the beautiful cannot be reduced to what is useful.--Nor to
convenience.--Nor to proportion.--Essential characters of the
beautiful.--Different kinds of beauties. The beautiful and the
sublime. Physical beauty. Intellectual beauty. Moral
beauty.--Ideal beauty: it is especially moral beauty.--God, the
first principle of the beautiful.--Theory of Plato.
We have made known the beautiful in ourselves, in the faculties that
perceive it and appreciate it, in reason, sentiment, imagination, taste;
we come, according to the order determined by the method, to other
questions: What is the beautiful in objects? What is the beautiful taken
in itself? What are its characters and different species? What, in fine,
is its first and last principle? All these questions must be treated,
and, if possible, solved. Philosophy has its point of departure in
psychology; but, in order to attain also its legitimate termination, it
must set out from man, and reach things themselves.
The history of philosophy offers many theories on the nature of the
beautiful: we do not wish to enumerate nor discuss them all; we will
designate the most important.[103]
There is one very gross, which defines the beautiful as that which
pleases the senses, that which procures an agreeable impression. We will
not stop at this opinion. We have sufficiently refuted it in showing
that it is impossible to reduce the beautiful to the agreeable.
A sensualism a little more wise puts the useful in the place of the
agreeable, that is to say, changes the form of the same principle.
Neither is the beautiful the object which procures for us in the present
moment an agreeable but fugitive sensation, it is the object which can
often procure for us this same sensation or others similar. No great
effort of observation or reasoning is necessary to convince us that
utility has nothing to do with beauty. What is useful is not always
beautiful. What is beautiful is not always useful, and what is at once
useful and beautiful is beautiful for some other reason than its
utility. Observe a lever or a pulley: surely nothing is more useful.
Nevertheless, you are not tempted to say that this is beautiful. Have
you discovered an antique vase admirably worked? You exclaim that this
vase is beautiful, without thinking to seek of what use it may be to
you. Finally, symmetry and order are beautiful things, and at the same
time, are useful things, because they economize space, because objects
symmetrically disposed are easier to find when one wants them; but that
is not what makes for us the beauty of symmetry, for we immediately
seize this kind of beauty, and it is often late enough before we
recognize the utility that is found in it. It even sometimes happens,
that after having admired the beauty of an object, we are not able to
divine its use, although it may have one. The useful is, then, entirely
different from the beautiful, far from being its foundation.
A celebrated and very ancient[104] theory makes the beautiful consist in
the perfect suitableness of means to their end. Here the beautiful is no
longer the useful, it is the suitable; these two ideas must be
distinguished. A machine produces excellent effects, economy of time,
work, etc.; it is therefore useful. If, moreover, examining its
construction, I find that each piece is in its place, and that all are
skilfully disposed for the result which they should produce; even
without regarding the utility of this result, as the means are well
adapted to their end, I judge that there is suitableness in it. We are
already approaching the idea of the beautiful; for we are no longer
considering what is useful, but what is proper. Now, we have not yet
attained the true character of beauty; there are, in fact, objects very
well adapted to their end, which we do not call beautiful. A bench
without ornament and without elegance, provided it be solid, provided
all the parts are firmly connected, provided one may sit down on it with
safety, provided it may be for this purpose suitable, agreeable even,
may give an example of the most perfect adaptation of means to an end;
it will not, therefore, be said that this bench is beautiful. There is
here always this difference between suitableness and utility, that an
object to be beautiful has no need of being useful, but that it is not
beautiful if it does not possess suitableness, if there is in it a
disagreement between the end and the means.
Some have thought to find the beautiful in proportion, and this is, in
fact, one of the conditions of beauty, but it is not the only one. It is
very certain, that an object ill-proportioned cannot be beautiful. There
is in all beautiful objects, however far they may be from geometric
form, a sort of living geometry. But, I ask, is it proportion that is
dominant in this slender tree, with flexible and graceful branches, with
rich and shady foliage? What makes the terrible beauty of a storm, what
makes that of a great picture, of an isolated verse, or a sublime ode?
It is not, I know, wanting in law and rule, neither is it law and rule:
often, even what at first strikes us is an apparent irregularity. It is
absurd to pretend that what makes us admire all these things and many
more, is the same quality that makes us admire a geometric figure, that
is to say, the exact correspondence of parts.
What we say of proportion may be said of order, which is something less
mathematical than proportion, but scarcely explains better what is
free, varied, and negligent in certain beauties.
All these theories which refer beauty to order, harmony, and proportion,
are at foundation only one and the same theory which in the beautiful
sees unity before all. And surely unity is beautiful; it is an important
part of beauty, but it is not the whole of beauty.
The most probable theory of the beautiful is that which composes it of
two contrary and equally necessary elements, unity and variety. Behold a
beautiful flower. Without doubt, unity, order, proportion, symmetry
even, are in it; for, without these qualities, reason would be absent
from it, and all things are made with a marvellous reason. But, at the
same time, what a diversity! How many shades in the color, what richness
in the least details! Even in mathematics, what is beautiful is not an
abstract principle, it is a principle carrying with itself a long chain
of consequences. There is no beauty without life, and life is movement,
is diversity.
Unity and variety are applied to all orders of beauty. Let us rapidly
run over these different orders.
In the first place, there are beautiful objects, to speak properly, and
sublime objects. A beautiful object, we have seen, is something
completed, circumscribed, limited, which all our faculties easily
embrace, because the different parts are on a somewhat narrow scale. A
sublime object is that which, by forms not in themselves
disproportionate, but less definite and more difficult to seize, awakens
in us the sentiment of the infinite.
There are two very distinct species of beauty. But reality is
inexhaustible, and in all the degrees of reality there is beauty.
Among sensible objects, colors, sounds, figures, movements, are capable
of producing the idea and the sentiment of the beautiful. All these
beauties are arranged under that species of beauty which, right or
wrong, is called physical beauty.
If from the world of sense we elevate ourselves to that of mind, truth,
and science, we shall find there beauties more severe, but not less
real. The universal laws that govern bodies, those that govern
intelligences, the great principles that contain and produce long
deductions, the genius that creates, in the artist, poet, or
philosopher,--all these are beautiful, as well as nature herself: this
is what is called intellectual beauty.
Finally, if we consider the moral world and its laws, the idea of
liberty, virtue, and devotedness, here the austere justice of an
Aristides, there the heroism of a Leonidas, the prodigies of charity or
patriotism, we shall certainly find a third order of beauty that still
surpasses the other two, to wit, moral beauty.
Neither let us forget to apply to all these beauties the distinction
between the beautiful and the sublime. There are, then, the beautiful
and the sublime at once in nature, in ideas, in sentiments, in actions.
What an almost infinite variety in beauty!
After having enumerated all these differences, could we not reduce them?
They are incontestable; but, in this diversity is there not unity? Is
there not a single beauty of which all particular beauties are only
reflections, shades, degrees, or degradations?
Plotinus, in his treatise _On the Beautiful_,[105] proposed to himself
this question. He asks--What is the beautiful in itself? I see clearly
that such or such a form is beautiful, that such or such an action is
also beautiful; but why and how are these two objects, so dissimilar,
beautiful? What is the common quality which, being found in these two
objects, ranges them under the general idea of the beautiful?
It is necessary to answer this question, or the theory of beauty is a
maze without issue; one applies the same name to the most diverse
things, without understanding the real unity that authorizes this unity
of name.
Either the diversities which we have designated in beauty are such that
it is impossible to discover their relation, or these diversities are
especially apparent, and have their harmony, their concealed unity.
Is it pretended that this unity is a chimera? Then physical beauty,
moral beauty, and intellectual beauty, are strangers to each other.
What, then, will the artist do? He is surrounded by different beauties,
and he must make a work; for such is the recognized law of art. But if
this unity that is imposed upon him is a factitious unity, if there are
in nature only essentially dissimilar beauties, art deceives and lies to
us. Let it be explained, then, how falsehood is the law of art. That
cannot be; the unity that art expresses, it must have somewhere caught a
glimpse of, in order to transport it into its works.
We neither retract the distinction between the beautiful and the
sublime, nor the other distinctions just now indicated; but it is
necessary to re-unite after having distinguished them. These
distinctions and these re-unions are not contradictory: the great law of
beauty, like that of truth, is unity as well as variety. All is one, and
all is diverse. We have divided beauty into three great
classes--physical beauty, intellectual beauty, and moral beauty. We must
now seek the unity of these three sorts of beauty. Now, we think that
they resolve themselves into one and the same beauty, moral beauty,
meaning by that, with moral beauty properly so called, all spiritual
beauty.
Let us put this opinion to the proof of facts.
Place yourself before that statue of Apollo which is called Apollo
Belvidere, and observe attentively what strikes you in that
master-piece. Winkelmann, who was not a metaphysician, but a learned
antiquarian, a man of taste without system, made a celebrated analysis
of the Apollo.[106] It is curious to study it. What Winkelmann extols
before all, is the character of divinity stamped upon the immortal youth
that invests that beautiful body, upon the height, a little above that
of man, upon the majestic altitude, upon the imperious movement, upon
the _ensemble_, and all the details of the person. The forehead is
indeed that of a god,--an unalterable placidity dwells upon it. Lower
down, humanity reappears somewhat; and that is very necessary, in order
to interest humanity in the works of art. In that satisfied look, in the
distension of the nostrils, in the elevation of the under lip, are at
once felt anger mingled with disdain, pride of victory, and the little
fatigue which it has cost. Weigh well each word of Winkelmann: you will
find there a moral impression. The tone of the learned antiquary is
elevated, little by little, to enthusiasm, and his analysis becomes a
hymn to spiritual beauty.
Instead of a statue, observe a real and living man. Regard that man who,
solicited by the strongest motives to sacrifice duty to fortune,
triumphs over interest, after an heroic struggle, and sacrifices fortune
to virtue. Regard him at the moment when he is about to take this
magnanimous resolution; his face will appear to you beautiful, because
it expresses the beauty of his soul. Perhaps, under all other
circumstances, the face of the man is common, even trivial; here,
illuminated by the soul which it manifests, it is ennobled, and takes an
imposing character of beauty. So, the natural face of Socrates[107]
contrasts strongly with the type of Grecian beauty; but look at him on
his death-bed, at the moment of drinking the hemlock, convening with his
disciples on the immortality of the soul, and his face will appear to
you sublime.[108]
At the highest point of moral grandeur, Socrates expires:--you have
before your eyes no longer any thing but his dead body; the dead face
preserves its beauty, as long as it preserves traces of the mind that
animated it; but little by little the expression is extinguished or
disappears; the face then becomes vulgar and ugly. The expression of
death is hideous or sublime,--hideous at the aspect of the decomposition
of the matter that no longer retains the spirit,--sublime when it
awakens in us the idea of eternity.
Consider the figure of man in repose: it is more beautiful than that of
an animal, the figure of an animal is more beautiful than the form of
any inanimate object. It is because the human figure, even in the
absence of virtue and genius, always reflects an intelligent and moral
nature, it is because the figure of an animal reflects sentiment at
least, and something of soul, if not the soul entire. If from man and
the animal we descend to purely physical nature, we shall still find
beauty there, as long as we find there some shade of intelligence, I
know not what, that awakens in us some thought, some sentiment. Do we
arrive at some piece of matter that expresses nothing, that signifies
nothing, neither is the idea of beauty applied to it. But every thing
that exists is animated. Matter is shaped and penetrated by forces that
are not material, and it obeys laws that attest an intelligence
everywhere present. The most subtile chemical analysis does not reach a
dead and inert nature, but a nature that is organized in its own way,
that is neither deprived of forces nor laws. In the depths of the earth,
as in the heights of the heavens, in a grain of sand as in a gigantic
mountain, an immortal spirit shines through the thickest coverings. Let
us contemplate nature with the eye of the soul as well as with the eye
of the body:--everywhere a moral expression will strike us, and the
forms of things will impress us as symbols of thought. We have said
that with man, and with the animal even, the figure is beautiful on
account of the expression. But, when you are on the summit of the Alps,
or before the immense Ocean, when you behold the rising or setting of
the sun, at the beginning or the close of the day, do not these imposing
pictures produce on you a moral effect? Do all these grand spectacles
appear only for the sake of appearing? Do we not regard them as
manifestations of an admirable power, intelligence, and wisdom? And,
thus to speak, is not the face of nature expressive like that of man?
Form cannot be simply a form, it must be the form of something. Physical
beauty is, then, the sign of an internal beauty, which is spiritual and
moral beauty; and this is the foundation, the principle, the unity of
the beautiful.[109]
All the beauties that we have just enumerated and reduced compose what
is called the really beautiful. But, above real beauty, is a beauty of
another order--ideal beauty. The ideal resides neither in an individual,
nor in a collection of individuals. Nature or experience furnishes us
the occasion of conceiving it, but it is essentially distinct. Let it
once be conceived, and all natural figures, though never so beautiful,
are only images of a superior beauty which they do not realize. Give me
a beautiful action, and I will imagine one still more beautiful. The
Apollo itself is open to criticism in more than one respect. The ideal
continually recedes as we approach it. Its last termination is in the
infinite, that is to say, in God; or, to speak more correctly, the true
and absolute ideal is nothing else than God himself.
God, being the principle of all things, must for this reason be that of
perfect beauty, and, consequently, of all natural beauties that express
it more or less imperfectly; he is the principle of beauty, both as
author of the physical world and as father of the intellectual and moral
world.
Is it not necessary to be a slave of the senses and of appearances in
order to stop at movements, at forms, at sounds, at colors, whose
harmonious combinations produce the beauty of this visible world, and
not to conceive behind this scene so magnificent and well regulated, the
orderer, the geometer, the supreme artist?
Physical beauty serves as an envelope to intellectual and moral beauty.
What can be the principle of intellectual beauty, that splendor of the
true, except the principle of all truth?
Moral beauty comprises, as we shall subsequently see,[110] two distinct
elements, equally but diversely beautiful, justice and charity, respect
and love of men. He who expresses in his conduct justice and charity,
accomplishes the most beautiful of all works; the good man is, in his
way, the greatest of all artists. But what shall we say of him who is
the very substance of justice and the exhaustless source of love? If our
moral nature is beautiful, what must be the beauty of its author! His
justice and goodness are everywhere, both in us and out of us. His
justice is the moral order that no human law makes, that all human laws
are forced to express, that is preserved and perpetuated in the world by
its own force. Let us descend into ourselves, and consciousness will
attest the divine justice in the peace and contentment that accompany
virtue, in the troubles and tortures that are the invariable punishments
of vice and crime. How many times, and with what eloquence, have men
celebrated the indefatigable solicitude of Providence, its benefits
everywhere manifest in the smallest as well as in the greatest phenomena
of nature, which we forget so easily because they have become so
familiar to us, but which, on reflection, call forth our mingled
admiration and gratitude, and proclaim a good God, full of love for his
creatures!
Thus, God is the principle of the three orders of beauty that we have
distinguished, physical beauty, intellectual beauty, moral beauty.
In him also are reunited the two great forms of the beautiful
distributed in each of these three orders, to wit, the beautiful and the
sublime. God is, _par excellence_, the beautiful--for what object
satisfies more all our faculties, our reason, our imagination, our
heart! He offers to reason the highest idea, beyond which it has nothing
more to seek; to imagination the most ravishing contemplation; to the
heart a sovereign object of love. He is, then, perfectly beautiful; but
is he not sublime also in other ways? If he extends the horizon of
thought, it is to confound it in the abyss of his greatness. If the soul
blooms at the spectacle of his goodness, has it not also reason to be
affrighted at the idea of his justice, which is not less present to it?
God is at once mild and terrible. At the same time that he is the life,
the light, the movement, the ineffable grace of visible and finite
nature, he is also called the Eternal, the Invisible, the Infinite, the
Absolute Unity, and the Being of beings. Do not these awful attributes,
as certain as the first, produce in the highest degree in the
imagination and the soul that melancholy emotion excited by the sublime?
Yes, God is for us the type and source of the two great forms of beauty,
because he is to us at once an impenetrable enigma and still the
clearest word that we are able to find for all enigmas. Limited beings
as we are, we comprehend nothing in comparison with that which is
without limits, and we are able to explain nothing without that same
thing which is without limits. By the being that we possess, we have
some idea of the infinite being of God; by the nothingness that is in
us, we lose ourselves in the being of God; and thus always forced to
recur to him in order to explain any thing, and always thrown back
within ourselves under the weight of his infinitude, we experience by
turns, or rather at the same time, for this God who raises and casts us
down, a sentiment of irresistible attraction and astonishment, not to
say insurmountable terror, which he alone can cause and allay, because
he alone is the unity of the sublime and the beautiful.
Thus absolute being, which is both absolute unity and infinite
variety,--God, is necessarily the last reason, the ultimate foundation,
the completed ideal of all beauty. This is the marvellous beauty that
Diotimus had caught a glimpse of, and thus paints to Socrates in the
_Banquet_:
"Eternal beauty, unbegotten and imperishable, exempt from decay as well
as increase, which is not beautiful in such a part and ugly in such
another, beautiful only, at such a time, in such a place, in such a
relation, beautiful for some, ugly for others, beauty that has no
sensible form, no visage, no hands, nothing corporeal, which is not such
a thought or such a particular science, which resides not in any being
different from itself, as an animal, the earth, or the heavens, or any
other thing, which is absolutely identical and invariable by itself, in
which all other beauties participate, in such a way, nevertheless, that
their birth or their destruction neither diminishes nor increases, nor
in the least changes it!... In order to arrive at this perfect beauty,
it is necessary to commence with the beauties of this lower world, and,
the eyes being fixed upon the supreme beauty, to elevate ourselves
unceasingly towards it, by passing, thus to speak, through all the
degrees of the scale, from a single beautiful body to two, from two to
all others, from beautiful bodies to beautiful sentiments, from
beautiful sentiments to beautiful thoughts, until from thought to
thought we arrive at the highest thought, which has no other object than
the beautiful itself, until we end by knowing it as it is in itself.
"O my dear Socrates," continued the stranger of Mantinea, "that which
can give value to this life is the spectacle of the eternal beauty....
What would be the destiny of a mortal to whom it should be granted to
contemplate the beautiful without alloy, in its purity and simplicity,
no longer clothed with the flesh and hues of humanity, and with all
those vain charms that are condemned to perish, to whom it should be
given to see face to face, under its sole form, the divine beauty!"[111]
FOOTNOTES:
[103] If one would make himself acquainted with a simple and piquant
refutation, written two thousand years ago, of false theories of beauty,
he may read the _Hippias_ of Plato, vol. iv. of our translation. The
_Phaedrus_, vol. vi., contains the veiled exposition of Plato's own
theory; but it is in the _Banquet_ (_Ibid._), and particularly in the
discourse of Diotimus, that we must look for the thought of Plato
carried to its highest degree of development, and clothed with all the
beauty of human language.
[104] See the _Hippias_.
[105] First _Ennead_, book vi., in the work of M. B. Saint-Hillaire, on
the _School of Alexandria_, the translation of this morsel of Plotinus,
p. 197.