BEAUTY
I
How is beauty to be judged?--upon that we have to deliberate.
A man by skill may bring it into every single thing, for in some things
we recognise that as beautiful which elsewhere would lack beauty.
Good and better in respect of beauty are not easy to discern; for it
would be quite possible to make two different figures, one stout, the
other thin, which should differ one from the other in every proportion,
and yet we scarce might be able to judge which of the two excelled in
beauty. What beauty is I know not, though it dependeth upon many things.
I shall here apply to what is to be called beautiful the same touchstone
as that by which we decide what is right. For as what all the world
prizeth as right we hold to be right, so what all the world esteemeth
beautiful that we will also hold for beautiful, and ourselves strive to
produce the like.
There are many causes and varieties of beauty; he that can prove them is
so much the more to be trusted.
The accord of one thing with another is beautiful, therefore want of
harmony is not beautiful. A real harmony linketh together things unlike.
Use is a part of beauty, whatever therefore is useless unto men is
without beauty.
The more imperfection is excluded so much the more doth beauty abide in
the work.
Guard thyself from superfluity.
But beauty is so put together in men and so uncertain is our judgment
about it, that we may perhaps find two men both beautiful and fair to
look upon, and yet neither resembleth the other, in measure or kind, in
any single point or part; and so blind is our perception that we shall
not understand whether of the two is the more beautiful, and if we give
an opinion on the matter it shall lack certainty.
Negro faces are seldom beautiful because of their very flat noses and
thick lips; moreover, their shinbone is too prominent, and the knee and
foot too long, not so good to look upon as those of the whites; and so
also is it with their hand. Howbeit, I have seen some amongst them whose
whole bodies have been so well-built and handsome that I never beheld
finer figures, nor can I conceive how they might be bettered, so
excellent were their arms and all their limbs.
Seeing that man is the worthiest of all creatures, it follows that, in
all pictures, the human figure is most frequently employed as a centre
of interest. Every animal in the world regards nothing but his own kind,
and the same nature is also in men, as every man may perceive
in himself.
[Illustration: Charcoal-drawing heightened with white on a green
prepared ground, in the Berlin Print Room _Face p_. 320]
Further, in order that he may arrive at a good canon whereby to bring
somewhat of beauty into our work, there-unto it were best for thee, it
bethinks me, to form thy canon from many living men. Howbeit seek only
such men as are held beautiful, and from such draw with all diligence.
For one who hath understanding may, from men of many different kinds,
gather something good together through all the limbs of the body. But
seldom is a man found who hath all his limbs good, for every man lacks
something.
No single man can be taken as a model of a perfect figure, for no man
liveth on earth who uniteth in himself all manner of beauties.... There
liveth also no man upon earth who could give a final judgment upon what
the perfect figure of a man is; God only knoweth that.
And although we cannot speak of the greatest beauty of a living
creature, yet we find in the visible creation a beauty so far surpassing
our understanding that no one of us can fully bring it into his work.
If we were to ask how we are to make a beautiful figure, some would give
answer: According to human judgment (i.e., common taste). Others would
not agree thereto, neither should I without a good reason. Who will give
us certainty in this matter?[87]
II
I have already given what I believe to be the best answer to these
questions as to what beauty is and how it is to be judged. Beauty is
beauty as good is good (_see_ pp. 7, 8), or yellow, yellow; indeed, to
the second question, Matthew Arnold has given the only possible
answer--the relative value of beauties is "as the judicious would
determine," and the judicious are, in matters of art "finely touched and
gifted men." This criterion obviously cannot be easily or hastily
applied, nor could one ever be quite sure that in any given case it had
been applied to any given effect. But for practical needs we see that it
suffices to cast a slur on facile popularity, and vindicate over and
over again those who had been despised and rejected. What the true
artist desires to bring into his pictures is the power to move
finely-touched and gifted men. Not only are such by very much the
minority, but the more part of them being, by their capacity to be moved
and touched, easily wounded, have developed a natural armour of reserve,
of moroseness, of prejudice, of combativeness, of pedantry, which makes
them as difficult to address as wombats, or bears, or tortoises, or
porcupines, or polecats, or elephants. It is interesting to witness how
Dürer's self-contradictions show him to be aware of the great complexity
of these difficulties, as also to see how very near he comes to the true
answer. At one time he tells us:
"When men demand a work of a master, he is to be praised in so far as he
succeeds in satisfying their likings ..."[88]
At another he tells us:
"The art of painting cannot be truly judged save by such as are
themselves good painters; from others verily is it hidden even as a
strange tongue."[89]
Every "finely touched and gifted man" is not an artist; but every true
artist must, in some measure, be a finely touched and gifted man. There
is no necessity to limit the public addressed to those who themselves
produce: yet those who "can prove what they say with their hand" bring
credentials superior to those offered by any others,--although even
their judgment is not sure, as they may well represent a minority of
the true court of appeal which can never be brought together.
No doubt there is a judgment and a scale of values accepted as final by
each generation that gives any considerable attention to these
questions. Æsthetic appear to be exactly similar to religious
convictions. Those who are subject to them probably pass through many
successively, even though they all their lives hold to a certain fashion
which enables them to assert some obvious unity, like those who, in
religion, belong always to one sect. Yet if they were in a position to
analyse their emotions and leanings, no doubt very fundamental
contradictions would be discovered to disconcert them. Conviction and
enthusiasm in the arts and religion would seem to be the frame of mind
natural to those who assimilate, and are rendered productive by what
they study and admire. Convictions may never be wholly justifiable in
theory, but in practice when results are considered, it would seem that
no other frame of mind should escape censure.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 87: "Literary Remains of Albrecht Dürer," p. 244.]
[Footnote 88: "Literary Remains of Albrecht Dürer," p. 245.]
[Footnote 89: _Idem_. p. 177.]