator of the study of Esthetics as a separate branch of Philosophy. He derived the word from the Greek αἰσθητικός aisthetikos (from αἰσθάνεσθαι π to perceive), or that which is perceived by the senses. called this science Esthetics, as signifying sensation and = He perception, and applied it to the Beautiful, the Beautiful, according to his views, being obscurely perceived by the senses, and not by reason, like Logic. And thus the term Esthetics remained, although it covers a much wider field than its etymology suggests. The Greek philosophers, however, had already discussed the subject of Beauty. Socrates, according to Xenophon,1 held the idea of the Ethical to be predominant, and the effect was of importance for him. The Beautiful was for him identical with the Useful. Plato, in his "Hippias Major," " considered the Beautiful identical with the Divine and with the idea of the Good. Beauty, therefore, is something abstract, absolute, and unchangeable. He conceives it as a being apart from any reality. The soul had enjoyed the aspect of eternal beauty in its natal preterrestrial life, and therefore man, when reminded of it by the aspect of a thing that possesses something of this eternal beauty, becomes enthusiastic. Plato thought that beauty is inherent in a thing and independent of our senses, whilst the moderns, especially since the doctrine of evolution, maintain that beauty in itself is nothing but what our sensations and senses make it. According to Plato, there is an absolute beauty in which all things participate. Aristotle, in his work on Poetry, has given an analysis of the theory of art. the Middle Ages no interest was taken in speculations concerning Esthetics. The celebrated common sense of the Englishman has made itself felt in the English School of Philosophy and also in æsthetic theories. In Philosophy the attention of the English thinkers was directed towards the empirical; they speculated not upon the thing itself, but upon the impression it produced on the human In 1 The reader must bear in mind that Socrates left no writings. We are indebted for our knowledge of him to his two pupils Xenophon and Plato, who have given accounts of the master in their own words. Xenophon's data are contained in his "Memorabilia" and Plato's in his "Dialogues." In reading Plato's "Dialogues" it is, however, often difficult to say what is purely reported from Socrates and what is originated by Plato himself. 2 It is doubtful, however, whether Plato really wrote the Hippias Major." |