LAW OF GENERAL ASSENT
General opinion the test of beauty in the Associated Arts.
The first aim of art is sensorial beauty, because sensorial experience
must precede the impression of beauty upon the mind. The extent to which
something appears to be sensorially harmonious depends upon the
condition or character of the nerves conveying the impression of it to
the brain. We know from experience that exercise of these nerves results
in the removal or partial removal of natural irregularities therein, and
enables a complex form of beauty to be recognized which was not before
perceived. The vast majority of the people have not cultivated their
sense nerves except involuntarily, and consequently can only recognize
more or less simple beauty: thus, as the sign combinations become more
complicated, so is diminished the number of persons capable of
appreciating the beauty thereof.
The highest form of beauty conceivable to the imagination is that of the
human being, because here corporeal and intellectual beauty may be
combined. This is universally admitted and has been so since the first
records of mental activity. The human figure must be regarded as a
single sign since the relation of its parts to each other is fixed and
invariable; and further it is the simplest, because of all signs none is
so quickly recognized by the rudimentary understanding. In the
Associated Arts therefore, the highest beauty is to be found in the
simplest sign, and this is the one supremely important sign in these
arts, for without it only the lowest forms may be produced.
From all this we determine that the higher the beauty in a work of the
Associated Arts, the larger is the number of persons capable of
recognizing it; so that if we say that something in these arts is
beautiful because it pleases, we imply that it is still more beautiful
if we say that it generally pleases, and the highest of all standards of
beauty is involved in the interpretation of Longinus: "That is sublime
and beautiful which always pleases, and takes equally with all sorts of
men." Thus, in the Associated Arts, the general opinion as to the
aesthetic value of a work of high art is both demonstration and law.[27]
In music the significance of the signs is inverted compared with the
progression in the Associated Arts, for while in the latter the highest
form of beauty is produced by the simplest of single signs, in music the
higher forms are the result of complex combinations of signs. The
greatest musical compositions consist of an immense variety of signs
arranged in a hitherto unknown order. Thus, while the immature or
uncultivated mind recognizes the higher forms of beauty before the lower
in the Associated Arts, it first recognizes the lower forms in music. In
the Associated Arts therefore, cultivation results in the further
appreciation of the forms of art as they descend, and in music as they
ascend.
In painting, the most uncultivated persons, even those who have never
exercised their organs of sight except involuntarily, will always admire
the higher forms before the lower.[28] They will more highly appreciate
a picture of a Madonna or other beautiful woman than an interior where
the scene is comparatively complicated by the presence of several
persons, and they will prefer the interior to a landscape, and a
landscape to a still-life picture. So in sculpture. Other things being
equal, a figure of a man or woman will be preferred to a group, and the
group to an animal or decorative ornament. An exception must however be
made in respect of the sublime reaches of Grecian sculpture in the fifth
and fourth centuries B.C., owing to an artificial restriction. There is
very little of this sculpture to be actually seen, nearly all the more
important works being known only from records or variable copies.
Considerable observation, comparison, and study, are necessary before
one can gain a fair conception of the Grecian ideals, and so they are
practically lost to the bulk of the people.
In fiction it is common knowledge that the greatest works from the point
of view of art are always the most popular, as they are invariably the
most simple in construction and diction. In considering poetry we must
exclude the great epics, as those of Homer, Virgil, Dante, and Milton,
because where the actions of supernatural persons are described, the
sentiments and language employed are so elevated in character, and the
images and literary references so numerous, that a certain superior
education is required before the sense of the poems can be comprehended.
Subject to this artificial restriction, the rule holds entirely good.
Shakespeare is at once the greatest and most popular of our poets:
Shelley, Byron, and Burns, are as far ahead of Tennyson and Browning in
popularity as they are in general beauty and simplicity.
In music on the other hand the lower forms are the simplest and
consequently the most popular. Songs, dance measures, and ditties of
various kinds, are enjoyed by the mass of the people in preference to
Beethoven and Wagner, a certain cultivation of the aural nerves being
necessary for the appreciation of the greater artists. The architect is
under the necessity of meeting the ends of utility, but subject to this
restriction it is obvious that simplicity must be the keynote to his
design, for the highest quality of beauty in his power to produce is
grandeur, and this diminishes with an increase in the complexity of his
sign combinations. The combination of simplicity with grandeur is the
first form of beauty that would be recognized by the immature eye, and
consequently in respect of the general test of art excellence,
architecture falls into line with the Associated Arts, and not with
music.
From what has been said it will be understood how it is that in the
Associated Arts opinion as to the aesthetic value of particular works
begins to differ as soon as we leave the recognized masterpieces of the
first rank, and why the divergence widens with every step downwards. As
the character of the art is lowered so is diminished the number of
persons capable of appreciating it. In painting and sculpture this
diminution is direct with the increased complexity of the signs used,
and indirect according as the character of the signs weakens. In poetry
the same rule applies generally, but in the lower forms alliance with
the art of music may bring about a variation. Only the very lowest forms
of music may be used with the higher forms of poetry because the poet
must have the minimum of restriction when dealing with the character and
actions of the personages who constitute the principal signs in his
work, but as the art descends the musical form becomes of more
importance, and the substance more simple. Hence the sensorial beauty of
a lyric may be appreciated more quickly than that of a poem which is, in
substance, of a much higher order, though the kind of beauty recognized
will differ in the two cases. But even in the greatest lyric the musical
form is comparatively very simple, its beauty being recognized without
special cultivation of the aural nerves: thus, subject to the division
of poetry into its natural grades--the two sections where substance and
form respectively predominate--the measure of its beauty is the extent
to which it is generally appreciated. None of the other Associated Arts
may be allied with a second art without crippling it as a fine art,
because of the extraordinary limitations forced upon the artist by the
alliance; and hence in respect of sculpture, painting, and fiction,
there is no exception to the rule that the beauty capable of being
produced diminishes strictly with an increase in the complexity of the
signs used.
These facts appear sufficiently to establish what may be called the Law
of General Assent in the Associated Arts; that is to say, in the arts of
poetry, sculpture, painting, and fiction, the supreme test of the
aesthetic value of a work, is general opinion; and a corollary of this is
that the smaller the number of persons to whom a work of one of these
arts appeals, the weaker is the art therein.