Yet the thinkers of antiquity were aware that a problem lay in the
direction of Aesthetic, and Xenophon records the sayings of Socrates
that the beautiful is "that which is fitting and answers to the end
required." Elsewhere he says "it is that which is loved." Plato likewise
vibrates between various views and offers several solutions. Sometimes
he appears almost to confound the beautiful with the true, the good and
the divine; at others he leans toward the utilitarian view of Socrates;
at others he distinguishes between what is beautiful In itself and what
possesses but a relative beauty. At other times again, he is a hedonist,
and makes it to consist of pure pleasure, that is, of pleasure with no
shadow of pain; or he finds it in measure and proportion, or in the very
sound, the very colour itself. The reason for all this vacillation of
definition lay in Plato's exclusion of the artistic or mimetic fact from
the domain of the higher spiritual activities. The _Hippias major_
expresses this uncertainty more completely than any of the other
dialogues. What is the beautiful? That is the question asked at the
beginning, and left unanswered at the end. The Platonic Socrates and
Hippias propose the most various solutions, one after another, but
always come out by the gate by which they entered in. Is the beautiful
to be found in ornament? No, for gold embellishes only where it is in
keeping.
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