Lectures on Art by Washington Allston
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Washington Allston >> Lectures on Art
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Of the peculiar fruits of this law, which we shall here distinguish by
the general term _mental pleasures_, it is our purpose to treat
in the present discourse.
It is with no assumed diffidence that we venture on this subject; for,
though we shall offer nothing not believed to be true, we are but too
sensible how small a portion of truth it is in our power to present.
But, were it far greater, and the present writer of a much higher
order of intellect, there would still be sufficient cause for
humility in view of those impassable bounds that have ever met every
self-questioning of the mind.
But whilst the narrowness of human knowledge may well preclude all
self-exaltation, it would be worse than folly to hold as naught the
many important truths which have been wrought out for us by the mighty
intellects of the past. If they have left us nothing for vainglory,
they have left us at least enough to be grateful for. Nor is it
a little, that they have taught us to look into those mysterious
chambers of our being,--the abode of the spirit; and not a little,
indeed, if what we are there permitted to know shall have brought with
it the conviction, that we are not abandoned to a blind empiricism, to
waste life in guesses, and to guess at last that we have all our
lives been guessing wrong,--but, unapproachable though it be to the
subordinate Understanding, that we have still within us an abiding
Interpreter, which cannot be gainsaid, which makes our duty to God and
man clear as the light, which ever guards the fountain of all true
pleasures, nay, which holds in subjection the last high gift of the
Creator, that imaginative faculty whereby his exalted creature, made
in his image, might mould at will, from his most marvellous world, yet
unborn forms, even forms of beauty, grandeur, and majesty, having all
of truth but his own divine prerogative,--_the mystery of Life_.
As the greater part of those Pleasures which we propose to discuss are
intimately connected with the material world, it may be well, perhaps,
to assign some reason for the epithet _mental_. To many, we know,
this will seem superfluous; but, when it is remembered how often we
hear of this and that object delighting the eye, or of certain sounds
charming the ear, it may not be amiss to show that such expressions
have really no meaning except as metaphors. When the senses, as the
medium of communication, have conveyed to the mind either the sounds
or images, their function ceases. So also with respect to the objects:
their end is attained, at least as to us, when the sounds or images
are thus transmitted, which, so far as they are concerned, must for
ever remain the same within as without the mind. For, where the
ultimate end is not in mere bodily sensation, neither the senses nor
the objects possess, of themselves, any productive power; of the
product that follows, the _tertium aliquid_, whether the pleasure
we feel be in a beautiful animal or in according sounds, neither the
one nor the other is really the cause, but simply the _occasion_.
It is clear, then, that the effect realized supposes of necessity
another agent, which must therefore exist only in the mind. But of
this hereafter.
If the cause of any emotion, which we seem to derive from an outward
object, were inherent exclusively in the object itself, there could
be no failure in any instance, except where the organs of sense were
either diseased or imperfect. But it is a matter of fact that they
often do fail where there is no disease or organic defect. Many of us,
perhaps, can call to mind certain individuals, whose sense of hearing
is as acute as our own, who yet can by no possibility be made to
recognize the slightest relation between the according notes of the
simplest melody; and, though they can as readily as others distinguish
the individual sounds, even to the degrees of flatness and sharpness,
the harmonic agreement is to them as mere noise. Let us suppose
ourselves present at a concert, in company with one such person and
another who possesses what is called musical sensibility. How are
they affected, for instance, by a piece of Mozart's? In the sense
of hearing they are equal: look at them. In the one we perceive
perplexity, annoyance, perhaps pain; he hears nothing but a confused
medley of sounds. In the other, the whole being is rapt in ecstasy,
the unutterable pleasure gushes from his eyes, he cannot articulate
his emotion;--in the words of one, who felt and embodied the subtile
mystery in immortal verse, his very soul seems "lapped in Elysium."
Now, could this difference be possible, were the sole cause, strictly
speaking, in mere matter?
Nor do we contradict our position, when we admit, in certain
cases,--for instance, in the producer,--the necessity of a nicer
organization, in order to the more perfect _transmission_ of the
finer emotions; inasmuch as what is to be communicated in space and
time must needs be by some medium adapted thereto.
Such a person as Paganini, it is said, was able to "discourse most
excellent music" on a ballad-monger's fiddle; yet will any one
question that he needed an instrument of somewhat finer construction
to show forth his full powers? Nay, we might add, that he needed no
less than the most delicate _Cremona_,--some instrument, as it
were, articulated into humanity,--to have inhaled and respired those
attenuated strains, which, those who heard them think it hardly
extravagant to say, seemed almost to embody silence.
Now this mechanical instrument, by means of which such marvels were
wrought, is but one of the many visible symbols of that more subtile
instrument through which the mind acts when it would manifest itself.
It would be too absurd to ask if any one believed that the music we
speak of was created, as well as conveyed, by the instrument. The
violin of Paganini may still be seen and handled; but the soul that
inspired it is buried with its master.
If we admit a distinction between mind and matter, and the result we
speak of be purely mental, we should contradict the universal law
of nature to assign such a product to mere matter, inasmuch as the
natural law forbids in the lower the production of the higher. Take
an example from one of the lower forms of organic life,--a common
vegetable. Will any one assert that the surrounding inorganic elements
of air, earth, heat, and water produce its peculiar form? Though some,
or all, of these may be essential to its developement, they are so
only as its predetermined correlatives, without which its existence
could not be manifested; and in like manner must the peculiar form of
the vegetable preexist in its life,--in its _idea_,--in order to
evolve by these assimilants its own proper organism.
No possible modification in the degrees or proportion of these
elements can change the specific form of a plant,--for instance, a
cabbage into a cauliflower; it must ever remain a cabbage, _small or
large, good or bad. _ So, too, is the external world to the
mind; which needs, also, as the condition of its manifestation, its
objective correlative. Hence the presence of some outward object,
predetermined to correspond to the preexisting idea in its living
power, is essential to the evolution of its proper end,--the
pleasurable emotion. We beg it may be noted that we do not say
_sensation_. And hence we hold ourself justified in speaking of
such presence as simply the occasion, or condition, and not, _per
se_, the cause. And hence, moreover, may be inferred the absolute
necessity of Dual Forces in order to the actual existence of any
thing. One alone, the incomprehensible Author of all things, is
self-subsisting in his perfect Unity.
We shall now endeavour to establish the following proposition: namely,
that the Pleasures in question have their true source in One Intuitive
Universal Principle or living Power, and that the three Ideas of
Beauty, Truth, and Holiness, which we assume to represent the
_perfect_ in the physical, intellectual, and moral worlds, are
but the several realized phases of this sovereign principle, which we
shall call _Harmony_.
Our first step, then, is to possess ourself of the essential or
distinctive characteristic of these pleasurable emotions. Apparently,
there is nothing more simple. And yet we are acquainted with no single
term that shall fully express it. But what every one has more or less
felt may certainly be made intelligible in a more extended form, and,
we should think, by any one in the slightest degree competent to
self-examination. Let a person, then, be appealed to; and let him put
the question as to what passes within him when possessed by these
emotions; and the spontaneous feeling will answer for us, that what we
call _self_ has no part in them. Nay, we further assert, that,
when singly felt, that is, when unallied to other emotions as
modifying forces, they are wholly unmixed with _any personal
considerations, or any conscious advantage to the individual_.
Nor is this assigning too high a character to the feelings in question
because awakened in so many instances by the purely physical; since
their true origin may clearly be traced to a common source with those
profounder emotions which we are wont to ascribe to the intellectual
and moral. Besides, it should be borne in mind, that no physical
object can be otherwise to the mind than a mere _occasion_; its
inward product, or mental effect, being from another Power. The proper
view therefore is, not that such alliance can ever degrade the higher
agent, but that its more humble and material _assimilant_ is thus
elevated by it. So that nothing in nature should be counted mean,
which can thus be exalted; but rather be honored, since no object can
become so assimilated except by its predetermined correlation to our
better nature.
Neither is it the privilege of the exclusive few, the refined and
cultivated, to feel them deeply. If we look beyond ourselves, even to
the promiscuous multitude, the instance will be rare, if existing at
all, where some transient touch of these purer feelings has not raised
the individual to, at least, a momentary exemption from the common
thraldom of self. And we greatly err if their universality is not
solely limited by those "shades of the prison-house," which, in the
words of the poet, too often "close upon the growing boy." Nay, so
far as we have observed, we cannot admit it as a question whether any
person through a whole life has always been wholly insensible,--we
will not say (though well we might) to the good and true,--but to
beauty; at least, to some one kind, or degree, of the beautiful. The
most abject wretch, however animalized by vice, may still be able to
recall the time when a morning or evening sky, a bird, a flower, or
the sight of some other object in nature, has given him a pleasure,
which he felt to be distinct from that of his animal appetites, and
to which he could attach not a thought of self-interest. And, though
crime and misery may close the heart for years, and seal it up for
ever to every redeeming thought, they cannot so shut out from the
memory these gleams of innocence; even the brutified spirit, the
castaway of his kind, has been made to blush at this enduring light;
for it tells him of a truth, which might else have never been
remembered,--that he has once been a man.
And here may occur a question,--which might well be left to the ultra
advocates of the _cui bono_,--whether a simple flower may not
sometimes be of higher use than a labor-saving machine.
As to the objects whose effect on the mind is here discussed, it is
needless to specify them; they are, in general, all such as are known
to affect us in the manner described. The catalogue will vary both in
number and kind with different persons, according to the degree of
force or developement in the overruling Principle.
We proceed, then, to reply to such objections as will doubtless be
urged against the characteristic assumed. And first, as regards the
Beautiful, we shall probably be met by the received notion, that we
experience in Beauty one of the most powerful incentives to passion;
while examples without number will be brought in array to prove it
also the wonder-working cause of almost fabulous transformations,--as
giving energy to the indolent, patience to the quick, perseverance
to the fickle, even courage to the timid; and, _vice versa_, as
unmanning the hero,--nay, urging the honorable to falsehood, treason,
and murder; in a word, through the mastered, bewildered, sophisticated
_self_, as indifferently raising and sinking the fascinated
object to the heights and depths of pleasure and misery, of virtue and
vice.
Now, if the Beauty here referred to is of the _human being_, we
do not gainsay it; but this is beauty in its _mixed mode_,--not
in its high, passionless form, its singleness and purity. It is not
Beauty as it descended from heaven, in the cloud, the rainbow, the
flower, the bird, or in the concord of sweet sounds, that seem to
carry back the soul to whence it came.
Could we look, indeed, at the human form in its simple, unallied
physical structure,--on that, for instance, of a beautiful woman,--and
forget, or rather not feel, that it is other than a _form_, there
could be but one feeling: that nothing visible was ever so framed to
banish from the soul every ignoble thought, and imbue it, as it were,
with primeval innocence.
We are quite aware that the doctrine assumed in our main proposition
with regard to Beauty, as holding exclusive relation to the Physical,
is not very likely to forestall favor; we therefore beg for it only
such candid attention as, for the reasons advanced, it may appear to
deserve.
That such effects as have just been objected could not be from Beauty
alone, in its pure and single form, but rather from its coincidence
with some real or supposed moral or intellectual quality, or with the
animal appetites, seems to us clear; as, were it otherwise, we might
infer the same from a beautiful infant,--the very thought of which is
revolting to common sense. In such conjunction, indeed, it cannot but
have a certain influence, but so modified as often to become a mere
accessory, subordinated to the animal or moral object, and for the
attainment of an end not its own; in proof of which, we find it almost
uniformly partaking the penalty imposed on its incidental associates,
should ever their desires result in illusion,--namely, in the aversion
that follows. But the result of Beauty can never be such; when it
seems otherwise, the effect, we think, can readily be traced to other
causes, as we shall presently endeavour to show.
It cannot be a matter of controversy whether Beauty is limited to the
human form; the daily experience of the most ordinary man would answer
No: he finds it in the woods, the fields, in plants and animals,
nay, in a thousand objects, as he looks upon nature; nor, though
indefinitely diversified, does he hesitate to assign to each the same
epithet. And why? Because the feelings awakened by all are similar in
kind, though varying, doubtless, by many degrees in intenseness. Now
suppose he is asked of what personal advantage is all this beauty to
him. Verily, he would be puzzled to answer. It gives him pleasure,
perhaps great pleasure. And this is all he could say. But why should
the effect be different, except in degree, from the beauty of a human
being? We have already the answer in this concluding term. For what is
a human being but one who unites in himself a physical, intellectual,
and moral nature, which cannot in one become even an object of thought
without at least some obscure shadowings of its natural allies? How,
then, can we separate that which has an exclusive relation to his
physical form, without some perception of the moral and intellectual
with which it is joined? But how do we know that Beauty is limited
to such exclusive relation? This brings us to the great problem; so
simple and easy of solution in all other cases, yet so intricate and
apparently inexplicable in man. In other things, it would be felt
absurd to make it a question, whether referring to form, color, or
sound. A single instance will suffice. Let us suppose, then, an
unfamiliar object, whose habits, disposition, and so forth, are wholly
unknown, for instance, a bird of paradise, to be seen for the
first time by twenty persons, and they all instantly call it
beautiful;--could there be any doubt that the pleasure it produced
in each was of the same kind? or would any one of them ascribe his
pleasure to any thing but its form and plumage? Concerning natural
objects, and those inferior animals which are not under the influence
of domestic associations, there is little or no difference among men:
if they differ, it is only in degree, according to their sensibility.
Men do not dispute about a rose. And why? Because there is nothing
beside the physical to interfere with the impression it was
predetermined to make; and the idea of beauty is realized instantly.
So, also, with respect to other objects of an opposite character; they
can speak without deliberating, and call them plain, homely, ugly, and
so on, thus instinctively expressing even their degree of remoteness
from the condition of beauty. Who ever called a pelican beautiful, or
even many animals endeared to us by their valuable qualities,--such as
the intelligent and docile elephant, or the affectionate orang-outang,
or the faithful mastiff? Nay, we may run through a long list of most
useful and amiable creatures, that could not, under any circumstances,
give birth to an emotion corresponding to that which we ascribe to the
beautiful.
But there is scarcely a subject on which mankind are wider at
variance, than on the beauty of their own species,--some preferring
this, and others that, particular conformation; which can only be
accounted for on the supposition of some predominant expression,
either moral, intellectual, or sensual, with which they are in
sympathy, or else the reverse. While some will task their memory,
and resort to the schools, for their supposed infallible
_rules_;--forgetting, meanwhile, that ultimate tribunal to which
their canon must itself appeal, the ever-living principle which first
evolved its truth, and which now, as then, is not to be reasoned
about, but _felt_. It need not be added how fruitful of blunders
is this mechanical ground.
Now we venture to assert that no mistake was ever made, even in a
single glance, concerning any natural object, not disfigured by human
caprice, or which the eye had not been trained to look at through
some conventional medium. Under this latter circumstance, there are
doubtless many things in nature which affect men very differently; and
more especially such as, from their familiar nearness, have come under
the influence of _opinion_, and been incrusted, as it were, by
the successive deposits of many generations. But of the vast and
various multitude of objects which have thus been forced from their
original state, there is perhaps no one which has undergone so many
and such strange disfigurements as the human form; or in relation to
which our "ideas," as we are pleased to call them, but in truth our
opinions, have been so fluctuating. If an Idea, indeed, had any thing
to do with Fashion, we should call many things monstrous to
which custom has reconciled us. Let us suppose a case, by way of
illustration. A gentleman and lady, from one of our fashionable
cities, are making a tour on the borders of some of our new
settlements in the West. They are standing on the edge of a forest,
perhaps admiring the grandeur of nature; perhaps, also, they are
lovers, and sharing with nature their admiration for each other, whose
personal charms are set off to the utmost, according to the most
approved notions, by the taste and elegance of their dress. Then
suppose an Indian hunter, who had never seen one of our civilized
world, or heard of our costume, coming suddenly upon them, their faces
being turned from him. Would it be possible for him to imagine what
kind of animals they were? We think not; and least of all, that he
would suppose them to be of his own species. This is no improbable
case; and we very much fear, should it ever occur, that the unrefined
savage would go home with an impression not very flattering either to
the milliner or the tailor.
That, under such disguises, we should consider human beauty as a kind
of enigma, or a thing to dispute about, is not surprising; nor even
that we should often differ from ourselves, when so much of the
outward man is thus made to depend on the shifting humors of some
paramount Petronius of the shears. But, admitting it to be an easy
matter to divest the form, or, what is still more important, our
own minds, of every thing conventional, there is the still greater
obstacle to any true effect from the person alone, in that moral
admixture, already mentioned, which, more or less, must color the
most of our impressions from every individual. Is there not, then,
sufficient ground for at least a doubt if, excepting idiots, there is
one human being in whom the purely physical is _at all times_ the
sole agent? We do not say that it does not generally predominate. But,
in a compound being like man, it seems next to impossible that the
nature within should not at times, in some degree, transpire through
the most rigid texture of the outward form. We may not, indeed, always
read aright the character thus obscurely indexed, or even be able to
guess at it, one way or the other; still, it will affect us; nay, most
so, perhaps, when most indefinite. Every man is, to a certain extent,
a physiognomist: we do not mean, according to the common acceptation,
that he is an interpreter of lines and quantities, which may be
reduced to rules; but that he is born one, judging, not by any
conscious rule, but by an instinct, which he can neither explain nor
comprehend, and which compels him to sit in judgment, whether he will
or no. How else can we account for those instantaneous sympathies and
antipathies towards an utter stranger?
Now this moral influence has a twofold source, one in the object,
and another in ourselves; nor is it easy to determine which is the
stronger as a counteracting force. Hitherto we have considered only
the former; we now proceed with a few remarks upon the latter.
Will any man say, that he is wholly without some natural or acquired
bias? This is the source of the counteracting influence which we speak
of in ourselves; but which, like many other of the secret springs,
both of thought and feeling, few men think of. It is nevertheless one
which, on this particular subject, is scarcely ever inactive;
and according to the bias will be our impressions, whether we be
intellectual or sensual, coldly speculative or ardently imaginative.
We do not mean that it is always called forth by every thing we
approach; we speak only of its usual activity between man and man; for
there seems to be a mysterious something in our nature, that, in spite
of our wishes, will rarely allow of an absolute indifference towards
any of the species; some effect, however slight, even as that of the
air which we unconsciously inhale and again respire, must follow,
whether directly from the object or reacting from ourselves. Nay, so
strong is the law, whether in attraction or repulsion, that we cannot
resist it even in relation to those human shadows projected on air by
the mere imagination; for we feel it in art only less than in nature,
provided, however, that the imagined being possess but the indication
of a human soul: yet not so is it, if presenting only the outward
form, since a mere form can in itself have no affinity with either
the heart or intellect. And here we would ask, Does not this
striking exception in the present argument cast back, as it were, a
confirmatory reflection?
We have often thought, that the power of the mere form could not be
more strongly exemplified than at a common paint-shop. Among the
annual importations from the various marts of Europe, how
many beautiful faces, without an atom of meaning, attract the
passengers,--stopping high and low, people of all descriptions,
and actually giving pleasure, if not to every one, at least to the
majority; and very justly, for they have beauty, and _nothing
else_. But let another artist, some man of genius, copy the same
faces, and add character,--breathe into them souls: from that moment
the passers-by would see as if with other eyes; the affections and
the imagination then become the spectators; and, according to the
quickness or dulness, the vulgarity or refinement, of these, would be
the impression. Thus a coarse mind may feel the beauty in the hard,
soulless forms of Van der Werf, yet turn away with apathy from the
sanctified loveliness of a Madonna by Raffaelle.
But to return to the individual bias, which is continually inclining
to, or repelling, What is more common, especially with women, than
a high admiration of a plain person, if connected with wit, or a
pleasing address? Can we have a stronger case in point than that of
the celebrated Wilkes, one of the ugliest, yet one of the most
admired men of his time? Even his own sex, blinded no doubt by their
sympathetic bias, could see no fault in him, either in mind or
person; for, when it was objected to the latter, that "he squinted
confoundedly," the reply was, "No, Sir, not more than a gentleman
ought to squint."
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