Page:Philosophical Review Volume 24.djvu/595

work of art may be valued by comparing the grandeur of the emotions it calls forth with the grandeur of the emotions called forth by the represented object itself. If there is no difference its merit depends on the nature of the subject. A work to be good must satisfy the senses, tin feelings and the imagination, and must also possess technical value, especially in painting. In sculpture especially, perfect technique cannot make beauty. The indifference of the general public to most of the arts, the incompetence of most amateurs, and the passions and interest of artists, critics, etc., influence aesthetic judgments. But let us examine the intrinsic value of our judgments. As far as the body of man is concerned, owing to a variety of circumstances, the criterion can only be approximated. There is a more or less precise basis of appreciation as regards the head and the face. The appreciation of physical beauty varies with the point of view from which one looks at it. But two experienced critics, judging a person or a statue, would approximately agree and so give their judgment an objective value, though they might be subjective in their judgment of details. In judging works of architecture, the critic is not guided by nature or by a type following the relatively precise law of harmonious development, as he is in judging the body. Architecture possesses no universal general forms, and in it more than in any other art technique is independent of beauty. Judgments of architectural works of all categories are subjective in so far as certain people do not like a particular category—the Gothic style, etc.,—but in the same category, among persons of the same moral structure, etc., judgments generally harmonize. In judging natural scenery our tastes are fairly uniform as regards locations for permanent habitations, but they vary more widely with conditions as regards sites for temporary living, and in respect to mountain scenery, etc. In painting we demand a true appreciation of the beautiful. The technique of the painting and its fitness for the subject, the correctness of the perspective, etc., are open to criticism. There has also been established a canon of the association of colors and sounds. But in the main, the critic must give us his sensations and sentiments without much justification; the sentiments which a painting inspires are derived almost entirely from a conformity to structure tried by experience. The artist's mission is to express and develop in his own language the sensations and sentiments given him by his surroundings and atmosphere, and he can only be completely understood by those living in his own country and in his own time. All intelligent aesthetic criticism depends on such a knowledge of time and place. Aesthetic judgments are object among normal men possessing similar tendencies at any one time in the same country, but in great part they are subjective, communicated from one man to another, from social group to social group, from nation to nation, from epoch to epoch. "No single beauty is universally appreciated or in itself immortal."

Jules G. Proctor.⁠