His scale of values is double or
triple. We must first fix the degree of importance of the
characteristic, that is, the greater or less generality of the idea, and
the degree of good in it, that is to say, its greater or lesser moral
value. These, he says, are two degrees of the same thing, strength, seen
from different sides. We must also establish the degree of convergence
of the effects, that is, the fulness of expression, the harmony between
the idea and the form.
This half-moral, half-metaphysical exposition is accompanied with the
usual protestations, that the matter in hand is to be studied
methodically, analytically, as the naturalist would study it, that he
will try to reach "a law, not a hymn." As if these protestations could
abolish the true nature of his thought! Taine actually went so far as to
attempt dialectic solutions of works of art! "In the primitive period of
Italian art, we find the soul without the body: Giotto. At the
Renaissance, with Verrocchio and his school, we find the body without
the soul. With Raphael, in the sixteenth century, we find expression and
anatomy in harmony: body and soul." Thesis, antithesis, synthesis!
With G.T. Fechner we find the like protestations and the like
procedure. He will study Aesthetic inductively, from beneath. He seeks
clarity, not loftiness. Proceeding thus inductively, he discovers a long
series of laws or principles of Aesthetic, such as unity in variety,
association and contrast, change and persistence, the golden mean, etc.
Pages:
326
327
328
329
330
331
332
333
334
335
336
337
338
339
340
341
342
343
344
345
346
347
348
349
350