I would not make any
secret of this with regard to the following pages of this book. Yet
this intrusion of personality need not be harmful, but may, on the
contrary, be valuable. It cannot be harmful if the writer proceeds
undogmatically, making constant appeals to the judgment of his readers
and claiming no authority for his statements except in so far as they
find favor there. Influence rather than authority is what he should
seek. In presenting his views, as he must, he should strive to stimulate
the reader to make a clear and consistent formulation of his own
preferences rather than to impose upon him standards ready made. And
the good of the personal element comes from the power which one strong
preference or conviction has of calling forth another, and compelling
it to the discovery and defense of its grounds.
In so far as aesthetics is studied by the objective method it is a
branch of psychology. Aesthetic facts are mental facts. A work of art,
no matter how material it may at first seem to be, exists only as
perceived and enjoyed. The marble statue is beautiful only when it
enters into and becomes alive in the experience of the beholder. Keys
and strings and vibrations of the air are but stimuli for the auditory
experience which is the real nocturne or etude. Ether vibrations and
the retina upon which they impinge are nothing more than instruments
for the production of the colors which, together with the interpretation
of them in terms of ideas and feelings, constitute the real picture
which we appreciate and judge.
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