and judg ment of value. of the science. It science. science. more regulative principles which may help us to as nor- me agreeably." It means that the rose has a general power of | concerned with determining the nature of a species of the desirso affecting me (at different times) and others as well. able or the good (in the large sense). It seeks one or Aesthetics Logical judgment The judgment is not the same as a logical one. does not say or imply that as a matter of fact it always does please even if we add the limitation, those who possess the sensibilities and the taste presupposed; for, as we know, our varying mood and state of receptivity make a profound difference in the fulness of the aesthetic enjoyment. It is a "judgment of value" which claims for the rose aesthetic rank as an object properly qualified to please contemplative subjects. This value, it is plain, is relative to conscious subjects; yet since it is relative to all competent ones, it may be regarded as objective "that is to say, as belonging to the object.1 This slight preliminary inspection of the subject will prepare one for the circumstance that the scientific treatment of it has Late de- begun late, and is even now far from being complete. velopment This slowness of development is in part explained by the detachment of aesthetic experience from the urgent needs of life. In a comparatively early stage of human progress some thought had to be bestowed on such pressing problems as to how to cope with the forces of nature and to turn them to useful account; how to secure in human communities obedience to custom and law. But the problem of throwing light on our aesthetic pleasures had no such urgency.2 To this it must be added that aesthetic experience (in all but its simpler and cruder forms) has been, and still is confined to a small number of persons; so that the subject does not appeal to a wide popular interest; while, on the other hand, the subjects of this experience not infrequently have a strong sentimental dislike to the idea of introducing into the region of refined feeling the cold light of scientific investigation. Lastly, there are special difficulties inherent in the subject. One serious obstacle to a scientific theory of aesthetic experience is the illusive character of many of its finer elements-for example, the subtle differences of feeling-tone produced by the several colours as well as by their several tones and shades, by the several musical intervals, and so forth. Finally, there is the circumstance just touched on that much of this region of experience, instead of at once disclosing uniformity, seems to be rather the abode of caprice and uncertainty. The variations in taste at different levels of culture, among different races and nations and among the individual members of the same community are numerous and striking, and might at first seem to bar the way to a scientific treatment of the subject. These considerations suggest that an adequate theory of aesthetic experience could only be attempted after the requisite scientific skill had been developed in other and more pressing departments of inquiry. subject. If we glance at the modes of treating the subject up to a quite recent date we find but little of serious effort to apply to it a strictly scientific method of investigation. The whole Inadequate theories of extent of concrete experience has not been adequately recognized, still less adequately examined. For the greater part thinkers have been in haste to reach some simple formula of beauty which might seem to cover the more obvious facts. This has commonly been derived deductively from some more comprehensive idea of experience or human life as a whole. Thus in German treatises on aesthetics which have been largely thought out under the influence of philosophic idealism the beautiful is subsumed under the idea, of which it is regarded as one special manifestation, and its place in human experience has been determined by defining its logical relations to the other great co-ordinate concepts, the good and the true. These attempts to reach a general conception of beauty have often led to one-sidedness of view. And this one-sidedness has sometimes characterized the theories of those who, like Alison, have made a wider survey of aesthetic facts. Aesthetics, like Ethics, is a Normative Science, that is to say, 1 See below for Kant's view of the aesthetic judgment, as having subjective universal validity. On the meaning of judgments of value see J. Cohn, Allgem. Ästhetik, Einleitung, pp. 7 ff., and Teil i., Kap. 2 and 3. 2 Cf. Ladd, Introduction to Philosophy, pp. 330, 331. Problems science. objects? We may now indicate with more fulness the main problems of our science, seeking to give them as precise a form as possible. At the outset we are confronted with an old and almost baffling question: "Is beauty a single quality the inherent in objects of perception like form or colour?" Common language certainly suggests that it is. Aesthetics, too, began its inquiry at the same point of view, and its history shows how much pains men have taken in Is beauty trying to determine the nature of this attribute, as well a single as that of the faculty of the soul by which it is per- quality in ceived. Yet a little examination of the facts suffices to show that the theory is beset with serious difficulties. Whatever beauty may be it is certainly not a quality of an object in the same way in which the colour or the form of it is a quality. These are physical qualities, known to us by specific modifications of our sensations. The beauty of a rose or of a peach is clearly not a physical quality. Nor do we in attributing beauty to some particular quality in an object, say colour, conceive of it as a phase of this quality, like depth or brilliance of colour, which, again, is known by a special modification of the sensations of colour. Hence we must say that beauty, though undoubtedly referred to a physical object, is extraneous to the group of qualities which makes it a physical object. Beauty not a physical quality. ferent qualities in objects. Beauty is frequently attributed to a concrete object as a whole-to a flower or shell, for example, as a visible whole. Our everyday aesthetic judgments are wont to leave Beauty the attributes thus vaguely referred to the concrete attributed object. Yet it is equally certain that we not infre- to difquently speak of the beauty of some definable aspect or quality of an object, as when we pronounce the contour of a mountain or of a vase to be beautiful. And it may be asked whether, in thus localizing beauty, so to speak, in one of the constituent qualities of an object, we always place it in the same quality. A mere glance at the facts will suffice to convince us that we do not. We call the façade of a Greek temple beautiful with special reference to its admirable form; whereas in predicating beauty of the ruin of a Norman castle we refer rather to what the ruin means-to the effect of an imagination of its past proud strength and slow vanquishment by the unrelenting strokes of time. This fact that beauty appertains now more to one quality, now more to another, helps us to understand why certain theorists, known as formalists, regard all beauty as formal or residing in form, whereas Formalists others, the idealists or expressionalists, view it as and exresiding in ideal content or expression. These theories, pressionhowever, like other attempts to find an adequate single principle of beauty, are unsatisfactory. Form and ideal content are each a great source of aesthetic enjoyment, and alists. Yet it is better to keep the term applicable to the objects commonly denoted by it by making it represent the fuller aesthetic satisfactions which flow from a rare and commanding exhibition of one or more of these qualities, from what may be described as an appreciable excellence of aesthetic quality. either can be found in a degree of supremacy which practically | expression for aesthetic value in all its degrees. renders the co-operation of the other unimportant. The two buildings cited above, two human faces, two musical compositions, may exhibit in an impressive and engrossing way the beauty of form and of expression respectively. Nor is this all. Three Beauty refuses to be confined even to these two. ultimate There are the various beauties of colour, for example, By thus dispensing with the concept of beauty as some occult modes of as exhibited in such familiar phenomena of nature as undefinable quality, we get rid of much of the contradiction beauty. sea and sky, autumn moors and woods. A slight which appears to inhere in our aesthetic experience. For exanalysis of the constituents of objects to which we attribute ample, a bit of brilliant colour in a bonnet which pleases the beauty shows that there are at least three distinct modes of wearer but offends her superior in aesthetic matters takes its this attribute, namely (1) sensuous beauty, (2) beauty of form place as something which per se has a certain degree of aesthetic and (3) beauty of meaning or expression, nor do these appear to value even though the particular relations into which it has be reducible to any higher or more comprehensive principle. now thrust itself, palpable to the trained eye, may practically It requires a certain boldness to attempt to effect a rapproche- rob it of its value. In thus substituting the relative idea of ment between the formal and the expressional factor. An aesthetic value for the absolute idea of beauty we may no doubt apparent unification of the three seems at present only possible seem to be destroying the reality of the object of aesthetic by substituting for beauty another concept at least equally perception. This point may more conveniently be taken vague, such as perfection, which seems to imply the idea of up later when we consider the whole question of aesthetic purposiveness, and to apply clearly only to certain domains of illusion. beauty, e.g. organic form. сопсерtions. We may now take another step and say that beauty appears to be a quality in objects which is not sharply differentiated Beauty from other and allied qualities. If we look at the and allied usages of speech we shall find that beauty has its kindred conceptions, such as gracefulness, prettiness and others. Writers on aesthetics have spent much time on these "Modifications of the Beautiful." The point emphasized here is the difficulty of drawing the line between them. Even an expert may hesitate long before saying whether a human face, a flower or a cameo should be called beautiful or pretty. Must we postulate as many allied qualities as there are names for these pleasing aspects of objects? Or must we do violence to usage and so stretch the word "Beauty as to make it cover all qualities or aspects of objects which have aesthetic value, including those "modifications of the beautiful" which we know as the sublime, the comic and the rest? But the wider we try in this way to make the denotation of the term the vaguer grows the connotation. We are thus left equally incapable of saying what the quality is, and in which aspect or attribute of the object it inheres.3 It seems to follow that in constructing a scientific theory we do well to dispense with the assumption of an objective quality of beauty. Aesthetics will return to Kant and conAssumpfine itself to the examination of objects called beautition of objective ful in their relation to, and in their manner of affecting quality of our minds. The aesthetic value of such an object beauty will be viewed as consisting in the possession of certain dispensed with. assignable characteristics by means of which it is fitted to affect us in a certain desirable way, to draw us into the enjoyable mood of aesthetic contemplation. These characteristics may conveniently be called aesthetic qualities. Objects Aesthetic which are found to possess one or more of these qualities. qualities in the required degree of fulness claim a certain aesthetic value, even though they fall short of being "beautiful," in the more exacting use of this word. They are in the direction-" im Sinne," as Fechner says-of beauty, conceived as something fuller and richer, answering to a higher standard of aesthetic enjoyment and a severer demand on our part. The word "beauty" may still be used occasionally, where no ambiguity arises, as a convenient 1 For example, that hinted at by Bosanquet in his definition of the beautiful, History of Aesthetic, p. 5. 2 Beauty is defined as Perfection by P. Souriau, La Beauté rationnelle, zeme partie. K. Groos argues well against this violent stretching of the word beautiful, Einleitung in die Ästhetik, pp. 46 seq. Kant, in developing his idea of beauty as subjective, was probably influenced by Hume, who wrote: " Beauty is no quality in things themselves; it exists merely in the mind which contemplates them" (Essays, xxii.). On the nature of these qualities see S. Witasek, Grundzüge der allgem. Ästhetik, p. 11. Problem of one. This new way of envisaging aesthetic objects requires us to make the study of their effect a prominent part of our investigation. In all the valuable recent work on the subject, attention has been largely concentrated on this effect. aesthetic More particularly we have to investigate and illumine effect. scientifically the pleasurable side of the experience. In doing this we shall make use of all the light we can obtain from a study of known laws of pleasure. Thus we shall avail ourselves not only of the theory of the pleasure-tones of sensation Aesthetics but of that of the conditions of an agreeable exercise of and the attention upon objects, more particularly of the laws of pleasure. characteristics of objects which adequately stimulate the attention without confusing or burdening it. Yet this does not require that we should treat the aesthetic problem as a part of the more general science of pleasure, as has been Problem of attempted by some, e.g. Grant Allen (Physiological aesthetic Aesthetics) and Rutgers Marshall (Pain, Pleasure and enjoyment Aesthetics, and Aesthetic Principles). To do so would a special be to run the risk of considering only the more general aspects and conditions of aesthetic enjoyment, whereas what we need is a theory of it as a specific kind of pleasurable experience. What is required at the present stage of development of the science is a deeper investigation of the aesthetic attitude of mind as a whole, of what we may call the aesthetic psychosis. We need to probe the act of contemplation itself, the mode of activity of attention involved in this calm, half-dreamlike gazing on the mere look of things unconcerned with their ordinary and weightier imports. We need further to determine the effect of this contemplative attitude upon the several mental processes involved, the act of perception itself, with its grasp of manifold relations, the flow of ideas, the partial resurgence and transformation of emotion. In examining these effects we must keep in view the double side of the contemplative attitude, the wide range of free movement which perception and imagination claim and enjoy, and the willing subjection of the contemplative mind to the spell of the object. A deeper inspection of the contemplative mood may be expected to render clearer the difference between the mental activity employed in aesthetic perception and imagination and intellectual activity proper; between, say, the differencing of allied tints involved in the finer aesthetic enjoyment of tiated. colour and the sharper, clearer discrimination of tints required in scientific observation, and between such a grasp of relations as is required for a just appreciation of beautiful form and that severe analysis and measurement of formal elements and their relations which is insisted upon by science. As a result of a finer distinction here we may probably be in a better position to determine the point-touched on more than once in recent works on aesthetics-how far intellectual pleasure proper, e.g. that of recognizing and classifying objects. enters as a subordinate element into aesthetic enjoyment. The attitude of aesthetic contem plation. Intellectual and aesthetic activity further differen Is aes One point in the characterization of aesthetic experience has been reserved, namely, the question whether it is essentially a form of social enjoyment. No one doubts that a man thetic often enjoys beauty, e.g. that of a landscape, when enjoyment alone; yet at such a moment he not only recognizes essentially that his pleasure is a possible one for others, but is social? probably aware of a sub-conscious wish that others were present to share his enjoyment. Kant went so far as to say that on a desert island a man would adorn neither his hut nor his person. However this be, it seems certain that as a rule we tend to indulge our aesthetic tastes in company with others. This habit of making aesthetic enjoyment a social experience would in itself tend to develop the sympathies and the sympathetic intelligence and thus to promote exchanges of aesthetic experience. The content, too, of our aesthetic experiences would be favourable to such conjoint acts of aesthetic contemplation, and to the mutual sharing of aesthetic experiences; for, as disinterested and universal modes of enjoyment detached from personal interests, they are clearly free from the egoistic exclusiveness which characterizes our private enjoy-literature, viz. the relation of this attitude to that of ments which at best can only be participated in by one or two closely attached friends. Our aesthetic enjoyments are thus eminently fitted to be social ones; and as such they become greatly amplified by sympathetic resonance. and its enjoyable freedom of movement. They are, moreover, the two senses by the use of which a number of persons may join most perfectly in a common act of aesthetic contemplation. This distinction strengthens their claims to be in a special manner the aesthetic senses, and this for a double reason. (1) It makes them sense-avenues by which each of us obtains the most immediate and most impressive conviction that aesthetic experience is a common possession of the many, and is largely similar in the case of different individuals. (2) It marks them off as the senses by the exercise of which perceptual enjoyment may most readily and certainly be increased through the resonant effects of sympathy. The experiences of the theatre and of the concert-hall sufficiently illustrate these distinguishing functions of the two senses. Other distinguishing prerogatives of sight and hearing flow from the characteristics of their sensations and perceptions, a point to be touched on later.2 The aesthetic senses. Aesthetic claims of We are now in a position to consider a point much discussed of late, namely, the special connexion of aesthetic enjoyment with the two senses, sight and hearing. Two questions arise here: (1) Do the other and "lower" senses take any part in aesthetic experience? (2) What are the characteristics which give the predominance to the two "higher " ones? With regard to the first it is coming to be recognized that aesthetic pleasure is not strictly confined to the two senses in question. Common language suggests that we find in certain odours and even in certain flavours a value analogous to that implied in calling an object beautiful. Hegel excluded the other senses—even touch-on the ground that aesthetics had to do only with art, in which touch. there was no place for perceptions of touch. A closer examination has shown that this important sense plays a considerable part in art-effects. And even if this were not so, Hegel's exclusion of touch from the rank of aesthetic senses would be a striking illustration of the narrowing effect on scientific theory of the identification of aesthetic objects with productions of art. To say that the experience of exploring with the fingers a velvety petal or the smooth surface of a searounded pebble has no aesthetic element savours of a perverse arbitrariness. Touch is no doubt wanting in a prerogative of hearing and sight which we shall presently see to be important, namely, that being acted on by objects at a distance they admit of a simultaneous perception by a number of persons--as indeed even the sense of smell does in a measure. This is probably the chief reason why, according to certain testimony, the blind receive but little aesthetic enjoyment from tactual experience.1 Yet this drawback is compensated to some extent by the fact that agreeable tactual experience may be taken up as suggested meaning into our visual perceptions. The two privileged senses, sight and hearing, owe their superiority to a number of considerations. They are the farthest Prerogaremoved from the necessary life functions, with the tives of pressing needs and disturbing cravings which belong to sight and these. Even touch, though important as a source of hearing. knowledge, has for its primary function to examine the things which approach our organisms in their relation to this as injurious or harmless. The two higher senses present to us material objects in their least aggressive and menacing manner: visible forms and colours, tones and their combinations, appear when compared with objects felt to be in contact with our body, to be rather semblances or distant signs of material realities than these realities themselves; and this circumstance fits these senses to be in a special way the organs of aesthetic perception with its calm, dreamlike detachment 1 See J. Cohn, Allgem. Ästhetik, p. 95. Our determination of the characteristics of the aesthetic attitude has now been carried far enough to enable us to consider another point much discussed in recent aesthetic Aesthetic activity and play. (a) Points of affinity between them. Play. The affinities of the two are striking and are (b) Points of difference. Originally, as pointed out by Home and others, sight was regarded as the sense by which we received impressions of beauty. Yet the recognition of the claims of hearing date back to Plato. (See Bosanquet, Hist. of Aesth. pp. 51-52). For recent discussions Der of the claims of sight and hearing see article by J. Volkelt, Aesth. Werth der niederen Sinne," in Zeitschrift für Psych. u. Phys. der Sinnesorgane, vol. xxix. pp. 402 ff.; see also below, Biblio graphy. Laws, 889 (see Bosanquet, op. cit. p. 54). anything corresponds in play save where games of skill take on | supposed to originate it is apt to be complicated and disguised something of the dignity of a fine art.1 by other motives, e.g. utility in architecture, an impulse to instruct if not to reform in modern fiction. Again, if it is said that a certain degree of permanence assures us of the Effects of aesthetic value of a feature of art, we are met by the custom So far as to the preliminary delimiting work in aesthetic science. Only a bare indication can be made as to the methods Methods of research by which its advance can be furthered, of re- and as to the several directions of inquiry which it search in will have to follow. With regard to the former the aesthetics. method of investigation will consist in a careful inquiry into two orders of fact: (1) Objects which common testimony or the history of art show to be widely recognized objects of aesthetic value; (2) records of the aesthetic experience of individuals, whether artists or amateurs. Since aesthetic experience is brought about and its modes determined by objects possessing certain qualities, it seems eviExamina dent that scientific aesthetics must make an examintion of ation and comparison of these a fundamental part aesthetic of its problem. These objects will, as already hinted, include both natural ones in the inorganic and organic worlds, and works of art which can be shown to be objects of general or widely recognized aesthetic value. Without Nature as attempting here to discuss adequately the relation of supplying natural beauty to that of art we may note one or two objects. aesthetic objects. points. Some contemplation and appreciation of the beautiful aspects of nature is not only prior in time to art, but is a condition of its genesis. The enjoyment of the pleasing aspects of land and sea, of mountain and dale, of the innumerable organic forms, has steadily grown with the development of culture; and this growth, though undoubtedly aided by that of the feeling for art-especially painting and poetry-is to a large extent independent of it. Some of the finest insight into the secrets of beauty has been gained by those who had only a limited acquaintance with art. What is still more important in the present connexion is that the aesthetic experience gained by the direct contemplation of nature includes varieties which art cannot reproduce. It is enough to recall what Helmholtz and others have told us about the limitations of the powers of pictorial art to represent the more brilliant degrees of light; the admissions of painters themselves as to the limits of their art when it seeks to render the finer gradations of light and colour in such common objects as a tree-trunk or a bit of old wall. Nature, moreover, in spreading out her spaces of earth, sea and sky, and in exhibiting the action of her forces, does so on a scale which seems to make sublimity her prerogative in which art vainly endeavours to participate. On the other hand, it is coming to be seen that the construction of a theory of aesthetic values must be assisted by a much more Use of precise examination than aestheticists are commonly works of content to make, of works of art. The importance art by the of including these is that they are well-defined objectheorist. tive expressions of what the aesthetic consciousness approves and prefers. In inquiring, for example, into the pleasing relations of colour we might have to wait long for a theory if we were dependent on what even so gifted a writer as Ruskin can tell us about nature's juxtapositions: whereas if it can be shown that throughout the history of chromatic art or during its better period there has been a tendency to prefer certain combinations, this fact becomes a piece of convincing evidence as to their aesthetic value. Even here, Difficulties in however, there are sources of uncertainty. It is not using true to say that a work of art is a pure outcome of the aesthetic feeling of the artist, even if we take this in a comprehensive sense. It is subject to the influence of all the temporary feelings and tendencies of the time which produced it. The aesthetic motive which is 1 Plato had a glimpse of the resemblance of art to play (see Bosanquet, op. cit. p. 54). Among modern writers the idea is specially connected with the names of Schiller and Herbert Spencer. In recent works the subject is touched on by S. Wittasek, Grundzüge der allgem. Ästhetik, pp. 223 ff.; Bray, Du Beau, pp. 62 ff., and by Rutgers Marshall and others referred to below in Bibliography. works of art as material. 2 Hence to say, as Bosanquet says (op. cit. pp. 3-4), that art is to nature as the scientific conception of the world to that of the ordinary observer, seems wide of the mark. on artistic difficulty that custom plays an important part in art, preference. the result of convention fixed by tradition often simulating the aspect of a deep-seated aesthetic preference. In this connexion it is to be remarked that even so permanent an element as symmetry may owe its quasiaesthetic value to custom, by which is understood its wide and impressive display in the organic and even the inorganic world." Yet the influence of custom taken in this larger sense need not greatly disturb us. In aesthetics, as in ethics, the question of validity has to be kept distinct from that of origin. If symmetry (in general) is appreciated as aesthetically pleasing, the question of its genesis becomes immaterial. Another difficulty, not peculiar to aesthetic investigation, is that of reconstructing the modes of aesthetic consciousness represented by forms of art which differ widely from those of our own age and type of culture. aesthetics. Evolution as criter In utilizing art material for aesthetic theory the theorist will need to note the work recently done by English and German writers on primitive art. And this not merely because Value of of the value of the early forms of art for a theory of primitive the evolution of the aesthetic consciousness; but art for because the embryonic stages of art are likely to have a peculiar interest as illustrating in a comparatively isolated form some of the simpler modes of aesthetic appreciation, e.g. in the grouping of colours, in the mode of covering a surface with linear ornament. Yet it is not necessary to give primitive art a considerable place in a general aesthetics. As a normative science, it is to be remembered, this is much more immediately concerned with the higher stages of aesthetic culture. In seeking to establish norms or regulative principles, we must, it is evident, make a special study of objects of art which belong to our own level of culture. For these reasons it would appear necessary to include in a general aesthetic theory some reference to the evolution of art and of the aesthetic consciousness. A further reason for including it is that the evolution of art supplies a most valuable auxiliary criterion of degree or height of aesthetic value. Provided that we distinguish what is a real process of evolution from one of mere change of fashion in taste, and that we confine ourselves to the larger features of the process, we may make the principle of evolution a serviceable one by regarding those forms and features of art as higher in respect of aesthetic value which grow distinct and relatively fixed in the later and better stages of the evolution of art. This part of aesthetic investigation should be made as exact as possible. Thus in dealing with the triads of colour said to be most frequently employed in the best period of Italian painting the observer should note and record as far as this is possible not only the precise tints, but also the precise art-work. degrees of their several luminosities. With regard to elements of form in art, the judicious use of photography and careful measurement would probably help us to understand the practices of art in its better periods. This examination of art material by the aesthetic theorist should be supplemented by a study of what artists have written about their methods, of the rules laid down for students of art, and lastly of the generalizations reached by the more scientific kind of writer upon art." ion of aesthetic height. Exact measure ment of charac teristics of A proper methodical inquiry into aesthetic objects aided by a K. Lange goes very far in attributing a practical motive to features of architecture commonly supposed to have aesthetic value, e.g: a regular series of similar forms (Das Wesen der Kunst, Bd. i. pp. 277 ff.). K. Lange thinks that even symmetry probably has a technica i origin (op. cit. pp. 283-284). The question of the place of the historical development of art in aesthetic theory is carefully considered by J. Volkelt, System der Ästhetik, Bd. i. 5es Kap. See, for example, a little work, The Genesis of Art-form, by G. L Raymond. Aesthetic induc tions. Germs of aesthetic Aesthetic experiment. knowledge of the practices of art would lead to inductions of the type "objects in so far as they possess such and such characteristics are aesthetically valuable." This preliminary work of aesthetic science in collecting and analysing facts may be extended in two directions: by an examination (a) of the earlier and simpler forms of aesthetic experience, and (b) of the fuller and more complex experiences of those specially trained in the perception and enjoyment of beauty. (a) The former would be illustrated preference by a more methodical investigation into the rudimentin chilary aesthetic likings of children, and of the survivdren, etc. ing lower races. Such inquiries may be expected to add to our knowledge of the simpler and more universal forms of aesthetic enjoyment. Some attention has been paid by Darwin and others to germs of taste in birds and other animals. Yet this line of inquiry, though of some value for a theory of the evolution of taste, seems to throw but little light on aesthetic preferences as found in man. An important feature in this new investigation into simpler modes of aesthetic preference is that it proceeds by way of experiment, that is to say, a methodical testing of the aesthetic preferences of a number of individuals. Fechner introduced the method of experiment into aesthetics in his researches on the preferability (according to Zeising) of the proportion known as the "golden section." Since his time other experimental inquiries have been made, both as to what forms (e.g. what variety of rectangle) and what combinations of colours are most pleasing. The results of these experiments are distinctly promising, though they have Experinot yet been carried far enough to be made the basis of ence and perfectly trustworthy generalizations. (b) A valuable judgments portion of the data for a science of aesthetics lies in the of experts. recorded experiences of artists, art critics and others who have specially developed their tastes. This source of information has certainly never been made use of in a complete and methodical manner by theorists, a quotation now and again from writers like Goethe and Ruskin having been deemed sufficient. Yet it is safe to say that an adequate understanding of the finer effects of beauty, both in nature and in art, presupposes the assimilation of what is best in these records. And this not only because they commonly supply us with new and valuable varieties of experience of the more refined kind, but because the aesthetic judgments on nature and art of men in whom the feeling of beauty has been specially cultivated have a greater value than those of others.5 It may be added that these records are wont to contain reflexions which, though wanting in scientific precision, can be utilized by science. material. We now come to the work of scientific construction proper. The finer analysis of the objects which please aesthetically as Psychowell as of the agreeable type of consciousness to which logical they minister belongs to the psychologist, and it is analysis of noteworthy that the best recent contributions to the science have been made by men who were either known as psychologists or at least had trained themselves in psychological analysis. A word or two must suffice to indicate the more important directions of the theoretic interpretation. We may in illustrating this set out from the convenient triple division of the factors in aesthetic experience: (A) the sensuous, (B) the perceptual or formal, (C) the imaginative, including all that is suggested by the aesthetic presentation, its meaning and expressiveness. 1 Kant, stopping short of an analysis of the beauty of a concrete object, said there were no aesthetic judgments of this universal form (see below). On the importance of these inductions see K. H. von Stein, Vorlesungen über Ästhetik (Einleitung). 2 Curiously enough Thomas Reid recognized a germ of aesthetic taste in animals. Essays, Of Taste, ch. v. The aesthetic importance of the observations made on animals is dealt with by L. Bray, Du Beau, pp. 233 ff. See below, and Bosanquet, op. cit. pp. 382 ff. The chief lines of experimental aesthetics are indicated by W. Wundt in his Physiol. Psychologie (5° Auflage), Bd. iii. pp. 142 ff. and 147 ff. 5 On the value of judgments of experts see K. Groos, Der ästh. Genuss, p. 149. (A) In dealing with the sensuous factor the psychologist is materially aided by the physiologist. It is sufficient to point to the contribution made to the analysis of musical The sensations by the classical researches of Helmholtz sensuous (see below). Yet the application of a knowledge of factor. physiological conditions seems as yet to be of little Physiological service when we come to the finer aspects of this aesthetics. sensuous experience, to the subtle effects of colourcombination, for example, and to the nuances of feeling-tone attaching to different tints. In the finer analysis of the sensuous material of aesthetic enjoyment it is the psychologist who counts." Among the valuable contributions recently made in this Psychodomain one may instance the careful determination of logical the aesthetically important characteristics of the sensa- problems. tions of sight and hearing, such as the finely graduated variety of their qualities (colour and tone), their capability of entering into combinations in which they preserve their individuality, including the important combinations of time and space form. With these are to be included the distinguishing characteristics of the concomitant feeling-tones, e.g. their comparative calmness and their clear separation from the sensations which they accompany. These characteristics help us to understand the greater refinement of these senses and also the more prolonged as well as varying enjoyment which they contribute, as well as the extension of this enjoyment by imaginative reproduction. Next to this determination of important aesthetic characteristics of the two senses may be named a finer probing of the nuances of pleasurable tone exhibited by the several colours and tones. A point still needing special investigation is extent of the sensuous factor in aesthetic enjoyment. There has been a tendency in aesthetic theory to over-intellectualize aesthetic experience and to find the value even of the sensuous factor in some intellectual principle, as when it is said (by Plato and Hegel among others) that a smooth or level tone and a uniform mass of colour owe their value to the principle of unity. But such prolongation (within obvious limits) in time or space is a condition of the full enjoyment of the distinctive quality of an individual tone or colour, and as such has a sensuous value. Aesthetics has to prove the sensuous value, the pleasure which is due not only to the feeling-tones of the several sensations but to those of their various combinations. Spite of a tendency of late to disparage the co-operation of the " motor sensations connected with movements of the eye in the aesthetic appreciation of linear form, e.g. curves, evidence suggests that certain curves, like fine gradations of colour, may owe a considerable part of their value to a mode of varying the sensuous experience which is in a peculiar manner agreeable. On the other hand, this theoretic investigation of sense-material will need to determine with care the added value due to the action of experience in giving something of meaning to particular colours and tones and their combinations, e.g. warmth of colour, height of tone. The (B) Under the scientific treatment of the perceptual or formal factor in aesthetic experience we have many special problems, of which only a few can be touched on here. Taking this factor to include all combinations of elements in perceptual which there is a more or less distinct perception of factor. pleasing relations, we meet here with such work as that of C. Stumpf (Ton-psychologie) in determining the way in which tones combine and tend to fuse. Later experiments have added to our knowledge of the obscure subject of colour harmony, enabling us to distinguish pleasing contrasts of colour from the more restful combinations of nearly allied tints. Our knowledge of pleasing form in the narrower sense, that is to say, space and time form, has been advanced by a number of recent inquiries. The value of symmetry, the meaning of proportion and the aesthetic value to be set on certain proportions, the forms of rhythm-these are some of the points dealt with in more general Examples of a forcing of the physiological method in aesthetics may be found in the Physiological Aesthetics of Grant Allen, and the Aufgabe der Kunstphysiologie, by Georg Hirsch. These aesthetic prerogatives of the sensations of hearing and sight have been well brought out in the article by J. Volkelt, already referred to. |