Part 4
_I._--And yet there is a common point of union for all the arts wherefrom the laws of all proceed.
_Guest._--And that is--
_I._--The soul of man.
_Guest._--Ay, ay; that is just the way with you gentlemen of the new school of philosophy. You bring everything upon your own ground and province; and, in fact, it is more convenient to shape the world according to your ideas than to adapt your notions to the truth of things.
_I._--Here is no question of any metaphysical dispute.
_Guest._--If there were I should certainly decline it.
_I._--I shall admit for the sake of argument that Nature can be imagined as absolutely apart from man, but with him art necessarily concerns itself, for art exists only through man and for man.
_Guest._--Where does all this tend?
_I._--You yourself, when you make Character the end of art, appoint the understanding, which takes cognizance of the characteristic, as the judge.
_Guest._--To be sure I do. What I cannot seize with my understanding does not exist for me.
_I._--Yet man is not only a being of thought, but also of feeling. He is a whole; a union of various, closely connected powers; and to this whole of man the work of art is to address itself. It must speak to this rich unity, this simple variety in him.
_Guest._--Don’t carry me with you into these labyrinths, for who could ever help us out again?
_I._--It will then be best for us to give up the dispute and each retain his position.
_Guest._--I shall at least hold fast to mine.
_I._--Perhaps a means may still be found whereby, if one does not take the other’s position, he can at least observe him in it.
_Guest._--Propose it then.
_I._--We will for a moment contemplate art in its origin.
_Guest._--Good.
_I._--Let us accompany the work of art on its road to perfection.
_Guest._--But only by the way of experience, if you expect me to follow. I will have nothing to do with the steep paths of speculation.
_I._--You allow me to begin at the beginning?
_Guest._--With all my heart.
_I._--A man feels an inclination for some object; let us suppose a single living being.
_Guest._--As, for instance, this pretty lap-dog.
_Julia._--Come, Bello! It is no small honor to serve as example in such a discussion.
_I._--Truly, the dog is pretty enough, and if the man we are speaking of had the gift of imitation, he would try in some way to make a likeness of it. But let him prosper never so well in his imitation, we are still not advanced, for we have at best only two Bellos instead of one.
_Guest._--I will not interrupt, but wait and see what is to become of this.
_I._--Suppose that this man, to whom for the sake of his talent we will give the name of Artist, has by no means satisfied himself as yet; that his desire seems to him too narrow, too limited; that he busies himself about more individuals, varieties, kinds, species, in such wise that at last not the creature itself, but the Idea of the creature stands before him, and he is able to express this by means of his art.
_Guest._--Bravo! That is just my man, and his work must be characteristic.
_I._--No doubt.
_Guest._--And there I would stop and go no farther.
_I._--But we go beyond this.
_Guest._--I stop here.
_Uncle._--I will go along for the sake of experiment.
_I._--By this operation we may arrive at a canon useful indeed, and scientifically valuable, but not satisfactory to the soul of man.
_Guest._---How then are you going to satisfy the fantastic demands of this dear soul?
_I._--Not fantastic; it is only not satisfied in its just claims. An old tradition informs us that the Elohim once took counsel together, saying, let us make man after our own image; and man says therefore, with good cause, let us make gods and they shall be in our image.
_Guest._--We are getting into a dark region.
_I._--There is only one light that can aid us here.
_Guest._--And that is?
_I._--Reason.
_Guest._--How far it be a guide or a will-o’-wisp is hard to say.
_I._--We need not give it a name; but let us ask ourselves what are the demands the soul makes of a work of art. It is not enough that it fulfils a limited desire, that it satisfies our curiosity, or gives order and stability to our knowledge; that which is Higher in us must be awakened; we must be inspired with reverence, and feel ourselves worthy of reverence.
_Guest._--I begin to be at a loss to comprehend you.
_Uncle._--But I think I am able to follow in some measure;--how far, I shall try to make clear by an example. We will suppose our artist had made an eagle in bronze which perfectly expressed the idea of the species, but now he would place him on the sceptre of Jupiter. Do you think it would be perfectly suitable there?
_Guest._--It would depend.
_Uncle._--I say, No! The artist must first impart to him something beyond all this.
_Guest._--What then?
_Uncle._--It is hard to express.
_Guest._--So I should think.
_I._--And yet something may be done by approximation.
_Guest._--To it then.
_I._--He must give to the eagle what he gave to Jupiter, in order to make him into a God.
_Guest._--And this is--
_I._--The Godlike,--which in truth we should never become acquainted with, did not man feel and himself reproduce it.
_Guest._--I continue to hold my ground, and let you ascend into the clouds. I see that you mean to indicate the high style of the Greeks, which I prize only so far as it is characteristic.
_I._--It is something more to us, however; it answers to a high demand, but still not the highest.
_Guest._--You seem to be very hard to satisfy.
_I._--It beseems him to demand much for whom much is in store. Let me be brief. The human soul is in an exalted position when it reverences, when it adores; when it elevates an object and is elevated by it again. But it cannot remain long in this state. The general concept of genus leaves it cold; the Ideal raises it above itself; but now it must return again into itself; and it would gladly enjoy once more that affection which it then felt for the Individual, without coming back to the same limited view, and will not forego the significant, the spirit-moving. What would become of it now, if Beauty did not step in and happily solve the riddle? She first gives life and warmth to the Scientific, and breathing her softening influence and heavenly charm over even the Significant and the High, brings it back to us again. A beautiful work of art has gone through the entire circle; it becomes again an Individual that we can embrace with affection, that we can make our own.
_Guest._--Have you done?
_I._--For the present. The little circle is completed; we have come back to our starting point; the soul has made its demands, and those demands have been satisfied. I have nothing further to add. (Here our good uncle was peremptorily called away to a patient.)
_Guest._--It is the custom of you philosophic gentlemen to engage in battle behind high-sounding words, as if it were an ægis.
_I._--I can assure you that I have not now been speaking as a philosopher. These are mere matters of experience.
_Guest._--Do you call that experience, whereof another can comprehend nothing?
_I._--To every experience belongs an organ.
_Guest._--Do you mean a separate one?
_I._--Not a separate one; but it must have one peculiarity.
_Guest._--And what is that?
_I._--It must be able to produce.
_Guest._--Produce what?
_I._--The experience! There is no experience which is not brought forth, produced, created.
_Guest._--This is too much!
_I._--This is particularly the case with artists.
_Guest._--Indeed! How enviable would the portrait painter be, what custom would he not have, if he could reproduce all his customers without troubling people with so many sittings!
_I._--I am not deterred by your instance, but rather am convinced no portrait can be worth anything that the painter does not in the strictest sense create.
_Guest_ (springing up).--This is maddening! I would you were making game of me, and all this were only in jest. How happy I should be to have the riddle explained in that manner! How gladly would I give my hand to a worthy man like you!
_I._--Unfortunately, I am quite in earnest, and cannot come to any other conclusion.
_Guest._--Now I did hope that in parting we should take each other’s hand, especially since our good host has departed, who would have held the place of mediator in your dispute. Farewell, Mademoiselle! Farewell, Sir! I shall inquire to-morrow whether I may wait on you again.
So he stormed out of the door, and Julia had scarce time to send the maid, who was ready with the lantern, after him. I remained alone with the sweet child, for Caroline had disappeared some time before,--I think about the time that my opponent had declared that mere beauty, without character, must be insipid.
You went too far, my friend, said Julia, after a short pause. If he did not seem to me altogether in the right, neither can I give unqualified assent to you; for your last assertion was only made to tease him. The portrait painter must make the likeness a pure creation?
Fair Julia, I replied, how much I could wish to make myself clear to you upon this point. Perhaps in time I shall succeed. But you, whose lively spirit is at home in all regions, who not only prize the artist but in some sense anticipate him, and who know how to give form to what your eyes have never seen, as if it stood bodily before you, you should be the last to start when the question is of creation, of production.
_Julia._--I see it is your intention to bribe me. That will not be hard, for I like to listen to you.
_I._--Let us think well of man, and not trouble ourselves if what we say of him may sound a little bizarre. Everybody admits that the poet must be born. Does not every one ascribe to genius a creative power, and no one thinks he is repeating a paradox? We do not deny it to works of fancy; but the inactive, the worthless man will not become aware of the good, the noble, the beautiful, either in himself or others. Whence came it, if it did not spring from ourselves? Ask your own heart. Is not the method of intercourse born with intercourse? Is it not the capacity for good deeds that rejoices over the good deed? Who ever feels keenly without the wish to express that feeling? and what do we express but what we create? and in truth, not once only, that it may exist and there end, but that it may operate, ever increase, and again come to life, and again create. This is the god-like power of love, of the singing and speaking of which there is no end, that it reproduces at every moment the noble qualities of the beloved object, perfects it in the least particulars, embraces it in the whole, rests not by day, sleeps not by night, is enchanted with its own work, is astonished at its own restless activity, ever finds the familiar new, because at every moment it is re-created in the sweetest of all occupations. Yes, the picture of the beloved cannot grow old, for every moment is the moment of its birth.
The maid returned from lighting the stranger. She was highly satisfied with his liberality, for he had given her a handsome _pourboire_; but she praised his politeness still more highly, for he had dismissed her with a friendly word, and, moreover, called her “Pretty Maid.”
I was not in a humor to spare him, and exclaimed: “Oh, yes! I can easily credit that one who denies the ideal should take the common for the beautiful.”
FOOTNOTES:
[3] Alois Hirt, protagonist of the theory of the “characteristic.”
[4] Schiller.
ON TRUTH AND PROBABILITY IN WORKS OF ART
_A Dialogue_
(1798)
In a certain German theatre there was represented a sort of oval amphitheatrical structure, with boxes filled with painted spectators, seemingly occupied with what was being transacted below. Many of the real spectators in the pit and boxes were dissatisfied with this, and took it amiss that anything so untrue and improbable was put upon them. Whereupon the conversation took place of which we here give the general purport.
_The Agent of the Artist._--Let us see if we cannot by some means agree more nearly.
_The Spectator._--I do not see how such a representation can be defended.
_Agent._--Tell me, when you go into a theatre, do you not expect all you see to be true and real?
_Spectator._--By no means! I only ask that what I see shall appear true and real.
_Agent._--Pardon me if I contradict even your inmost conviction and maintain this is by no means the thing you demand.
_Spectator._--That is singular! If I did not require this, why should the scene painter take so much pains to draw each line in the most perfect manner, according to the rules of perspective, and represent every object according to its own peculiar perfection? Why waste so much study on the costume? Why spend so much to insure its truth, so that I may be carried back into those times? Why is that player most highly praised who most truly expresses the sentiment, who in speech, gesture, delivery, comes nearest the truth, who persuades me that I behold not an imitation, but the thing itself?
_Agent._--You express your feelings admirably well, but it is harder than you may think to have a right comprehension of our feelings. What would you say if I reply that theatrical representations by no means seem really true to you, but rather to have only an appearance of truth?
_Spectator._--I should say that you have advanced a subtlety that is little more than a play upon words.
_Agent._--And I maintain that when we are speaking of the operations of the soul, no words can be delicate and subtle enough; and that this sort of play upon words indicates a need of the soul, which, not being able adequately to express what passes within us, seeks to work by way of antithesis, to give an answer to each side of the question, and thus, as it were, to find the mean between them.
_Spectator._--Very good. Only explain yourself more fully, and, if you will oblige me, by examples.
_Agent._--I shall be glad to avail myself of them. For instance, when you are at an opera, do you not experience a lively and complete satisfaction?
_Spectator._--Yes, when everything is in harmony, one of the most complete I know.
_Agent._--But when the good people there meet and compliment each other with a song, sing from billets that they hold in their hands, sing you their love, their hatred, and all their passions, fight singing, and die singing, can you say that the whole representation, or even any part of it, is true? or, I may say, has even an appearance of truth?
_Spectator._--In fact, when I consider, I could not say it had. None of these things seems true.
_Agent._--And yet you are completely pleased and satisfied with the exhibition?
_Spectator._--Beyond question. I still remember how the opera used to be ridiculed on account of this gross improbability, and how I always received the greatest satisfaction from it, in spite of this, and find more and more pleasure the richer and more complete it becomes.
_Agent._--And you do not then at the opera experience a complete deception?
_Spectator._--Deception, that is not the proper word,--and yet, yes!--But no--
_Agent._--Here you are in a complete contradiction, which is far worse than a quibble.
_Spectator._--Let us proceed quietly; we shall soon see light.
_Agent._--As soon as we come into the light, we shall agree. Having reached this point, will you allow me to ask you some questions?
_Spectator._--It is your duty, having questioned me into this dilemma, to question me out again.
_Agent._--The feeling you have at the exhibition of an opera cannot be rightly called deception?
_Spectator._--I agree. Still it is a sort of deception; something nearly allied to it.
_Agent._--Tell me, do you not almost forget yourself?
_Spectator._--Not almost, but quite, when the whole or some part is excellent.
_Agent._--You are enchanted?
_Spectator._--It has happened more than once.
_Agent._--Can you explain under what circumstances?
_Spectator._--Under so many, it would be hard to tell.
_Agent._--Yet you have already told when it is most apt to happen, namely, when all is in harmony.
_Spectator._--Undoubtedly.
_Agent._--Did this complete representation harmonize with itself or some other natural product?
_Spectator._--With itself, certainly.
_Agent._--And this harmony was a work of art?
_Spectator._--It must have been.
_Agent._--We have denied to the opera the possession of a certain sort of truth. We have maintained that it is by no means faithful to what it professes to represent. But can we deny to it a certain interior truth, which arises from its completeness as a work of art?
_Spectator._--When the opera is good, it creates a little world of its own, in which all proceeds according to fixed laws, which must be judged by its own laws, felt according to its own spirit.
_Agent._--Does it not follow from this, that truth of nature and truth of art are two distinct things, and that the artist neither should nor may endeavor to give his work the air of a work of nature?
_Spectator._--But yet it has so often the air of a work of nature.
_Agent._--That I cannot deny. But may I on the other hand be equally frank?
_Spectator._--Why not? our business is not now with compliments.
_Agent._--I will then venture to affirm, that a work of art can seem to be a work of nature only to a wholly uncultivated spectator; such a one the artist appreciates and values indeed, though he stands on the lowest step. But, unfortunately, he can only be satisfied when the artist descends to his level; he will never rise with him, when, prompted by his genius, the true artist must take wing in order to complete the whole circle of his work.
_Spectator._--Your remark is curious; but proceed.
_Agent._--You would not let it pass unless you had yourself attained a higher step.
_Spectator._--Let me now make trial, and take the place of questioner, in order to arrange and advance our subject.
_Agent._--I shall like that better still.
_Spectator._--You say that a work of art could appear as a work of nature only to an uncultivated person?
_Agent._--Certainly. You remember the birds that tried to eat the painted cherries of the great master?
_Spectator._--Now does not that show that the cherries were admirably painted?
_Agent._--By no means. It rather convinces me that these connoisseurs were true sparrows.
_Spectator._--I cannot, however, for this reason concede that this work could have been other than excellent.
_Agent._--Shall I tell you a more modern story?
_Spectator._--I would rather listen to stories than arguments.
_Agent._--A certain great naturalist, among other domesticated animals, possessed an ape, which he missed one day, and found after a long search in the library. There sat the beast on the ground, with the plates of an unbound work of Natural History scattered about him. Astonished at this zealous fit of study on the part of his familiar, the gentleman approached, and found, to his wonder and vexation, that the dainty ape had been making his dinner of the beetles that were pictured in various places.
_Spectator._--It is a droll story.
_Agent._--And seasonable, I hope. You would not compare these colored copperplates with the work of so great an artist?
_Spectator._--No, indeed.
_Agent._--But you would reckon the ape among the uncultivated amateurs?
_Spectator._--Yes, and among the greedy ones! You awaken in me a singular idea. Does not the uncultivated amateur, just in the same way, desire a work to be natural, that he may be able to enjoy it in a natural, which is often a vulgar and common way?
_Agent._--I am entirely of that opinion.
_Spectator._--And you maintain, therefore, that an artist lowers himself when he tries to produce this effect?
_Agent._--Such is my firm conviction.
_Spectator._--But here again I feel a contradiction. You did me just now the honor to number me, at least, among the half-cultivated spectators.
_Agent._--Among those who are on the way to become true connoisseurs.
_Spectator._--Then explain to me, Why does a perfect work of art appear like a work of nature to me also?
_Agent._--Because it harmonizes with your better nature. Because it is above natural, yet not unnatural. A perfect work of art is a work of the human soul, and in this sense, also, a work of nature. But because it collects together the scattered objects, of which it displays even the most minute in all their significance and value, it is above nature. It is comprehensible only by a mind that is harmoniously formed and developed, and such an one discovers that what is perfect and complete in itself is also in harmony with himself. The common spectator, on the contrary, has no idea of it; he treats a work of art as he would any object he meets with in the market. But the true connoisseur sees not only the truth of the imitation, but also the excellence of the selection, the refinement of the composition, the superiority of the little world of art; he feels that he must rise to the level of the artist, in order to enjoy his work; he feels that he must collect himself out of his scattered life, must live with the work of art, see it again and again, and through it receive a higher existence.
_Spectator._--Well said, my friend. I have often made similar reflections upon pictures, the drama, and other species of poetry, and had an instinct of those things you require. I will in future give more heed both to myself and to works of art. But if I am not mistaken, we have left the subject of our dispute quite behind. You wished to persuade me that the painted spectators at our opera are admissible, and I do not yet see, though we have come to an agreement, by what arguments you mean to support this license, and under what rubric I am to admit these painted lookers-on.
_Agent._--Fortunately, the opera is repeated to-night; I trust you will not miss it.
_Spectator._--On no account.
_Agent._--And the painted men?
_Spectator._--Shall not drive me away, for I think myself something more than a sparrow.
_Agent._--I hope that a mutual interest may soon bring us together again.
SIMPLE IMITATION OF NATURE, MANNER, STYLE
(1789)
It does not seem to be superfluous to define clearly the meaning we attach to these words, which we shall often have occasion to make use of. For, however long we may have been in the habit of using them, and however they may seem to have been defined in theoretical works, still every one continues to use them in a way of his own, and means more or less by them, according to the degree of clearness or uncertainty with which he has seized the ideas they express.
_Simple Imitation of Nature_
If an artist, in whom we must of course suppose a natural talent, is in the first stage of progress, and after having in some measure practised eye and hand, turns to natural objects, uses all care and fidelity in the most perfect imitation of their forms and colors, never knowingly departs from nature, begins and ends in her presence every picture that he undertakes,--such an artist must possess high merit, for he cannot fail of attaining the greatest accuracy, and his work must be full of certainty, variety and strength.
If these conditions are clearly considered, it will be easily seen that a capable but limited talent can in this way treat agreeable but limited subjects.
Such subjects must always be easy to find. Leisurely observation and quiet imitation must be allowed for; the disposition that occupies itself in such works must be a quiet one, self-contained, and satisfied with moderate gratification.
This sort of imitation will thus be practised by men of quiet, true, limited nature, in the representation of dead or still-life subjects. It does not by its nature exclude a high degree of perfection.
_Manner_