concepts, _i.e._ to act in conformity with the representation of a
purpose, would be the Will. But an Object, or a state of mind, or even
an action, is called purposive, although its possibility does not
necessarily presuppose the representation of a purpose, merely because
its possibility can be explained and conceived by us only so far as we
assume for its ground a causality according to purposes, _i.e._ a will
which would have so disposed it according to the representation of a
certain rule. There can be, then, purposiveness without[22] purpose,
so far as we do not place the causes of this form in a will, but yet
can only make the explanation of its possibility intelligible to
ourselves by deriving it from a will. Again, we are not always forced
to regard what we observe (in respect of its possibility) from the
point of view of Reason. Thus we can at least observe a purposiveness
according to form, without basing it on a purpose (as the material of
the _nexus finalis_), and we can notice it in objects, although only
by reflection.
§ 11. _The judgement of taste has nothing at its basis but the_ form of
the purposiveness _of an object (or of its mode of representation)_
Every purpose, if it be regarded as a ground of satisfaction, always
carries with it an interest--as the determining ground of the
judgement--about the object of pleasure. Therefore no subjective
purpose can lie at the basis of the judgement of taste. But neither
can the judgement of taste be determined by any representation of an
objective purpose, _i.e._ of the possibility of the object itself in
accordance with principles of purposive combination, and consequently
it can be determined by no concept of the good; because it is an
aesthetical and not a cognitive judgement. It therefore has to do with
no _concept_ of the character and internal or external possibility of
the object by means of this or that cause, but merely with the relation
of the representative powers to one another, so far as they are
determined by a representation.
Now this relation in the determination of an object as beautiful
is bound up with the feeling of pleasure, which is declared by the
judgement of taste to be valid for every one; hence a pleasantness,
accompanying the representation, can as little contain the determining
ground [of the judgement] as the representation of the perfection of
the object and the concept of the good can. Therefore it can be nothing
else than the subjective purposiveness in the representation of an
object without any purpose (either objective or subjective); and thus
it is the mere form of purposiveness in the representation by which
an object is _given_ to us, so far as we are conscious of it, which
constitutes the satisfaction that we without a concept judge to be
universally communicable; and, consequently, this is the determining
ground of the judgement of taste.
§ 12. _The judgement of taste rests on_ a priori _grounds_
To establish _a priori_ the connexion of the feeling of a pleasure
or pain as an effect, with any representation whatever (sensation or
concept) as its cause, is absolutely impossible; for that would be a
[particular][23] causal relation which (with objects of experience)
can always only be cognised _a posteriori_, and through the medium
of experience itself. We actually have, indeed, in the Critique of
practical Reason, derived from universal moral concepts _a priori_ the
feeling of respect (as a special and peculiar modification of feeling
which will not strictly correspond either to the pleasure or the pain
that we get from empirical objects). But there we could go beyond
the bounds of experience and call in a causality which rested on a
supersensible attribute of the subject, viz. freedom. And even there,
properly speaking, it was not this _feeling_ which we derived from the
Idea of the moral as cause, but merely the determination of the will.
But the state of mind which accompanies any determination of the will
is in itself a feeling of pleasure and identical with it, and therefore
does not follow from it as its effect. This last must only be assumed
if the concept of the moral as a good precede the determination of the
will by the law; for in that case the pleasure that is bound up with
the concept could not be derived from it as from a mere cognition.
Now the case is similar with the pleasure in aesthetical judgements,
only that here it is merely contemplative and does not bring about
an interest in the Object, which on the other hand in the moral
judgement it is practical.[24] The consciousness of the mere formal
purposiveness in the play of the subject’s cognitive powers, in a
representation through which an object is given, is the pleasure
itself; because it contains a determining ground of the activity of
the subject in respect of the excitement of its cognitive powers,
and therefore an inner causality (which is purposive) in respect of
cognition in general without however being limited to any definite
cognition; and consequently contains a mere form of the subjective
purposiveness of a representation in an aesthetical judgement. This
pleasure is in no way practical, neither like that arising from the
pathological ground of pleasantness, nor that from the intellectual
ground of the represented good. But yet it involves causality, viz. of
_maintaining_ the state of the representation itself, and the exercise
of the cognitive powers without further design. We _linger_ over the
contemplation of the beautiful, because this contemplation strengthens
and reproduces itself, which is analogous to (though not of the same
kind as) that lingering which takes place when a [physical] charm in
the representation of the object repeatedly arouses the attention, the
mind being passive.
§ 13. _The pure judgement of taste is independent of charm and emotion_
Every interest spoils the judgement of taste and takes from its
impartiality, especially if the purposiveness is not, as with the
interest of Reason, placed before the feeling of pleasure but grounded
on it. This last always happens in an aesthetical judgement upon
anything so far as it gratifies or grieves us. Hence judgements so
affected can lay no claim at all to a universally valid satisfaction,
or at least so much the less claim, in proportion as there are
sensations of this sort among the determining grounds of taste.
That taste is still barbaric which needs a mixture of _charms_ and
_emotions_ in order that there may be satisfaction, and still more so
if it make these the measure of its assent.
Nevertheless charms are often not only taken account of in the case
of beauty (which properly speaking ought merely to be concerned with
form) as contributory to the aesthetical universal satisfaction; but
they are passed off as in themselves beauties, and thus the matter of
satisfaction is substituted for the form. This misconception, however,
like so many others which have something true at their basis, may be
removed by a careful definition of these concepts.
A judgement of taste on which charm and emotion have no influence
(although they may be bound up with the satisfaction in the
beautiful),--which therefore has as its determining ground merely the
purposiveness of the form,--is a _pure judgement of taste_.
§ 14. _Elucidation by means of examples_
Aesthetical judgements can be divided just like theoretical (logical)
judgements into empirical and pure. The first assert pleasantness or
unpleasantness; the second assert the beauty of an object or of the
manner of representing it. The former are judgements of Sense (material
aesthetical judgements); the latter [as formal[25]] are alone strictly
judgements of Taste.
A judgement of taste is therefore pure, only so far as no merely
empirical satisfaction is mingled with its determining ground. But this
always happens if charm or emotion have any share in the judgement by
which anything is to be described as beautiful.
Now here many objections present themselves, which fallaciously put
forward charm not merely as a necessary ingredient of beauty, but
as alone sufficient [to justify] a thing’s being called beautiful.
A mere colour, _e.g._ the green of a grass plot, a mere tone (as
distinguished from sound and noise) like that of a violin, are by most
people described as beautiful in themselves; although both seem to
have at their basis merely the matter of representations, viz. simply
sensation, and therefore only deserve to be called pleasant. But we
must at the same time remark that the sensations of colours and of tone
have a right to be regarded as beautiful only in so far as they are
_pure_. This is a determination which concerns their form, and is the
only [element] of these representations which admits with certainty of
universal communicability; for we cannot assume that the quality of
sensations is the same in all subjects, and we can hardly say that the
pleasantness of one colour or the tone of one musical instrument is
judged preferable to that of another in the same[26] way by every one.
If we assume with _Euler_ that colours are isochronous vibrations
(_pulsus_) of the aether, as sounds are of the air in a state of
disturbance, and,--what is most important,--that the mind not only
perceives by sense the effect of these in exciting the organ, but also
perceives by reflection the regular play of impressions (and thus the
form of the combination of different representations) which I still
do not doubt[27]--then colours and tone cannot be reckoned as mere
sensations, but as the formal determination of the unity of a manifold
of sensations, and thus as beauties in themselves.
But “pure” in a simple mode of sensation means that its uniformity is
troubled and interrupted by no foreign sensation, and it belongs merely
to the form; because here we can abstract from the quality of that
mode of sensation (abstract from the colours and tone, if any, which
it represents). Hence all simple colours, so far as they are pure,
are regarded as beautiful; composite colours have not this advantage,
because, as they are not simple, we have no standard for judging
whether they should be called pure or not.
But as regards the beauty attributed to the object on account of its
form, to suppose it to be capable of augmentation through the charm
of the object is a common error, and one very prejudicial to genuine,
uncorrupted, well-founded taste. We can doubtless add these charms to
beauty, in order to interest the mind by the representation of the
object, apart from the bare satisfaction [received]; and thus they may
serve as a recommendation of taste and its cultivation, especially when
it is yet crude and unexercised. But they actually do injury to the
judgement of taste if they draw attention to themselves as the grounds
for judging of beauty. So far are they from adding to beauty that they
must only be admitted by indulgence as aliens; and provided always that
they do not disturb the beautiful form, in cases when taste is yet weak
and untrained.
In painting, sculpture, and in all the formative arts--in architecture,
and horticulture, so far as they are beautiful arts--the _delineation_
is the essential thing; and here it is not what gratifies in sensation
but what pleases by means of its form that is fundamental for taste.
The colours which light up the sketch belong to the charm; they may
indeed enliven[28] the object for sensation, but they cannot make it
worthy of contemplation and beautiful. In most cases they are rather
limited by the requirements of the beautiful form; and even where charm
is permissible it is ennobled solely by this.
Every form of the objects of sense (both of external sense and also
mediately of internal) is either _figure_ or _play_. In the latter case
it is either play of figures (in space, viz. pantomime and dancing), or
the mere play of sensations (in time). The _charm_ of colours or of the
pleasant tones of an instrument may be added; but the _delineation_
in the first case and the composition in the second constitute the
proper object of the pure judgement of taste. To say that the purity
of colours and of tones, or their variety and contrast, seems to add
to beauty, does not mean that they supply a homogeneous addition to
our satisfaction in the form because they are pleasant in themselves;
but they do so, because they make the form more exactly, definitely,
and completely, intuitible, and besides by their charm [excite the
representation, whilst they[29]] awaken and fix our attention on the
object itself.
Even what we call _ornaments_ [parerga[29]], _i.e._ those things which
do not belong to the complete representation of the object internally
as elements but only externally as complements, and which augment the
satisfaction of taste, do so only by their form; as for example [the
frames of pictures,[29] or] the draperies of statues or the colonnades
of palaces. But if the ornament does not itself consist in beautiful
form, and if it is used as a golden frame is used, merely to recommend
the painting by its _charm_, it is then called _finery_ and injures
genuine beauty.
_Emotion_, _i.e._ a sensation in which pleasantness is produced by
means of a momentary checking and a consequent more powerful outflow of
the vital force, does not belong at all to beauty. But sublimity [with
which the feeling of emotion is bound up[29]] requires a different
standard of judgement from that which is at the foundation of taste;
and thus a pure judgement of taste has for its determining ground
neither charm nor emotion, in a word, no sensation as the material of
the aesthetical judgement.
§ 15. _The judgement of taste is quite independent of the concept of
perfection_
_Objective_ purposiveness can only be cognised by means of the
reference of the manifold to a definite purpose, and therefore only
through a concept. From this alone it is plain that the Beautiful, the
judging of which has at its basis a merely formal purposiveness, _i.e._
a purposiveness without purpose, is quite independent of the concept of
the Good; because the latter presupposes an objective purposiveness,
_i.e._ the reference of the object to a definite purpose.
Objective purposiveness is either external, _i.e._ the _utility_, or
internal, _i.e._ the _perfection_ of the object. That the satisfaction
in an object, on account of which we call it beautiful, cannot rest on
the representation of its utility, is sufficiently obvious from the two
preceding sections; because in that case it would not be an immediate
satisfaction in the object, which is the essential condition of a
judgement about beauty. But objective internal purposiveness, _i.e._
perfection, comes nearer to the predicate of beauty; and it has been
regarded by celebrated philosophers[30] as the same as beauty, with the
proviso, _if it is thought in a confused way_. It is of the greatest
importance in a Critique of Taste to decide whether beauty can thus
actually be resolved into the concept of perfection.
To judge of objective purposiveness we always need not only the
concept of a purpose, but (if that purposiveness is not to be external
utility but internal) the concept of an internal purpose which shall
contain the ground of the internal possibility of the object. Now
as a purpose in general is that whose _concept_ can be regarded as
the ground of the possibility of the object itself; so, in order to
represent objective purposiveness in a thing, the concept of _what sort
of thing it is to be_ must come first. The agreement of the manifold
in it with this concept (which furnishes the rule for combining the
manifold) is the _qualitative perfection_ of the thing. Quite different
from this is _quantitative_ perfection, the completeness of a thing
after its kind, which is a mere concept of magnitude (of totality).[31]
In this _what the thing ought to be_ is conceived as already
determined, and it is only asked if it has _all_ its requisites. The
formal [element] in the representation of a thing, _i.e._ the agreement
of the manifold with a unity (it being undetermined what this ought
to be), gives to cognition no objective purposiveness whatever. For
since abstraction is made of this unity as _purpose_ (what the thing
ought to be), nothing remains but the subjective purposiveness of
the representations in the mind of the intuiting subject. And this,
although it furnishes a certain purposiveness of the representative
state of the subject, and so a facility of apprehending a given form
by the Imagination, yet furnishes no perfection of an Object, since
the Object is not here conceived by means of the concept of a purpose.
For example, if in a forest I come across a plot of sward, round which
trees stand in a circle, and do not then represent to myself a purpose,
viz. that it is intended to serve for country dances, not the least
concept of perfection is furnished by the mere form. But to represent
to oneself a formal _objective_ purposiveness without purpose, _i.e._
the mere form of a _perfection_ (without any matter and without
the _concept_ of that with which it is accordant, even if it were
merely the Idea of conformity to law in general[32]) is a veritable
contradiction.
Now the judgement of taste is an aesthetical judgement, _i.e._ such
as rests on subjective grounds, the determining ground of which
cannot be a concept, and consequently cannot be the concept of a
definite purpose. Therefore in beauty, regarded as a formal subjective
purposiveness, there is in no way thought a perfection of the object,
as a would-be formal purposiveness, which yet is objective. And thus to
distinguish between the concepts of the Beautiful and the Good, as if
they were only different in logical form, the first being a confused,
the second a clear concept of perfection, but identical in content and
origin, is quite fallacious. For then there would be no _specific_
difference between them, but a judgement of taste would be as much a
cognitive judgement as the judgement by which a thing is described as
good; just as when the ordinary man says that fraud is unjust he bases
his judgement on confused grounds, whilst the philosopher bases it
on clear grounds, but both on identical principles of Reason. I have
already, however, said that an aesthetical judgement is unique of its
kind, and gives absolutely no cognition (not even a confused cognition)
of the Object; this is only supplied by a logical judgement. On the
contrary, it simply refers the representation, by which an Object is
given, to the subject; and brings to our notice no characteristic
of the object, but only the purposive form in the determination of
the representative powers which are occupying themselves therewith.
The judgement is called aesthetical just because its determining
ground is not a concept, but the feeling (of internal sense) of that
harmony in the play of the mental powers, so far as it can be felt in
sensation. On the other hand, if we wish to call confused concepts and
the objective judgement based on them, aesthetical, we shall have an
Understanding judging sensibly or a Sense representing its Objects by
means of concepts [both of which are contradictory.[33]] The faculty
of concepts, be they confused or clear, is the Understanding; and
although Understanding has to do with the judgement of taste, as an
aesthetical judgement (as it has with all judgements), yet it has to
do with it not as a faculty by which an object is cognised, but as the
faculty which determines the judgement and its representation (without
any concept) in accordance with its relation to the subject and the
subject’s internal feeling, in so far as this judgement may be possible
in accordance with a universal rule.
§ 16. _The judgement of taste, by which an object is declared to be
beautiful under the condition of a definite concept, is not pure_
There are two kinds of beauty; free beauty (_pulchritudo vaga_)
or merely dependent beauty (_pulchritudo adhaerens_). The first
presupposes no concept of what the object ought to be; the second
does presuppose such a concept and the perfection of the object in
accordance therewith. The first is called the (self-subsistent)
beauty of this or that thing; the second, as dependent upon a concept
(conditioned beauty), is ascribed to Objects which come under the
concept of a particular purpose.
Flowers are free natural beauties. Hardly any one but a botanist
knows what sort of a thing a flower ought to be; and even he, though
recognising in the flower the reproductive organ of the plant, pays no
regard to this natural purpose if he is passing judgement on the flower
by Taste. There is then at the basis of this judgement no perfection
of any kind, no internal purposiveness, to which the collection of the
manifold is referred. Many birds (such as the parrot, the humming bird,
the bird of paradise), and many sea shells are beauties in themselves,
which do not belong to any object determined in respect of its purpose
by concepts, but please freely and in themselves. So also delineations
_à la grecque_, foliage for borders or wall-papers, mean nothing
in themselves; they represent nothing--no Object under a definite
concept,--and are free beauties. We can refer to the same class what
are called in music phantasies (_i.e._ pieces without any theme), and
in fact all music without words.
In the judging of a free beauty (according to the mere form) the
judgement of taste is pure. There is presupposed no concept of any
purpose, for which the manifold should serve the given Object, and
which therefore is to be represented therein. By such a concept the
freedom of the Imagination which disports itself in the contemplation
of the figure would be only limited.
But human beauty (_i.e._ of a man, a woman, or a child), the beauty of
a horse, or a building (be it church, palace, arsenal, or summer-house)
presupposes a concept of the purpose which determines what the thing is
to be, and consequently a concept of its perfection; it is therefore
adherent beauty. Now as the combination of the Pleasant (in sensation)
with Beauty, which properly is only concerned with form, is a hindrance
to the purity of the judgement of taste; so also is its purity injured
by the combination with Beauty of the Good (viz. that manifold which is
good for the thing itself in accordance with its purpose).
We could add much to a building which would immediately please the eye,
if only it were not to be a church. We could adorn a figure with all
kinds of spirals and light but regular lines, as the New Zealanders do
with their tattooing, if only it were not the figure of a human being.
And again this could have much finer features and a more pleasing and
gentle cast of countenance provided it were not intended to represent a
man, much less a warrior.
Now the satisfaction in the manifold of a thing in reference to the
internal purpose which determines its possibility is a satisfaction
grounded on a concept; but the satisfaction in beauty is such as
presupposes no concept, but is immediately bound up with the
representation through which the object is given (not through which it
is thought). If now the judgement of Taste in respect of the beauty
of a thing is made dependent on the purpose in its manifold, like a
judgement of Reason, and thus limited, it is no longer a free and pure
judgement of Taste.
It is true that taste gains by this combination of aesthetical with
intellectual satisfaction, inasmuch as it becomes fixed; and though
it is not universal, yet in respect to certain purposively determined
Objects it becomes possible to prescribe rules for it. These, however,
are not rules of taste, but merely rules for the unification of Taste
with Reason, _i.e._ of the Beautiful with the Good, by which the former
becomes available as an instrument of design in respect of the latter.
Thus the tone of mind which is self-maintaining and of subjective
universal validity is subordinated to the way of thinking which can
be maintained only by painful resolve, but is of objective universal
validity. Properly speaking, however, perfection gains nothing by
beauty or beauty by perfection; but, when we compare the representation
by which an object is given to us with the Object (as regards what it
ought to be) by means of a concept, we cannot avoid considering along
with it the sensation in the subject. And thus when both states of mind
are in harmony our _whole faculty_ of representative power gains.