But practical expressions are only transient links in the
endless chain of means, disappearing as the wheel of effort revolves.
Art is indeed expression, but free or autonomous expression.
The freedom of aesthetic expression is, however, only an intensification
of a quality that may belong to any expression. For, in its native
character, expression is never merely practical; it brings its own
reward in the pleasure of the activity itself. Ordinarily, when a man
makes something embodying his need or fancy, or says something that
expresses his meaning, he enjoys himself in his doing. There is
naturally a generous superfluity in all human behavior. The economizing
of it to what is necessary for self-preservation and dominion over the
environment is secondary, not primary, imposed under the duress of
competition and nature. Only when activities are difficult or their
fruits hard to get are they disciplined for the sake of their results
alone; then only does their performance become an imperative, and
nature and society impose upon them the seriousness and constraint of
necessity and law. But whenever nature and the social organization
supply the needs of man ungrudgingly or grant him a respite from the
urgency of business, the spontaneity of his activities returns. The
doings of children, of the rich, and of all men on a holiday illustrate
this. Compare, for example, the speech of trade, where one says the
brief and needful thing only, with the talk of excursionists, where
verbal expression, having no end beyond itself, develops at length and
at leisure; where brevity is no virtue and abundant play takes the
place of a narrow seriousness.
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