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jr. ■ 
 
 THE 
 
 ^ESTHETIC LETTERS, ESSAYS, 
 
 AND 
 
 THE PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS 
 
 OF 
 
 SCHILLER. 
 
\ 
 
THE 
 
 AESTHETIC LETTERS, ESSAYS, 
 
 ■ 
 
 AND 
 
 THE PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS 
 OF SCHILLER, ; 
 
 TRANSLATED, WITH AN INTRODUCTION, 
 BY J. WEISS. 
 
 Schbn zu leben, ist wahre Kunst, 
 Kunst im Leben das schb'ne Wahre, 
 Leben der Kunst das wahre Schb'ne, 
 Wahres Leben die schdne Kunst. 
 
 Schiller's Album. 
 
 BOSTON: 
 CHARLES C. LITTLE AND JAMES BROWN. 
 
 MDCCCXLV. 
 
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1845, by 
 John Weiss, in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the 
 District of Massachusetts. 
 
 boston: 
 printed by freeman and bolles, 
 washington street. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 Page 
 
 Introduction vii 
 
 Upon the ^Esthetic Culture of Man, in a Series 
 
 of Letters 1 
 
 Upon the Necessary Limits in the Use of Beau- 
 tiful Forms 149 
 
 Upon the Moral Use of ^Esthetic Manners . . 185 
 
 Upon the Pathetic 199 
 
 Upon the Sublime 239 
 
 Thoughts upon the Use of the Common and Low 
 
 in Art 265 
 
 Disconnected Observations upon Various ^Esthetic 
 
 Subjects 277 
 
 Upon the Tragic Art 307 
 
 The Philosophical Letters 339 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 We have lately fallen into the error, for which we 
 are indebted to Germany herself, of forcing an un- 
 natural contrast between Goethe and Schiller, her 
 two greatest men. Scholars spend their ingenuity 
 in drawing parallels and exposing differences, when 
 the true process would be to construct an equation 
 and indicate the points of contact. The error has 
 now become almost irremediable : and it seems to 
 be generally understood that the two men would 
 have never lived together in Weimar, if Providence 
 had not designed to puzzle posterity with the con- 
 trast, and to occupy its leisure moments with the de- 
 bate as to which is the greater. They have unfor- 
 tunately passed into history, with the legal versus 
 between their names, which never kept asunder the 
 
viii 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 Doe and Roe of fiction with a more abiding perti- 
 nacity. 
 
 This is a great injury which we inflict upon our- 
 selves. Undoubtedly, that delightful period of their 
 common activity at Weimar affords the most natural 
 opportunity for instituting a comparison between 
 them, which is not without its interest and advan- 
 tage. Their mental tendencies differed too distinctly 
 to escape observation ; perhaps they challenge it, 
 and perhaps the two poets are noteworthy as suc- 
 cessful exponents of the two great elements of Hu- 
 manity, the Real and the Ideal. For neither was 
 Goethe the whole man, nor was Schiller the less 
 complete one, he has been represented. But it is in 
 this very distinctness with which they developed re- 
 spectively those two great elements, that we ought 
 to discern, not only the special mission of each, but 
 the still higher mission of both united. It is striking 
 to notice how their diversity produces an unity ; it 
 would be instructive to analyze their characters, in 
 order to perceive their capacity for creating a third 
 character which is the idea of Humanity, the result 
 of the two tendencies which make a man. It seems, 
 then, as if that period of their artistic union was a 
 lucky manoeuvre of nature, to bring together her two 
 elements most favorably developed, that she might 
 " give the world assurance of a Man" Where 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 ix 
 
 Goethe was deficient, Schiller abounded ; where the 
 latter yearned to express that which is absolute, the 
 former fulfilled definite and ascertained limits. Both 
 were earnest seekers after Truth ; it was for both 
 the very condition of their existence, a demand of 
 their consciousness which they never once evaded. 
 But we attain a steadfast form of truth, and a har- 
 monious development of human faculties, only by 
 combining the results of both : or rather, a true man, 
 made after the divine image, is the union of both 
 their tendencies. There will be a residue, if we at- 
 tempt to unite the two men as they were, but, that 
 excepted, the product is the type of that which is 
 possible within us ; and as such it should be prized, 
 studied, and never rudely violated. When German 
 scholars have asked, " Which is greater ; Goethe ? 
 Schiller ? " others have sought to deprecate such a 
 distinction, and have taken refuge in the simile of 
 the Dioscuri : but even that will not serve our turn, 
 for an alternate immortality does not become those 
 who are really immortal and available only when 
 made into one. 
 
 The translator has since found this idea of the 
 genuine relation of Goethe and Schiller to each other 
 and to us, well stated by Gervinus in his admirable 
 history of German Literature. It occurs after a 
 parallel, or rather statement of a coalition, which 
 
X 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 exhausts the genius of both, and for insight and com- 
 pleteness is the best extant. " And thus the lines 
 of the double nature in both intersect so manifoldly, 
 that they exhibit to us a common whole only in the 
 shape of a coalescence, which should delight us, and 
 give us the foundation for a self-construction, as it 
 lay in the purpose of the men themselves. Who 
 would choose between them : who would blindly lose 
 sight of that fundamental doctrine of both, which we 
 find so repeatedly, so expressly, in their writings, 
 the doctrine of the united totality of human nature ? 
 Who would esteem either as the One, per excellen- 
 tiam, when they themselves refer us to a Third, 
 which is greater than both ? There is only one 
 point of view from which a preference for either is 
 admissible : in the recognition we make of that in 
 our own nature which is narrow and incomplete, and 
 which leads every one, after the very example of our 
 two poets, to that one of both who is foreign to him, 
 that merged in the excellence of an antagonistic na- 
 ture, he may repair his deficiency, and learn, from 
 the counterfoil of his being, to make the acknowledg- 
 ment which Goethe made with respect to Schiller — 
 he is what we ought to be ! For not unless we re- 
 cognize wherein our own existence is deficient, and 
 also strive to be that which we are not, need we 
 
INTRODUCTION. xi 
 
 hope in some measure to become, what we really 
 ought to be." 1 
 
 With this preliminary we are naturally led to the 
 Letters upon iEsthetic Culture, the first piece in 
 this volume : for its aim is to develop this very ideal 
 man, nowhere so nearly expressed in life as in the 
 union of Goethe and Schiller. These Letters stand 
 unequalled in the department of ^Esthetics, and are 
 so esteemed even in Germany, which is so fruitful 
 upon that topic. Schiller is Germany's best Ms- 
 thetician, and these letters contain the highest mo- 
 ments of Schiller. Whether we desire rigorous W- 
 ical investigation or noble poetic expression, whether 
 we wish to stimulate the intellect or inflame the 
 heart, we need seek no farther than these. They 
 are trophies won from an unpopular, metaphysical 
 form, by a lofty, inspiring and absorbing subject. It 
 is impossible to read many of them with an equable 
 color and an unquickened heart-beat : the voice we 
 hear is " as it were of a trumpet " talking with us, 
 and it says indeed none other than the words heard 
 by John — come up hither ! 
 
 The history of these Letters is interesting, and 
 also necessary for the full enjoyment and under- 
 standing of them. On this point the translator 
 
 1 Gesch. d. poetischen National-Literatur, v. 522. 
 
xii 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 avails himself of the labors of Professor Gervinus, 
 the best authority, both in matters of fact and of 
 taste. 
 
 Schiller published them in 1795, during a period 
 of the most intense political excitement, when the 
 Reign of Terror was drawing to its close, and the 
 affiliated societies throughout France and Germany 
 stormed the fiercest. He was far from being indif- 
 ferent to the signs of the age, and was more inclined 
 to call that a genuine movement of humanity which 
 Goethe only regarded as an accidental emeute. 
 Some of the early Letters give us his cool opinion 
 and the precise value at which he rated the existing 
 movement : and it will be seen that the character of 
 the times furnished him with the starting-point for 
 his investigations. It is also noteworthy that he ad- 
 dressed the Letters to Christian Frederic, Duke of 
 Holstein-Augustenburg, who had rendered Schiller 
 noble aid when he was sinking under disappointment 
 and disease. The incident is thus related by Mr. 
 Carlyle : " Schiller had not long been sick, when 
 the hereditary Prince, now reigning Duke of Hol- 
 stein-Augustenburg, jointly with the Count von 
 Schimmelmann, conferred on him a pension of a 
 thousand crowns for three years. No stipulation 
 was added, but merely that he should be careful of 
 his health, and use every attention to recover. This 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 xiii 
 
 speedy and generous aid, moreover, was presented 
 with a delicate politeness, which, as Schiller said, 
 touched him more than even the gift itself." He 
 could make no return more worthy than the work 
 which was the first fruit of his convalescence. 
 
 The Prince stood at the head of the Danish cir- 
 cle, which the poet Baggesen had inspired with an 
 enthusiasm for Schiller, and which, strangely enough, 
 seems to have embraced the French ideas of Free- 
 dom with greater warmth than the middle class. " If 
 this Prince is not ours beyond doubt," wrote Bag- 
 gesen to Reinhold, "then all the Posas 1 can be- 
 take themselves with their schemes to Bedlam." 
 When directed to such a man, the political observa- 
 tions in the commencement of the ^Esthetic Letters, 
 have a suitableness and significance. The philo- 
 sophic poet feels that the age requires a declara- 
 tion of Freedom rather than of Beauty ; and the 
 great process pending in France, which ought to be 
 decided by the reason, naturally would engage his 
 pen. But he withstands this temptation, and ex- 
 cuses himself not on the ground of inclination, but 
 on principle . He undertakes to show, that to solve 
 this political problem, one must pass through the re- 
 
 1 Posa, the philosophic Marquis in Don Carlos, the type of Schiller 
 himself: always doing homage to the Right, always on the side of 
 Humanity, the sworn foe of falseness and injustice. 
 
xiv 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 gion of the iEsthetic. To prove this, he considers 
 in one view the nature of Man and of the State, and 
 finds that if man would exchange the state of nature or 
 need for the moral state, he must possess that totality 
 of the ancients, in whom there was a distinct har- 
 mony of thought, perception and action, both in Art 
 and Polity ; while our bodies politic display rude- 
 ness in the lower, and relaxation in the higher 
 classes. We cannot suppose that the State, which 
 has induced this evil, can of itself obviate it : where 
 the upper classes do not use their freedom, they 
 need not be deprived of it, and it need not be given 
 to the great mass who blindly abuse it. All politi- 
 cal improvement can result only from ennoblement 
 of the character ; but how can that take place under 
 a barbarous polity ? For this design we must seek 
 an instrument which is independent of the State, 
 and lay open sources which preserve themselves 
 pure through every political depravation. This in- 
 strument is the Fine Arts. The Artist may secede 
 from his age and elevate himself above it. 
 
 This carries us to the Tenth Letter ; and the 
 whole range of German Literature cannot afford a 
 composition equal to the Ninth, in dignity of state- 
 ment, nobility of idea, aptness of language. Schil- 
 ler emerges from the relations of his century, and 
 stands upon the peak of time : he gives law to his 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 XV 
 
 age, he utters that which must be an inspiration not 
 to be withstood, for all the true-hearted, for those 
 who are now breaking ground for our Future. 
 There is hope for our young country only if we suc- 
 ceed in acclimating the principles of the poet. 
 
 Schiller then proceeds to consult experience for 
 the effects of Beauty upon the character. History 
 declares that nations have declined in proportion to 
 their aesthetic culture, that enervation and loss of 
 freedom have followed close upon refinement. But 
 perhaps, he says, experience is not the arbitress in 
 the decision of this question ; at least it remains to 
 be proved that the Beauty against which all histori- 
 cal examples seem to testify, is the same Beauty 
 concerning which he intends to speak. He then 
 proceeds to evolve the conception of Beauty from 
 the Reason, and to establish something necessary 
 and absolute which shall be independent of the old 
 declarations of history, and whose realization in life 
 shall create history anew. This is certainly a more 
 satisfactory process than if Schiller had postponed 
 his interrogation of the Reason, and had sought to 
 present history as a sure, but hitherto imperfect and 
 fragmentary, development of the pure idea of Beauty. 
 More satisfactory, because he is thereby able to dem- 
 onstrate that which no history has yet displayed, 
 and to prophecy surely and hopefully a better fu- 
 
vi 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 ture. To show how the State must finally repre- 
 sent his idea of Beauty, is better than merely to 
 show how or why the State has hitherto misrepre- 
 sented it, or how a philosophy of history might ex- 
 plain and combine isolated and incongruous pheno- 
 mena. The new Beauty which Schiller discovers 
 is equivalent to a philosophy of history, and he re- 
 turns to the order of nature in the Twenty-third and 
 Twenty-fourth Letters. The three different moments, 
 passivity under nature's force, freedom in the aes- 
 thetic state, and government of that force in the 
 moral state, are the three epochs for the develop- 
 ment of humanity in the mass and in the individual, 
 just as they are the condition of every cognition we 
 receive through the senses : we pass to the Real 
 through the Ideal, to the deeds of manhood through 
 the wishes of youth. 
 
 It is, however, the opinion of Gervinus that 
 Schiller would have simplified the matter by confining 
 himself wholly to the historical method, and by 
 showing how experience contradicted in no wise 
 his principles. " That Schiller did not return to 
 his problem, in the course of the Letters, and that 
 he did not carry out the idea he started of the rela- 
 tion between aesthetical and political culture, but 
 left it as a fragment, permits us to regard it as one 
 of those interruptions caused by circumstances, and 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 xvii 
 
 which demands a future man, with a like affinity for 
 the past and present time, to knit together in a fa- 
 vorable moment the dissevered threads. Before we 
 ourselves are farther advanced in our political cul- 
 ture, we shall not dare to decide, why the most art- 
 istic nation of the earth has had the purest civic 
 development ; how far an aesthetic people is quali- 
 fied by its harmonious culture for the creation of a 
 harmoniously compacted polity ; under what condi- 
 tions a people which has attained this culture will 
 remain stationary complacently, and feel more con- 
 tented to decline in the province of Art than to as- 
 pire in the State ; and how long it would bear the 
 discrepancy between its actual political position and 
 that more worthy one, which would correspond with 
 its degree of culture and fulness of power." 1 
 
 Following this there is an admirable analysis of 
 the remainder of the iEsthetic Letters, to the temp- 
 tation for translating which I should yield, were 
 not the temptation greater to leave the field fresh 
 and unexplored for every lover of Schiller and his 
 subject. Those parts which are purely metaphysi- 
 cal will not be repulsive, and the iron consistency of 
 the whole precludes their being slighted. Schiller 
 emerges from all of them with grace and ease, and 
 requites us for our labor by the captivating and in- 
 
 1 Gcscb. d. poetischen National -Literalur. v. 426. 
 B 
 
xviii 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 spiring statements of his conclusions. The dizzy 
 and perilous trains of thought all lead to high, sunny 
 table-lands, and into green resting places : they are 
 like the bridge, fine as a hair and keen as a razor, 
 which the Faithful must pass to reach Paradise. 1 
 
 A history of the JEsthetic Letters properly in- 
 cludes a statement of Schiller's relation to Kant, 
 since we find in the First Letter an admission that 
 they are based upon Kantian principles. But a 
 thorough discussion of this relation is much beyond 
 the limits of an introduction, which will only admit 
 such points as are necessary for the proper apprecia- 
 tion of Schiller's ^Esthetic theory. Schiller was 
 never strictly a disciple of Kant, but only coincided 
 with him in one or two mental tendencies which 
 they held in common. The pure subjective method 
 of Kant was modified by him, so as to include the 
 objective also. In one respect he was nearer Fichte 
 than Kant, because the former distinguished Object 
 
 1 Schiller's prose style is well adapted to metaphysical investiga- 
 tions. That which Jean Paul calls "the perfection of pomp-prose," 
 with its parallels and antitheses, avails the intellect quite as much as 
 the imagination. Schiller's parallels bear along two ideas related or 
 opposed, in company with each other, balancing them by the way, 
 till their absolute or relative weight is ascertained. In fact all the 
 Letters may be said to state the two tendencies of humanity in a 
 parallel, which skilfully develops, and finally unites in, a third pro- 
 duct, the ^Esthetic Man. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 xix 
 
 from Subject, while the latter only made it depend- 
 ent upon Subject. Fichte's metaphysical formula 
 which has provoked so much burlesque 1 and has ex- 
 cited so many good-natured suspicions of insanity, 
 1= I, is certainly the first term of any genuine meta- 
 physical theory, because thereby the Not-I, that is, 
 World, in the widest sense of that word, is left as a 
 quantity independent of our own Subject. There- 
 fore the operation of Subject and Object is reciprocal. 
 It is not true, with Kant, that the outward is only 
 a projection of the modes of our Understanding, 
 
 1 See, for instance, Coleridge's remarks upon Fichte's Egoism, and 
 a Note upon page 95 of the Biog. Literaria: " the categorical Imper- 
 ative, or the annunciation of the new Teutonic God, F,ywtvy.aiJTav, 
 &c." But Fichte did not state the reciprocity of Subject and 
 Object : he assumed the former as the absolute substance, there- 
 by only declaring the first term of a correct metaphysics. His posi- 
 tion is assailable, because it is unqualified. Schelling unfortunately 
 made it still less practicable. But in Schiller we recognize the two 
 necessary distinctions, first, between the finite Subject and the Di- 
 vinity ; second, between Subject and Object : and nothing can be 
 plainer than his statements of the reciprocity of the latter. The two 
 former distinctions save us from Pantheism, the ground -idea of 
 which, as a system, is, the entire uselessness of any system at all, 
 just as death is the unquestionable remedy of all disorders : and the 
 idea of reciprocity saves us from the materialism of Kant, for that is 
 materialism, in which the cognitions a priori (or the Understanding 
 in action) both create, and yet are only possible through, the Object, 
 — so the latter in reality limits all faith and knowledge. Schiller af- 
 fected neither the system nor the terminology of Kant. (For the 
 finest Analysis of Kant's system, see that by Mr. Brownson, in his 
 Boston Quarterly, 1844.) 
 
XX 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 which position admits nothing absolute, nothing pos- 
 itive and independent, save the categories into which 
 the Understanding is divided : neither is it true, with 
 Hume and others, that the source of all our know- 
 ledge is empirical, and only the efflorescence of 
 the rive senses. There is a point between the two, 
 and in a plane higher than both, an union of fact 
 and idea, induction from, and anticipation of, IVa- 
 ture, a distinct appreciation of the respective capaci- 
 ties of Subject and Object, which is the only true 
 starting-point for metaphysics and the only safe 
 ground for science. Schiller attempted to throw 
 himself into that position : the result was that he 
 made Kant's theory of --Esthetics available, or more 
 strictly speaking, he rejected the process of pure 
 speculation, and sought to give contents to Form ; 
 his plastic spirit wrought in Matter and the world of 
 sense, and was not content with Kant's ••' pure ab- 
 stract method of deduction from conceptions." He 
 was a Kantian only so far as Kant was practical, 
 and only where his ideas u extricated from their 
 technical form, appear as the prescriptive claims of 
 the common reason,''' and are the common sense of 
 humanity. 
 
 But it was Kant's stern morality which first at- 
 tracted Schiller, and which, after all. is the only 
 genuine bond of union between the two philoso- 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 xxi 
 
 phers. Kant was disgusted with the sentimentality 
 of pietism and poetry, on the one hand, and with the 
 loose philosophy of Wieland and the Anacreontic 
 school, on the other: and he promulgated a system 
 which reproduced in a scientific form, the high ethics 
 of Christianity, and he applied them, moreover, with 
 distinguished success, to every sphere of human ac- 
 tivity and knowledge. The sensualism of the age 
 was rebuked, and its waves arrested. This was the 
 chief benefit of Kant's labors : his metaphysical sys- 
 tem is only a material idealism, proving nothing, 
 giving no positive result, excepting as it shows the 
 incapacity of the understanding, "which is of the 
 earth, earthy," but his application of Christian mo- 
 rality to every relation of life, to every sphere of 
 science, and most especially, to that of ^Esthetics, 
 was positively useful, productive of immediate re- 
 sults, regenerating the tone of German thought. 
 This was Kant's real mission, on this rests his fame, 
 and it is here that he commands respect and invites 
 research. 
 
 This mental tendency of Kant was an irresistible 
 attraction for the severe and pure mind of Schiller, 
 and the sage of Konigsberg invited him precisely 
 where Goethe was repelled. Here recourse is again 
 had to Gervinus, for his statement of the way in 
 which Kant and his dominant tendency affected 
 
xxii 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 Schiller's ^Esthetics. " Kant separated Art from all 
 the demands of exigency and utility, he defined a 
 free Beauty as something distinct from dependent 
 Beauty, and made the essential of Art to consist in 
 the Form. He regarded the fine arts, if they were 
 not brought into union with moral ideas, as mere 
 means of mental dissipation : he called Beauty the 
 symbol of moral goodness, and the fine arts the em- 
 bodiment of moral ideas. To him, the development 
 and culture of the moral feeling appeared to be the 
 true preliminary to establishment of the taste, which 
 ought to create a passage from the allurements of 
 sense to an habitual moral interest. These were 
 the principles which mainly attracted Schiller. The 
 obscurity and discord in Kant on the subject of the 
 relation of sense and morality, determined him to 
 separate them distinctly ; the attractive opinions up- 
 on the Sublime, one of the finest places in Kant's 
 writings, where the dry limbs of speculation are 
 clothed with the pleasant green of fact and example, 
 arrested his attention : the hints which Kant let fall 
 concerning the happy union of a lofty culture and its 
 constraint of law with the force of free nature, in the 
 Grecian humanity, and a chance word that Art com- 
 pared with Labor may be considered as a Play, — all 
 excited a storm of ideas in the mind of Schiller, to 
 whom this province was familiar ; and he now strove 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 xxiii 
 
 on all sides, from sheer stress of thought, to give him- 
 self full utterance. It thus came to pass, that he 
 finally dared to accomplish that of which Kant de- 
 spaired. The latter had proposed to develop and to 
 establish the subjective principle of Taste as an a 
 priori principle of the Judgment ; he had denied an 
 objective principle. But Schiller developed this in 
 his iEsthetic Letters, and thus ipso facto refuted 
 him." 
 
 Although Schiller coincided with Kant particu- 
 larly on the side of morality, yet he did not sympa- 
 thize entirely with Kant's presentation of the idea of 
 Duty and Right. It was too hard and Draconic. 
 He was disposed to abate somewhat of Kant's ascet- 
 icism, because " he regarded virtue more as inclina- 
 tion for duty ; he respected the demands of nature, 
 he would have man obey his reason with joy. And 
 thus, conscious of his moral dignity, he placed him- 
 self on the side of the Latitudinarians against the 
 moral Rigorists." But how far this led Schiller 
 into latitudinarianism, in the common sense of that 
 word, will be pretty evident on the perusal of the 
 essay upon the " Limits of Taste," in which the loose 
 principles of modern novelists, and the dilettantism 
 which indulges artistic admiration of men whose 
 principles corrupt Art, excepting so far as it is only 
 imitative, — are pointedly rebuked. There is no 
 
xxiv 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 doubt that Schiller regarded not only a love for 
 Truth, but also a love for virtue, as essential to form 
 the true Artist : and when it is said that he diverged 
 from the asceticism of Kant, it is to be understood 
 only with reference to his more Christian statement 
 of Duty. In one place he has defined Christianity 
 as " the moral Imperative transfigured by Love." 
 Kant's system does not admit the latter principle : 
 his morality is " hung with clattering categorical im- 
 peratives," and though an admirable antagonistic 
 statement to the Epicureanism of his day, wants that 
 creative, renewing principle, which substitutes for 
 obedience to the Law, a love of God. 
 
 That chance word of Kant's, " that Art compared 
 with Labor may be considered as a Play," is the 
 origin of Schiller's Play-impulse, a term nowhere 
 used by Kant. But his " Critique of the Judg- 
 ment" furnishes us with remarks like the following : 
 " Every form of objects of sense (both of the external 
 and, mediately, of the internal) is either Shape or 
 Play : in the latter case, either play of shapes (in 
 Space, posture and dance) or play of perceptions 
 (in Time)." " To make a distinction between Art 
 and Labor, the one may be called free, the other 
 paid. We regard the first as subserving a design 
 only as play, that is, as an occupation in itself agree- 
 able : but the second, as a task imposed, that is, as 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 XXV 
 
 an occupation in itself disagreeable, and only attract- 
 ive through its result (that is, the pay)." "Ora- 
 tory is the art which carries on a business of the in- 
 tellect as a free play of the imagination : Poetry, 
 that which conducts a free play of the imagination as 
 a business of the intellect ;" and several other pas- 
 sages, certainly not quite distinct and practical, par- 
 ticularly in the Analysis of the Sublime, where Kant 
 makes a free use of this idea of Play as a mental 
 disposition. Schiller has erected it into a theory, 
 and the Play-impulse is the chief nerve of his aes- 
 thetic system. The Letters explain satisfactorily 
 what he means by it, and how even the common use 
 of language justifies the adoption of the term. Sup- 
 pose that at any moment we should have the two- 
 fold experience of perception and of reflection, and 
 should exist as Matter and Spirit, we should have at 
 that moment a complete intuition of our Humanity. 
 It would evolve the Play-impulse : the word play in- 
 dicating all that is neither internally nor externally 
 contingent nor constrained. The Play-impulse is 
 not entirely the desire for amusement, as displayed 
 in the sports of different nations, nor the faculty of 
 Humor, in which, by the way, Schiller is curiously 
 deficient. But all these are but single phases of the 
 Play-impulse, which is equivalent to man aestheti- 
 cally developed : it indicates a nature whose two 
 
XXVI 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 tendencies are poised and have a mutual and harmo- 
 nious operation. The aesthetic Art-impulse will never 
 unfold itself, if the Play-impulse has not first be- 
 come active. 
 
 So far as the sports of a people are indicative of 
 its aesthetic culture and the development of its Play- 
 impulse, the sons of the Puritans may be judged to 
 be still in a state of nature. With us it is most em- 
 phatically " all work and no play." Our life is 
 hard, austere, thoroughly empirical ; the oscillation to 
 the subjective extreme has just commenced. We 
 are not self-poised, our centre of gravity is not re- 
 moved far enough from the surface : we are not yet 
 Persons, but we only represent conditions. The 
 common national life does not depend upon any- 
 thing, it is like a superficies from which the interior 
 has fallen quite away, leaving it thin and hazardous. 
 The outside look imputed to us expresses exactly 
 our want of development, fulness, aesthetic balance : 
 in short, tried by Schiller's aesthetic rules, we are not 
 so enormously removed from the savages whom we 
 have just dispossessed, and whose arrow-heads the 
 New England plough still turns up in numbers. So 
 long as we seek definite results, " fiery -red with 
 haste," and those results not always the most enno- 
 bling, we shall never apprehend that golden mean 
 between Person and Condition, Freedom and Na- 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 xxvii 
 
 ture, where the true humanity will finally rest and 
 expand. 
 
 " The age culls simples, 
 With a broad clown's back turned, broadly, to the glory of the 
 stars — 
 
 We are gods by our own reck'ning — and may well shut up the tem- 
 ples, 
 
 And wield on, amid the incense-steam, the thunder of our cars. 
 
 " For we throw out acclamations of self-thanking, self- admiring, 
 With, at every mile run faster, — [ O the wondrous, wondrous age,' 
 Little thinking if we work our Souls as nobly as our iron, — 
 Or if angels will commend us, at the goal of pilgrimage." 
 
 Many of the characteristics of Schiller's age, men- 
 tioned in the earlier Letters, will be found to indi- 
 cate also our own. See particularly the Second, 
 Fifth and Sixth. 
 
 The other Essays contained in this volume were 
 written before the Letters upon iEsthetic Culture, 
 excepting the two immediately succeeding: and 
 though they display great insight, sound criticism, a 
 lively moral sense, and are full of admirable views 
 and suggestions, yet they have no particular system, 
 and do not betray the master-hand which gave us 
 the Letters. They are the results of his meditations 
 during the study of Lessing, Winckelmann, Aristotle 
 and Kant. Some of them were designed to make 
 
xxviii 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 an application of Kantian principles, that u Upon 
 the Sublime," for example. They might be freely 
 illustrated with hints, and parallel passages from 
 Kant's aesthetic works, but with no particular utility, 
 since he is everywhere more practical than Kant, 
 and is the best interpreter and applier of his specu- 
 lations. Two of Schiller's best Essays remain un- 
 translated, " Upon Grace and Dignity " and " Upon 
 Naive and Sentimental Poetry." Each is nearly as 
 long as the Letters upon JEsthetic Culture, and may 
 possibly appear in a second volume of Translations. 
 In the one "upon Naive and Sentimental Poetry," 
 he constructs the conception of the perfect Poet, as 
 he constructed the perfect humanity in the iEsthetic 
 Letters. It is less abstract than the latter, and more 
 historical, that is, it describes the national poets and 
 criticises different kinds of poetry, and abounds in 
 application and example. Schiller regards Naive 
 and Sentimental poetry as the only possible modes in 
 which the poetic genius can make expression. 1 
 
 Though a The Philosophical Letters," given in 
 this volume, have no connection with ^Esthetics, yet 
 they are interesting as revealing one of the early 
 
 1 Of the rest of Schiller's philosophical writings, the following have 
 been translated : " The Mission of Moses " — in the Monthly Reposi- 
 tory, 1825 : part of his introductory Lecture to a historical course at 
 Jena, in Mrs. Austin's "German Prose Writers:" and "The Stage, 
 considered as a Moral Institution," in the Knickerbocker : February, 
 1845. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 xxix 
 
 moods of Schiller's mind, and also attractive from 
 the subtil ty of thought and expression. That he 
 did not rest in the pantheistic " Theosophy of Jul- 
 ius," is sufficiently indicated by the Preface of the 
 Letters, even if his future writings did not make it 
 manifest. Schiller has nowhere distinctly stated the 
 articles of his religious faith, and probably, judged 
 by most orthodox standards, he did not possess any. 
 But if we believe that a pure and earnest heart, a 
 quick and honest conscience, a distinct perception of 
 Christ as the ideal of virtue and the embodiment of 
 a divine life, are the things needful to create a Chris- 
 tian, then was Schiller one. But if, in addition, we 
 are disposed to insist upon some intellectual state- 
 ment of the method and circumstances of that reve- 
 lation of Goodness, or if, venturing still farther, we 
 claim certain statements of doctrine as essential to 
 the reproduction of this goodness, — then indeed is 
 Schiller no longer a Christian ; for he supplies us 
 nowhere with a Christology, though the two princi- 
 ples of Duty and Love are most distinctly stated and 
 applied. His inner life was doubtless better than 
 any definition of a Christology, even were it made 
 by a Schiller. And if the possession of this inner 
 life is the destiny of humanity, if it is by such fruit 
 that the human soul is to be known, then Schiller 
 must have had somewhere an adequate Christology, 
 
XXX 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 and a definite supernatural one too — supposing the 
 latter essential to the formation of a divine life. But 
 as the Founder of our Faith has himself declared 
 such to be non-essential, we are forced to believe 
 that Schiller's adequate Christology was simply the 
 possession of that spirit, which is anterior to all in- 
 tellectual statements, which nerves the will, keeps 
 sacred the conscience, and which is to be known as 
 Life : or, in apostolic language, it is Christ himself 
 formed in our hearts. To ask how that life arises, 
 or to demand this or that intellectual garnish, as if 
 the life were else invalid, is immediately to leap the 
 pale of Christian toleration, and recall those times 
 when unconverted disciples would fain have kindled 
 a fire out of heaven for non-conforming Samaritans, 
 and those later times when the same fire was kin- 
 dled with torch and fagot, — since heaven has al- 
 ways sympathized with heretics, and will not burn. 
 
 The undeniable characters of a good life cannot 
 be denied to Schiller : he is known by his works — 
 in every sense. Pure, high-minded, truth-loving, en- 
 amored of virtue for her own sweet sake, he presents 
 to us the lofty spectacle of a man pursuing the 
 ideal of his race through every opposition, disap- 
 pointment, loss. He would realize Christianity, 
 which is the moral law transfigured by love. In his 
 own person he represents the struggles of humanity : 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 xxxi 
 
 his life was an unfinished prophecy. It is inspiring, 
 because his deeds were vast, and rang like the 
 sounds of a trumpet : it is pathetic and purifying, 
 because it contained the divine element of sorrow, 
 and we are given to see a spirit, not only battling 
 with the world and with necessities, but well-nigh 
 over-mastered by its own yearning. He was the di- 
 rect ambassador of the Ideal ; he had an indefeasible 
 right to dictate to humanity the terms of its culture, 
 because he evolved it from the regenerative idea of 
 duty as Love. And what he preached, he prac- 
 tised. 
 
 Therefore we do not require that the Philosophical 
 Letters should be anything more than a fragment, 
 which they are : neither are we troubled about his 
 antique, Graeco-hebraic " Artists," or " Gods of 
 Greece," composed during the same period. His 
 maturer writings present to us his genuine creed and 
 philosophy, and show us his heart still honest and 
 pure, still unstormed, though a Titanic intellect had 
 often encamped before it. His special mission was 
 to legislate for man's ^Esthetic Culture, and to plant 
 art upon the principle of morality. Therefore we 
 are to look for an intellectual development congru- 
 ous with that design, and to expect neither the ser- 
 monic style nor substance. 
 
 On Page 198, of this volume, Schiller seems to 
 
XXxii INTRODUCTION. 
 
 • ■ 
 
 confound Religion with the prospects of immortality, 
 and to make the former a substitute where true virtue 
 does not yet exist. But this is only a temporary 
 assumption on his part, of the popular definition of 
 religion. He merely wishes to state the relation of 
 the common conception of the latter to that which is 
 absolutely religious — that is, a love of virtue. Till 
 men possess true virtue, they must have legality, or 
 an obedience to the law ; which conception includes 
 reward and penalty. Absolute religion is a love of 
 virtue, because that alone fulfils our destiny ; it is a 
 necessity of our spiritual organization, and therefore 
 entirely independent of any reference to reward or 
 penalty. But Schiller's concession to the weakness 
 of human nature is only temporary ; he declares the 
 maximum of man's capacity, that he may not con- 
 tinue forever content with a minimum. Neither are 
 we to regard virtue as its own reward, which is a 
 dilution of the Kantian principle : because then vice 
 would be avoided only from a desire for moral hap- 
 piness, which deportment interpolates the element 
 of reward. But virtue must be won because it is 
 the sole condition and pabulum of our spiritual life. 
 We demand no pay for breathing, and we do not 
 carry it on because it turns out to be a luxury ; we 
 only wish to sustain life. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 xxxiii 
 
 In conclusion, the translator would fain make some 
 reparation for having called this an introduction. It 
 is very inadequate, in view of whom and what it 
 was his duty to introduce, and he joyfully concludes 
 the bungling formula which was honestly meant to 
 facilitate the formation of the reader's new friend- 
 ship. And with respect to the translation, he can 
 only hope never to have violated the meaning of the 
 author. The pleasant task is concluded which has 
 made the beloved Schiller so long a household word 
 and a daily presence ; and a premonition of solitude 
 and loss makes the multiplying last words a tempta- 
 tion, which is withstood only for the sake of the 
 reader. 
 
 Note. With the passage of Schiller above designated, compare the 
 Twenty-fourth Letter of the ^Esthetic Culture ; and particularly the 
 noble passage on page 118. — The prescribed limits of this introduc- 
 tion force the translator to resign one or two anticipated topics, con- 
 nected with Schiller's theory. 
 
 Watertown, Feb. 20, 1845. 
 
 c 
 
UPON THE 
 
 ESTHETIC CULTURE OF MAN. 
 
 IN A 
 
 SERIES OF LETTERS. 
 
■ 
 
ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 FIRST LETTER. 
 
 By your permission I lay before you, in a series of 
 letters, the results of my researches upon beauty and 
 art. I am feelingly sensible of the importance, but still 
 not less of the charm and dignity of this undertaking. 
 I shall speak of a subject, which is immediately related 
 to the better portion of our happiness, and stands in close 
 connection with the moral nobility of human nature. 
 I shall plead the cause of beauty before a heart, by 
 which her whole power is felt and exercised, and which 
 will take upon itself the severest part of my labor, in 
 an investigation where one is compelled to appeal as 
 often to feelings as to principles. 
 
 That which I would have asked as a favor, you gen- 
 erously propose as a duty ; thus leaving to me the ap- 
 pearance of a service, where I only consult my inclina- 
 tion. The freedom of motion, which you prescribe to 
 1 
 
2 
 
 .ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 me, I find no constraint, but rather a necessity. Little 
 practised in the use of formal rules, I shall hardly be in 
 danger of sinning against good taste, by any abuse of 
 them. My ideas, drawn rather from an uniform con- 
 verse with myself, than from a rich experience, or from 
 reading, will not deny their origin ; they will sooner be 
 guilty of any error than of sectarism, and will rather 
 fall from their own weakness, than maintain themselves 
 by authority and foreign strength. 
 
 I will not conceal from you that the following affirm- 
 ations will rest, for the most part, upon Kantian prin- 
 ciples ; but if, in the course of these investigations, you 
 should ever be reminded of some particular school of 
 philosophy, ascribe it to my incapacity, not to those 
 principles. No, the freedom of your mind shall be in- 
 violable to me ; your own sensibility will furnish me 
 the data upon which I build ; your own free thought 
 will dictate the laws, in conformity with which I shall 
 proceed. 
 
 Only philosophers disagree concerning those ideas 
 which predominate in the practical part of the Kantian 
 system, but I am confident of showing that mankind 
 have never done so. When extricated from their tech- 
 nical form, they become as the prescriptive claims of 
 the common reason, and appear as data of the moral in- 
 stinct, which nature places before man as a model, till 
 clear insight gives him his maturity. But this very 
 technical form, which makes the truth plain to the un- 
 derstanding, conceals it from the feeling : for alas, the 
 understanding can only appropriate the object of the 
 
.ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 3 
 
 inner sense, by first destroying it. The philosopher, 
 like the chemist, finds union only by means of dissolu- 
 tion, and the work of spontaneous nature only through 
 the torture of art. In order to detain the fleeting phe- 
 nomenon, he must bind it in the fetters of rule, present 
 its fair body in dismembered conceptions, and preserve 
 its living spirit in a meagre skeleton of words. Is it 
 wonderful that the native feeling does not recognize 
 itself in such a copy, and that truth appears as paradox 
 in the report of the analyst? 
 
 Therefore may I crave your indulgence, if the fol- 
 lowing investigations should remove their object out of 
 the sphere of sense, while seeking to approximate it to 
 the understanding. What there obtains with respect 
 to moral phenomena, must obtain, in a still higher de- 
 gree, with respect to the manifestation of beauty. The 
 whole enchantment lies in its mystery, and if the neces- 
 sary union of its elements is dissolved, so also is its es- 
 sence. 
 
SECOND LETTER. 
 
 But ought I not to make a better use of the liberty 
 which you have granted me, than to engage your atten- 
 tion upon the theatre of the fine arts ? Is it not at 
 least unseasonable to look around after a statute book 
 for the aesthetic world, when the affairs of the moral 
 world excite an interest so much keener, and the cir- 
 cumstances of the times call so pressingly upon the 
 spirit of philosophical inquiry, to engage in the most 
 perfect of all works of art — the erection of a true polit- 
 ical freedom? 
 
 I would fain not live in, or labor for another century. 
 One is a good citizen of the age, only so far as he is 
 a good citizen of the state ; and when it is found un- 
 seemly, nay, inadmissible, to withdraw from the man- 
 ners and customs of the circle in which we live, why 
 should we esteem it a less duty to allow the need and 
 the taste of the century a voice in our choice of activ- 
 ity? 
 
 But this voice seems by no means to decide in favor 
 of art ; not, at least, of that special phase, to which 
 alone my investigations will be directed. The course 
 of events has given the spirit of the age a direction, 
 which threatens to remove it farther and farther from 
 ideal art. This must abandon reality, and rise with 
 
.ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 5 
 
 decent boldness above necessity ; for art is a daughter of 
 freedom, and must receive her commission from the 
 needs of the spirit, not from the exigencies of matter. 
 
 But now necessity rules, and depresses fallen hu- 
 manity beneath its tyrannical yoke. Utility is the great 
 idol of the age, to which all powers stoop and all talents 
 do homage. The spiritual merit of art has no weight 
 in its clumsy balance, and, robbed of every incitement, 
 flees from the century's noisy mart. The spirit of 
 philosophical inquiry itself seizes one province of the 
 imagination after another, and the limits of art dimin- 
 ish the more those of science are enlarged. 
 
 The eyes of the philosopher and the man of the world 
 are turned, full of expectation, towards the political 
 arena, where, as is believed, the great destiny of hu- 
 manity is now developed. Does it not betray a censur- 
 able indifference to the welfare of society, not to share 
 this universal discourse ? So nearly does this great ac- 
 tion, on account of its tenor and results, approach every 
 one who calls himself a man, so must it especially in- 
 terest the self-thinker, on account of his profession. A 
 question, which otherwise only the blind right of the 
 strongest will answer, is apparently now pending before 
 the tribunal of pure reason, and whoever is only capable 
 of placing himself in the centre of the whole, and of sub- 
 stituting his individuality for the race, may consider 
 himself as a judge in this court of reason ; while at 
 the same time, as a man and citizen of the world, he 
 is a party, and perceives himself more or less intimately 
 implicated in the result. Thus it is not only his own 
 
G 
 
 ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 case, which awaits decision in this great action ; it 
 must also be judged according to laws, which, as a ra- 
 tional being, he himself is able and entitled to dictate. 
 
 How attractive would it be for me, to push my re- 
 searches into such a subject, with such an ingenious 
 thinker as well as liberal cosmopolite, and to surrender 
 the decision to a heart, consecrated with a fine enthu- 
 siasm to the welfare of humanity ! What an agreeable 
 surprise, to meet your unbiased spirit in the same re- 
 sult on the field of ideas, in spite of the great diversity 
 of station, and the wide difference which circumstances 
 in the actual world make necessary ! If I resist this 
 attractive experiment, and suffer Beauty to precede 
 Freedom, I trust not only to accommodate it to my in- 
 clination, but to vindicate it by principles. I hope to 
 convince you, that this matter is far less foreign to the 
 wants than to the taste of the age, nay more, that in 
 order to solve this political problem in experience, one 
 must pass through the aesthetic, since it is Beauty that 
 leads to Freedom. But this argument cannot be pur- 
 sued until I remind you of the principles, by which 
 generally the reason guides itself in political legislation. 
 
THIRD LETTER. 
 
 Nature commences with man no better than with 
 her other works ; she acts for him where he cannot yet 
 act as a free intelligence. But this fact creates him a 
 man, that he does not rest satisfied with the results of 
 mere nature, but possesses the capacity to retrace with 
 his reason the steps taken with nature in anticipation, 
 to transform the work of need into the work of his own 
 free choice, and to elevate physical into moral necessity. 
 
 Awaking from a sensuous slumber, he recognizes 
 himself as a man, looks around and finds himself — in 
 the state. An unavoidable exigency placed him in this 
 position, before he could choose it in his freedom ; need 
 shaped his course according to the bare laws of nature, 
 before he could conform it to the laws of reason. But 
 as a moral person he could and cannot be content — 
 alas for him, if he could — with this forced condition, 
 which only resulted from his natural destination, and 
 is only to be estimated as such ! Therefore, in that 
 right by which he is a man, he forsakes the dominion 
 of a blind necessity, since in so many other points he 
 is estranged from it by his freedom ; since, only to give 
 one example, he effaces by morality, and ennobles by 
 beauty, the low character which the need of sexual 
 love impressed. Thus in his maturity he artistically 
 
s 
 
 .(ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 recalls his childhood, constructs a state of nature in 
 idea — which indeed no experience has given him, but 
 is the necessary result of his reasoning process — bor- 
 rows in this ideal state an aim, which he knew not in 
 his actual state of nature, and a choice, for which he 
 was once incompetent ; and now he conducts no differ- 
 ently than if he began from the first, with the state of 
 mere contract exchanged for the state of independence, 
 arising from a clear insight and a free resolve. How- 
 ever artfully and firmly a blind caprice may have se- 
 cured its work, however arrogantly it may maintain it, 
 or cast around it whatsoever appearance of respect, he 
 may consider it as completely undone by this opera- 
 tion ; for the work of blind power possesses no author- 
 ity before which Freedom need to bend, and everything 
 must conform to the highest aim which the personal 
 reason proposes. In this way originates the attempt of 
 a people in its majority, to transform its state of nature 
 into a moral state : and in this way the attempt is vin- 
 dicated by success. 
 
 This state of nature — which is that of every political 
 body whose organization springs originally from force 
 and not from law — is indeed opposed to the moral man, 
 with whom mere conformity should serve as a law, but 
 it is quite adequate to the physical man, who only 
 gives himself laws in order to adapt himself to forces. 
 But the physical man is actual, and the moral man 
 only problematic. If then the reason abolishes the state 
 of nature, as she necessarily must, to substitute her 
 own state in place of it, she risks the physical and ac- 
 
ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 9 
 
 tlial man for the problematic moral man, the existence 
 of society for a merely possible (though morally neces- 
 sary) ideal of society. She takes from man something 
 that he really possesses, and without which he has no- 
 thing, and, in place of it, directs him to something that 
 he could and should possess : and should she count too 
 much upon him, instead of gaining a humanity, which 
 he still needs, and may continue to need without dan- 
 ger to his existence, he would lose even the means for 
 animality, which is yet the condition for a future hu- 
 manity. Before he has had time to unite himself firmly 
 by force of will, to the law, she has drawn the ladder 
 of nature from under his feet. 
 
 It is then highly doubtful, whether the physical so- 
 ciety in time could cease for a single instant, while the 
 moral society fashioned itself in idea, without hazard- 
 ing man's existence for the sake of his dignity. If the 
 artist has a clock to mend, he suffers the wheels to run 
 down ; but the living clock-work of the state must be 
 repaired while it is in motion — the wheel must be 
 changed during its revolution. Then we must go in 
 quest of such a support for the continuation of society, 
 as makes it independent of the state of nature, which 
 we would abolish. 
 
 This support is not to be found in the natural char- 
 acter of man, selfish and violent, rather bent upon the 
 destruction than the conservation of society : as little 
 is it to be found in his moral character, which, accord- 
 ing to the supposition, is yet to be fashioned, and upon 
 which, while it is free and never apparent, the legisla- 
 
10 ^ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 tor can neither have influence, nor depend with safety. 
 Then the task that devolves is this, — to separate ca- 
 price from the physical, and freedom from the moral 
 character ; to harmonize the former with laws, and 
 make the latter dependent upon impressions; to re- 
 move the former somewhat farther from the outward, 
 and bring the latter nearer to it, in order to create a 
 third character, which, related to both of them, may 
 construct a passage from the dominion of mere force to 
 the dominion of law, and without retarding the devel- 
 opment of the moral character, may serve as a sensible 
 pledge of it, still formless and unseen. 
 
FOURTH LETTER. 
 
 So much is certain : only the preponderance of such 
 a character among a people, can complete without peril 
 the transformation of a state according to moral princi- 
 ples, and only such a character can warrant its perpe- 
 tuity. In the creation of a moral state, the moral law 
 is reckoned upon as an active power, and the free will 
 is drawn into the realm of causes, where all things de- 
 pend upon each other with severe necessity and stabil- 
 ity. But we know that the determinations of the hu- 
 man will always remain contingent, and that physical 
 and moral necessity coincide only in the absolute be- 
 ing. If then a calculation could be made upon the 
 moral conduct of a man, as upon natural results, it 
 must be nature, and his instinct must already lead him 
 to such a demeanor as a moral character alone can 
 have as its result. But the will of man stands perfect- 
 ly free between duty and inclination, and no physical 
 constraint can or may encroach upon this royal right 
 of his person. Will he then retain this power of choice, 
 and be not the less a positive quantity in the causal 
 connexion of powers, he can only effect it when the 
 operations of both those instincts in the sphere of phe- 
 nomena take place in perfect equilibrium, and the sub- 
 ject-matter of his volition remains the same amid every 
 
12 
 
 .ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 variety in form, so that his motives are in sufficient 
 unison with his reason, to be available for an universal 
 legislation. 
 
 Each individual man, we can say, bears, in disposi- 
 tion and determination, a pure ideal man within him- 
 self; and the great task of his existence is to harmon- 
 ize in all his variety with its unalterable unity. 1 This 
 pure man, which may be recognized more or less dis- 
 tinctly in each subject, is represented by the state — 
 the objective and, so to speak, canonical form, in which 
 the manifoldness of the subject strives to unite. But 
 now two methods are supposable, by which the pheno- 
 menal man can coincide with the ideal man, conse- 
 quently just as many, by which the state can affirm it- 
 self in individuals : either by the suppression of the 
 empirical by the rational man, the nullification of in- 
 dividuals by the state, or by the individual becoming the 
 * state, by the phenomenal man ennobling himself to the 
 ideal man. 
 
 It is true, this distinction subsides when we make a 
 partial moral estimate; for the reason is content if her 
 law only has an unconditional value. But, in a com- 
 plete anthropological estimate, where subject-matter as 
 well as form is reckoned, and the active sentiment also 
 has a voice, that distinction is all the more notable. It 
 is true, the reason demands unity, but nature demands 
 variety, and both claim to legislate for man. The law 
 
 1 I will refer here to a work lately published — Lecture upon the 
 Destiny of the Scholar, by my friend Fichte, in which may be found 
 a very luminous and hitherto, in this way, unattempted treatment of 
 this principle. 
 
.ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 13 
 
 of the former is impressed upon him by an incorrupti- 
 ble consciousness, the law of the latter by an indelible 
 perception. Hence it will continually testify, by an 
 education yet deficient, if the moral character can 
 maintain itself only at the sacrifice of the natural : and 
 a government, which is only in a condition to effect 
 unity by the abolition of variety, will still remain very 
 incomplete. The state should not only respect in the 
 individual the objective and generic, but also the sub- 
 jective and specific : and must not dispeople the realm 
 of phenomena, while extending the unseen realm of 
 morals. 
 
 If the mechanical artist puts his hand to the shape- 
 less mass, to give it the form of his design, he does not 
 hesitate to force it to his purpose ; for the raw material 
 which he elaborates, demands no respect for itself, and 
 the whole does not concern him for the sake of the 
 parts, but the parts for the sake of the whole. If the 
 liberal artist puts his hand to the same mass, he hesi- 
 tates as little to do it violence, only he is careful lest it 
 should be apparent. He does not in the least, any 
 more than the mechanical artist, respect the raw ma- 
 terial which he elaborates ; but he will seek to deceive 
 the eye, which is not satisfied unless the freedom of the 
 material be preserved, by an apparent conformity there- 
 to. Quite otherwise is it with the pedagogical and po- 
 litical artist, who uses man at once as material and as 
 object. Here the design reverts to the material, and 
 the parts need to be adapted to the whole, only because 
 the whole serves the parts. But the state-artist must 
 
14 
 
 ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 approach his material, with a regard quite different from 
 that which the liberal artist feigns for his : he must pre- 
 serve its distinctive and personal nature, not only sub- 
 jectively, and for a deceptive effect upon the senses, 
 but objectively, and for its real essence and effect. 
 
 But for the reason that the state ought to be an or- 
 ganization, framed through and for itself, it can only 
 be realized so far as the parts have tuned themselves 
 to the idea of the whole. Since the state serves to 
 represent the pure and objective humanity in the breast 
 of its citizens, it must preserve the same relation to- 
 wards its citizens, in which they stand to themselves, 
 and only in proportion as their subjective humanity has 
 been made objective, can it command respect. If the 
 inner man is at one with himself, he will preserve his 
 distinctive character in the widest universality of its 
 expression, and the state will only be the interpreter of 
 his fine instinct, the more intelligible formula of his in- 
 ternal legislation. But if on the contrary, in the char- 
 acter of a people, the subjective man sets himself in 
 such distinct opposition to the objective, that only the 
 suppression of the former can secure to the latter a tri- 
 umph, then the state must engage the stern gravity of 
 law against the citizen, and trample down without re- 
 spect or favor an individuality so hostile, in order not 
 to be its victim. 
 
 Man can be self-opposed in a twofold manner : either 
 as savage, if his feelings rule his principles, or as bar- 
 barian, if his principles destroy his feelings. The 
 savage despises art, and recognizes nature as his abso- 
 
^ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 15 
 
 lute monarch : the barbarian mocks and dishonors na- 
 ture, but, with a meanness unknown to the savage, he 
 not unfrequently continues to be the slave of his slave. 
 The civilized man makes a friend of nature, and re- 
 spects her freedom, while he curbs only her caprice. 
 
 Then if reason introduces its moral unity into phy- 
 sical society, it need not injure the manifoldness of na- 
 ture. If nature strives to assert her manifoldness in 
 the moral structure of society, she need bring no de- 
 triment thereby to moral unity; the golden product, 
 the final expression rests equidistant from uniformity 
 and confusion. Then totality of character must be 
 found in a people, who would be capable and worthy of 
 exchanging the state of necessity for the state of free- 
 dom. 
 
FIFTH LETTER. 
 
 Is this the character, which the present age and oc- 
 currences manifest to us 1 My attention is immediately 
 arrested by the most prominent object in this ample 
 picture. 
 
 It is true, that respect for opinion has fallen, caprice 
 is unmasked, and though still armed with power, pur- 
 loins no longer any dignity ; man is aroused from his 
 long indolence and self-deception, and demands with 
 an overwhelming majority the restitution of his inalien- 
 able rights. But not merely demands them ; he bestirs 
 himself on every side, to take by force what in his 
 opinion has been denied to him unjustly. The fabric 
 of a natural state is tottering, its brittle foundations are 
 weakened, and a physical possibility appears granted 
 to place law upon the throne, at length to honor man 
 as himself his final aim, and to make true freedom the 
 basis of political union. Empty hopes ! Moral possi- 
 bility is wanting, and the favorable moment finds an 
 unsusceptible race. 
 
 Man portrays himself in his deeds, and what a form 
 is that which is presented in the drama of the present 
 age ! Barrenness here, license there ; the two ex- 
 tremes of human decline, and both united in a single 
 period. 
 
AESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 17 
 
 Crude and lawless instincts exhibit themselves in the 
 lower and more numerous classes, freeing themselves 
 with the dissolved restraint of civil order, and hastening 
 with ungovernable madness to a state of brutal satisfac- 
 tion. However it may be, that objective humanity has 
 had reason to complain of the state ; the subjective 
 must respect its institutions. Need one blame it for 
 disregarding the dignity of human nature, so long as it 
 was necessary to maintain its own existence — for has- 
 tening to separate by mere force of repulsion, and 
 unite by cohesion, where as yet no power of culture 
 existed ? Its vindication is contained in its dissolu- 
 tion. Society uncontrolled, instead of speeding up- 
 wards to organic life, falls back to its original elements. 
 
 On the other side the enlightened classes present the 
 opposite aspect of laxness and a depravation of charac- 
 ter, which is so much the more revolting, since culture 
 itself is the source. I forget, what ancient or modern 
 philosopher remarks, that the noblest is the vilest in its 
 downfall ; it is true also in a moral sense. A son of 
 nature becomes, in his decline, quite frantic ; a disci- 
 ple of art contemptible. The intellectual illumination, 
 which forms the boast, not wholly groundless, of the 
 polished classes, evinces on the whole an influence on 
 the disposition so little ennobling, that it rather lends 
 maxims to strengthen the depravity. We disown na- 
 ture in her proper sphere, in order to feel her tyranny in 
 the moral, and while we struggle against her impres- 
 sions, we borrow thence our principles. The affected 
 decency of our manners denies to her the venial Jirst 
 
18 ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 voice, that we may cede to her the decisive last one, 
 in our material ethics. Selfishness has founded its 
 system in the lap of the most refined sociality, and we 
 experience all the contagions and calamities of society, 
 without extracting therefrom truly kind affections. We 
 submit our own free judgment to its despotic opinion, 
 our feelings to its fantastic customs, our wills to its se- 
 ductions ; and maintain only our caprice against its 
 solemn rights. Proud self-sufficiency contracts, in the 
 worldling, the heart that so often beats with sympathy 
 in a child of nature ; just as each one in a burning city 
 seeks to save only his own pitiful property from the 
 desolation. Only in a complete abjuration of sensibil- 
 ity, can one find protection against its abuses, and the 
 jest, which often bestows salutary chastisement upon 
 the fanatic, lacerates as unrelentlessly the noblest feel- 
 ings. Civilization, far from placing us in freedom, 
 only unfolds a new want with every power that it edu- 
 cates within us ; the bonds of the physical pinch more 
 and more painfully, so that the fear of losing smothers 
 even the earnest desire for improvement, and the max- 
 im of passive obedience passes for the highest wisdom 
 of life. In fine, we behold the spirit of the age waver- 
 ing between perverseness and rudeness, between extrav- 
 agance and mere nature, between superstition and 
 moral disbelief, and it is only the equiponderance of ill, 
 that ever defines its limits. 
 
SIXTH LETTER. 
 
 Has my delineation of the age been overwrought? 
 I do not expect this objection, but rather another — 
 that I have proved too much. This picture, you say 
 to me, certainly resembles present humanity, but it re- 
 sembles, too, all people, who are in the process of cul- 
 tivation, since all without difference must fall from 
 nature by an over-refined intellectuality, before they can 
 return to her again through the reason. 
 
 But with some attention to the character of the age 
 one must be surprised at the contrast, that will be 
 evident between the present form of humanity and that 
 of former times, particularly the Grecian. The credit 
 of cultivation and refinement, which we justly make 
 the most of against every mere state of nature, cannot 
 avail us with the Grecian nature, which united all the 
 attractions of art with all the dignity of wisdom, with- 
 out, as ourselves, becoming its victim. The Greeks 
 shame us not only by a simplicity, to which our age is 
 a stranger ; they are at the same time our rivals, nay, 
 often our model in that very preeminence, with which 
 we are wont to console ourselves for the native per- 
 verseness of our manners. At once objective and sub- 
 jective, at once philosophic and creative, tender and 
 energetic, we behold the youth of fancy united in a 
 noble humanity to the manliness of reason. 
 
20 
 
 .ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 In the beautiful awaking of the spiritual powers, at 
 that period, sense and spirit had no strongly marked 
 peculiarity; no dispute had yet constrained them to 
 withdraw in hostile manner from each other, and de- 
 fine their boundaries. Poesy had not yet contended 
 with wit, and speculation had not disgraced itself by 
 craft. In case of need both could exchange their 
 functions, since each revered truth, after its own 
 fashion. However high reason soared, it ever lovingly 
 lifted the outward after it, and however finely and 
 sharply it discriminated, still it never lacerated. It is 
 true, it analyzed human nature, and threw its amplified 
 elements into the majestic circle of divinities, but not 
 thereby tearing it in pieces, only mingling it diversely, 
 since a complete humanity was wanting in no single 
 god. How entirely different with us moderns ! With 
 us too the type of the race is thrown, in parts that are 
 amplified, into individuals, but in fragments, not in 
 different combinations, so that one must inquire from 
 individual to individual, in order to read collectively 
 the totality of the race. With us, one is almost tempt- 
 ed to affirm, the powers of the mind display themselves 
 in experience detached, as they are represented by the 
 psychologist, and we see not only single subjects, but 
 whole classes of men developing only one part of their 
 dispositions, while the remainder, like stunted plants, 
 preserve vestiges of their nature almost too feeble to 
 be recognized. 
 
 I do not fail to see the superiority which the present 
 race, considered as a unit and on the ground of intel- 
 
ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 21 
 
 lect, may assert before the best of past time ; but it 
 must undertake the contest with isolated members, and 
 compare a whole with a whole. What single modern 
 steps forth, man to man, to strive for the prize of hu- 
 manity with a single Athenian? 
 
 Whence then, with every advantage of the race, this 
 disadvantageous relation of individuals ? In what con- 
 sisted the qualifications of a single Grecian to represent 
 his time, and why may not a single modern attempt 
 the same? Because all-uniting nature had imparted 
 her forms to the former, and all-dividing intellect her 
 own to the latter 
 
 It was culture itself which dealt modern humanity 
 this wound. As soon as extended experience and more 
 precise speculation made a nicer distinction of sciences 
 necessary on the one hand, and the more complicated 
 machinery of the state a more rigorous separation of 
 rank and occupation on the other, the essential tie of 
 human nature was rent, and a destructive warfare raged 
 between harmonious powers. The intuitive and the 
 speculative intellect assumed hostile attitudes on their 
 respective fields, whose boundaries they now began to 
 watch with jealousy and distrust ; and man, in confining 
 his efficiency to a single sphere, has created for him- 
 self a master which not seldom, by overbearing, is wont 
 to extinguish the remaining character. While here a 
 riotous imagination desolates the hard-earned fruits of 
 the intellect, there the fire of abstraction consumes, 
 when it should have expanded the heart and inflamed 
 the fancy. 
 
22 
 
 ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 The new spirit of government made complete and 
 universal this disorder which art and learning com- 
 menced in the inner man. Indeed, it was not to be 
 expected, that the artless organization of the first re- 
 publics should survive the simplicity of original man- 
 ners and circumstances, but, instead of reaching a 
 more elevated animal life, it degenerated into a common 
 and clumsy mechanism. That polypus-nature of the 
 Grecian states, where each individual enjoyed an inde- 
 pendent existence, and in case of need, could act with 
 the whole, now gives place to an ingenious enginery, in 
 which a mechanical life forms itself as a whole, from 
 the patchwork of innumerable, but lifeless parts. The 
 state and church, laws and customs, are now rent 
 asunder; enjoyment is separated from labor, the means 
 from the end, exertion from recompense. Eternally 
 fettered only to a single little fragment of the whole, 
 man fashions himself only as a fragment ; ever hearing 
 only the monotonous whirl of the wheel which he 
 turns, he never displays the full harmony of his being, 
 and, instead of coining the humanity that lies in his 
 nature, he is content with a mere impression of his 
 occupation, his science. But even the scanty frag- 
 mentary portion, which still binds single members to 
 the whole, depends not upon forms that present them- 
 selves spontaneously, (for what reliance could be 
 placed upon a mechanism of their freedom so arti- 
 ficial and clandestine?) but is assigned to them with 
 scrupulous exactness by formularies, to which the free 
 discernment of each one is restricted. The dead let- 
 
ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 23 
 
 ter represents the living intellect, and a hackneyed 
 memory is a safer guide than genius and feeling. 
 
 If the commonwealth makes the function the unit- 
 measure of a man, if it respects in one of its citizens 
 only memory, in another an epitomized intellect, in a 
 third only mechanical activity ; if, indifferent to the 
 character, it lays stress here only upon knowledge, 
 • there on the contrary esteems the greatest obscuration 
 of the understanding equivalent to a spirit of order 
 and a legitimate demeanor — if at the same time, it 
 requires these single modes of action pushed to a great 
 intensity, while a proportionate extension is not de- 
 manded of the subject — need it surprise us, that the 
 remaining powers of the mind are neglected, in order 
 to bestow every attention upon the single one which is 
 respected and recompensed? It is true, we know, 
 that vigorous genius does not make the limits of its 
 occupation circumscribe its activity, but moderate 
 talent consumes the whole scanty sum of its powers, 
 in the occupation that has fallen to its lot, and it 
 must be no common head, that can encourage all its 
 partialities, without detriment to its vocation. More- 
 over it is seldom a good recommendation to the state, 
 if the powers transcend their commission, or if the 
 deeper spiritual want of the man of genius gives a rival 
 to his business. So jealous is the state for the sole 
 possession of its servants, that it would sooner deter- 
 mine (and who can blame it ?) to share him with a 
 Venus Cytherea than with a Venus Urania. 
 
 And so gradually the single concrete life decays, 
 
24 
 
 ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 that the abstract life of the whole may continue its 
 precarious existence, and the state always remains a 
 stranger to its citizens, since feeling never connects 
 them with it. The governing part, compelled to lessen 
 the manifoldness of its citizens, by classification, and to 
 receive humanity at second hand only through repre- 
 sentation, at last entirely overlooks it, confounding it 
 with a mere composition of intellect ; and the governed 
 cannot receive but with coldness the laws that are so 
 little adapted to them. Finally, tired of maintaining 
 an alliance, so little facilitated by the state, positive 
 society results in a moral state of nature, (long ago the 
 fate of most European states) where open force makes 
 only one party more, hated and eluded by that which 
 makes it necessary, and only respected by that which 
 can dispense with it. 
 
 Could humanity, beneath this twofold tyranny which 
 presses it from within and without, well take any other 
 direction, than it actually has taken ? While the spec- 
 ulative spirit strives after inalienable possessions in 
 the realm of idea, it must be a stranger in the world 
 of sense, and relinquish the matter for the form. The 
 spirit of business, confined within a uniform circle of 
 objects, and in this still more circumscribed by for- 
 mulas, must lose cognizance of the independent whole, 
 daily becoming more impoverished in its sphere. Thus 
 while the one attempts to model the actual according 
 to the speculative, and to elevate its subjective ab- 
 stract conditions into constitutional laws for the exist- 
 ence of things, the other hastens in the opposite ex- 
 
ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 25 
 
 treme, to estimate generally all experience according 
 to a particular fragment of experience, and to apply 
 the rules of its own occupation to every occupation 
 without distinction. The former must become the 
 prey of an empty subtilty, the latter of a pedantic nar- 
 rowness, since the one was too high for the partial, 
 the other too low for the whole. But the detriment 
 of this mental tendency is not confined to knowledge 
 and production, it extends no less to perception and 
 action. We know, that the sensibility of the mind 
 depends for its degree upon the vivacity, for its extent 
 upon the richness, of the imagination. But the pre- 
 ponderance of the analytic faculty must necessarily 
 deprive the fancy of its power and fire, and a limited 
 sphere of objects must diminish its richness. Hence 
 the abstract thinker often has a cold heart, since he 
 analyzes the impressions, which only affect the soul 
 as a whole ; the man of business has often a narrow 
 heart, since his imagination, invested by the uniform 
 routine of his vocation, cannot enlarge itself to a 
 foreign mode of conception. 
 
 It lay in my way, to show the pernicious tendency of 
 the character of the age and its source, not the advan- 
 tages, whereby nature makes compensation. I freely 
 assert, that, however little this dismemberment of be- 
 ing can benefit individuals, the race could have made 
 progress in no other manner. The phenomenon of 
 Grecian humanity was undoubtedly a maximum, which 
 could neither be maintained nor surpassed. Not main- 
 tained, because the intellect must infallibly have been 
 
2G 
 
 .ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 impelled, by the stock which it already had, to desert 
 sensation and intuition, and strive after distinctness of 
 knowledge ; and not surpassed, because only a certain 
 degree of clearness can consist with a certain fullness 
 and warmth. The Greeks had attained this degree, 
 and if they had desired to realize a higher cultivation, 
 they must have surrendered, like ourselves, the totality 
 of their being, and pursued truth through diverse by- 
 paths. 
 
 There was no other method of developing man's 
 manifold dispositions, than by placing them in opposi- 
 tion. This antagonism of powers is the great instru- 
 ment of culture, but still only the instrument ; for so 
 long as the antagonism lasts, one is only on the way to 
 culture. The single powers of man isolate themselves 
 and arrogate an exclusive legislation ; and for this rea- 
 son alone, they are found at variance with the truth of 
 things, and compel the common sense, which usually 
 rests with idle satisfaction in outward appearances, to 
 press into the depths of objects. While the pure intel- 
 lect usurps an authority in the external world, and the 
 empirical is employed in subjecting it to the conditions 
 of experience, both dispositions expand to their utmost 
 ripeness, and exhaust the whole extent of their sphere. 
 While in one the imagination dares to dissolve by its 
 caprice the universal order, it compels in the other the 
 reason to climb to the highest sources of knowledge, 
 and to call in aid against it the law of necessity. 
 
 Partiality in the exercise of powers leads, it is true, 
 the individual inevitably into error, but the race to 
 
^ESTHETIC culture. 
 
 27 
 
 truth. We concentrate the whole energy of our spirit 
 in one focus, and draw together our whole being into 
 a single power, and for this reason alone, we bestow as 
 it were wings upon this single power, and bear it in- 
 geniously far over the limits which nature seems to 
 have imposed upon it. As certain as that all human 
 individuals combined, with the powers of vision that na- 
 ture has bestowed upon them, could never succeed in 
 discovering a satellite of Jupiter, which the astrono- 
 mer's telescope reveals ; just so certain is it, that hu- 
 man reflection would never have conducted an analysis 
 of the infinite or a criticism of pure reason, if the rea- 
 son had not apportioned itself to single kindred sub- 
 jects, freed as it were from all matter, and had not 
 strengthened its glance into the absolute by the highest 
 effort of abstraction. But in fact would such a spirit, 
 dissolved in pure intellect and contemplation, be fit to 
 exchange for the stern fetters of logic the free gait of 
 imagination, and to comprehend the individuality of 
 things with just and pure perception ? Here nature 
 places limits to universal genius, which it cannot trans- 
 gress, and the truth will make martyrs so long as phi- 
 losophy makes its chief business the laying down regu- 
 lations against error. 
 
 Thus, however much may be gained for the world as 
 a whole by this fragmentary cultivation, it is not to be 
 denied, that the individuals whom it befalls, are cursed 
 for the benefit of the world. An athletic frame, it is 
 true, is fashioned by gymnastic exercises, but a form of 
 beauty only by free and uniform action. Just so the 
 
28 
 
 .ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 exertions of single talents can create extraordinary men 
 indeed, but happy and perfect men only by their uni- 
 form temperature. And in what relation should we 
 stand then to the past and coming age, if the cultiva- 
 tion of human nature made necessary such a sacrifice 1 
 We should have been the slaves of humanity, and 
 drudged for her century after century, and stamped up- 
 on our mutilated natures the humiliating traces of our 
 bondage — that the coming race might nurse its moral 
 healthfulness in blissful leisure, and unfold the free 
 growth of its humanity ! 
 
 But can it be intended that man should neglect him- 
 self for any particular design ? Ought nature to de" 
 prive us by its design of a perfection, which reason by 
 its own prescribes to us ? Then it must be false that 
 the development of single faculties makes the sacrifice 
 of totality necessary; or, if indeed the law of nature 
 presses thus heavily, it becomes us, to restore by a 
 higher art, this totality in our nature which art has de- 
 stroyed. 
 
SEVENTH LETTER. 
 
 Should we look for this effect from the state ? That 
 is impossible, since the state as at present constituted, 
 has induced the evil, and the state which the reason 
 presents to itself in idea, instead of being able to found 
 this improved humanity, must first be founded thereon 
 itself. And so my researches hitherto have led me 
 back to the point, from which they drew me for a 
 time. The present age, far from exhibiting to us such 
 a form of humanity, as is known to be the necessary 
 condition for a moral reform of the state, shows us 
 rather the direct opposite. Then if the principles laid 
 down by me are accurate, and experience sanctions 
 my sketch of the present, it is evident that every ex- 
 periment in such a reform is so long premature, and 
 every hope founded thereon chimerical, till the divi- 
 sions of the inner man are again abolished, and his 
 nature is so far developed, that she herself may be the 
 artist, and warrant the reality of the reason's political 
 creation. 
 
 Nature traces out for us in the physical, the way we 
 should pursue in the moral creation. She does not 
 apply herself to the noble formation of the physical 
 man, till she has quieted the strife of elementary pow- 
 ers in the lower organizations. Just so must the strife 
 
30 
 
 ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 of elements in the ethical man, the conflict of blind 
 instincts, be first appeased, and stupid opposition must 
 have ceased in him, before he can venture to gratify 
 his manifoldness. On the other side, the self-depend- 
 ence of his character must be secured, and the subjec- 
 tion of a becoming freedom to external, despotic forms 
 must be abolished, before he can submit his manifold- 
 ness to the unity of the ideal. Where the child of 
 nature still abuses his caprice so lawlessly, one hardly 
 need point out to him his freedom ; where the edu- 
 cated man still neglects his freedom, one need not 
 deprive him of his caprice. The gift of liberal princi- 
 ples is treason to the whole, if it joins itself to a power 
 that is still tumultuous, and strengthens an already 
 superior nature ; the law of conformity becomes 
 tyranny to the individual, when it is combined with an 
 already prevailing weakness and physical constraint, 
 thus quenching the last glimmering sparks of self-ac- 
 tivity and possession. 
 
 The character of the age then must first recover 
 from its deep abasement ; in one quarter, nature must 
 resign its blind force, and in another return to its sim- 
 plicity, truth and fulness ; the work of more than a 
 century. In the mean time, I readily allow, that many 
 isolated experiments can succeed, but on the whole, 
 nothing will be thereby gained, and the contradic- 
 tion of conduct with the unity of maxims will be 
 continually manifest. In the other hemisphere, hu- 
 manity will be respected in the negro, and in Europe 
 disgraced in the thinker. The old principles will re- 
 
^ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 31 
 
 main, but they will wear the dress of the century, and 
 philosophy will lend her name to an oppression, which 
 once the church authorized. In one quarter men will 
 throw themselves into the arms of a convenient bond- 
 age, terrified at the freedom which always declared 
 itself inimical in their first essays ; and in another, 
 stung to desperation by a pedantic guardianship, will 
 escape to the wild licentiousness of a state of nature. 
 Usurpation will appeal to the infirmity of human na- 
 ture, insurrection to its dignity, till finally brute force, 
 the great mistress of all human things, interferes, and 
 decides the sham contest of principles like a common 
 boxing-match. 
 
EIGHTH LETTER. 
 
 Shall philosophy retire then from this sphere, de- 
 jected and despairing ? While the dominion of forms 
 extends itself in every other direction, shall this greatest 
 of all possessions be surrendered to arbitrary chance ? 
 Will the conflict of blind forces endure forever in the 
 political world, and hostile selfishness never succumb 
 to social law ? 
 
 By no means ! Reason, it is true, will not immedi- 
 ately attempt a struggle with this brutal force which 
 resists its weapons, nor appear upon the gloomy arena 
 unsustained, any more than the son of Saturn in the 
 Iliad. But it elects the worthiest from the crowd of 
 combatants, arrays him as Jupiter did his grandson, in 
 divine armor, and through his conquering might ac- 
 complishes the high resolve. 
 
 Reason has performed all it can perform, when it 
 discovers and exhibits the law ; the courageous will 
 and lively feeling must execute it. If truth would 
 conquer in the warfare with force, itself must first be- 
 come a force, and furnish an impulse to its counsel in 
 the realm of phenomena ; since impulses are the only 
 inciting powers in the world of sensation. If truth has 
 hitherto shown its superiority but little, it is not the 
 fault of the intellect, which knew not how to unveil it, 
 but of the heart which closed itself against it, and of the 
 impulses which refused to lend their activity. 
 
AESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 33 
 
 Then with all the conspicuous lights of philosophy 
 and experience, whence is this still universal influence 
 of prejudice, and this beclouded understanding? The 
 ao-e is enlightened, that is, those sciences are discovered 
 and laid open, which are at least adequate to direct our 
 practical principles. The spirit of free inquiry has 
 destroyed the false conceptions, which long obstructed 
 the passage to truth, and has undermined the founda- 
 tion on which fanaticism and fraud had reared their 
 throne. Reason has purged itself from the illusions of 
 sense and of a deceitful sophistry, and philosophy itself, 
 which at first seduced us from our allegiance, loudly 
 and pressingly calls us back to the bosom of nature. 
 Why is it that we are still barbarians ? 
 
 Thus there must be something existing in the dispo- 
 sitions of men, since it lies not in things, which im- 
 pedes the reception of truth, though ever so forcibly 
 convincing or luminous. An ancient sage has detected 
 it, and it lies concealed in the significant expression, 
 sap ere aude. 
 
 Dare to be wise. Energy of spirit is requisite to 
 overcome the obstructions which faint-heartedness as 
 well as the indolence of nature oppose to education. 
 Not without a significance did the goddess of wisdom 
 in the old fable, step in full armor from the head of Ju- 
 piter ; since her first occupation is warlike. At her 
 very birth she has to maintain a hard contest with the 
 senses, who will not be torn from their sweet repose. 
 The more numerous part of mankind are too much 
 harassed and exhausted by the contest with need, ever 
 3 
 
34 
 
 vESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 to gird themselves for a new and sterner contest with 
 error. Contented to escape the tedious toil of reflec- 
 tion, they willingly submit their ideas to the guardian- 
 ship of others, and should it happen that higher wants 
 stimulate them, they embrace with eager faith the 
 forms which the state and priesthood hold in readiness 
 for this emergency. If these unhappy men demand 
 our pity, so our just contempt lights upon those others 
 whom a better lot frees from the yoke of need, which 
 they bear from their own choice. Where feeling is 
 most lively, and fancy frames at will convenient im- 
 ages, they draw the twilight of indistinct conceptions 
 before the rays of truth, which chase away the fond 
 delusion of their dreams. They found the whole 
 structure of their happiness upon those very deceptions 
 which the hostile light of knowledge should disperse, 
 and they ought to purchase that truth so dear, which 
 commences by depriving them of all that they valued. 
 They must already be wise, in order to love wisdom ; 
 a truth, which he indeed felt, who gave philosophy its 
 name. 
 
 Therefore it is not enough that all intellectual im- 
 provement deserves our regard only so far as it flows 
 back upon the character ; it must in a manner proceed 
 from the character, since the way to the head must be 
 opened through the heart. Cultivation of the percep- 
 tive faculty is then the most pressing want of the age, 
 not only as a means to make a practical application of 
 an improved insight, but for its own sake, because it 
 prompts to this improvement of insight. 
 
NINTH LETTER. 
 
 But are we not proceeding in a circle ? Must theo- 
 retical culture precede the practical, and yet the latter 
 be the condition of the former ? All political improve- 
 ments should result from nobility of character — but 
 how can the character ennoble itself under the influ- 
 ence of a barbarous civil polity ? We must find then 
 an instrument for this design, which the state does not 
 afford, and lay open sources, which preserve them- 
 selves pure and undefiled in every political deprava- 
 tion. 
 
 I have now reached the point, to which all my pre- 
 vious meditations have tended. This instrument is 
 the fine arts ; those sources are displayed in their un- 
 dying models. 
 
 Art, like knowledge, is independent of everything 
 that is positive or established by human conventions, 
 and both enjoy an absolute immunity from the caprice 
 of men. The political lawgiver can encroach upon 
 its province, but he cannot govern there. He can 
 outlaw the friend of truth, but truth remains ; he can 
 humble the artist, but cannot debase the art. It is 
 true, nothing is more common, than that both science 
 and art should do homage to the spirit of the age, 
 whose judgments give the tone to the prevailing taste. 
 
36 
 
 ^ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 Where the character is tense and hardened, we see 
 science watching narrowly its limits, and art moving 
 in the galling fetters of rule ; where the character is 
 relaxed and dissolute, science strives to satisfy and art 
 to delight. Whole centuries have shown philosophers 
 as well as artists busied in immersing truth and beauty 
 in the depths of a vulgar humanity ; the former sink, 
 but the latter struggles up victoriously in her own 
 indestructible energy. 
 
 It is true, the artist is the son of his time, but alas 
 for him, if he is likewise its pupil, or even favorite. 
 Let a kind divinity snatch the suckling betimes from 
 his mother's breast, nourish him with the milk of a 
 better age, and let him come to maturity beneath a 
 distant Grecian sky. Then when he has become a 
 man, let him return, a foreign shape, into his century; 
 not to delight it with his appearance, but terrible, like 
 Agamemnon's son, to purify it. He will take his ma- 
 terial, indeed, from the present, but borrow his form 
 from a nobler time, nay, from beyond all time, from 
 the absolute, unchangeable unity of his being. Here, 
 from the pure ether of his divine nature, runs down the 
 fountain of Beauty, undefiled by the corruption of races 
 and times, which fret far beneath him in troubled 
 whirlpools. Whim can dishonor his material, as it 
 has ennobled it, but the chaste form is removed from 
 its vicissitudes. The Roman of the first century had 
 long bent the knee before the purple, but the statues 
 still stood erect ; the temple remained holy to the eyes 
 long after the gods had served for laughter ; and the 
 
^ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 37 
 
 atrocities of a Nero and Commodus disgraced the no- 
 ble style of the edifice, that lent to them its conceal- 
 ment. Humanity has lost its dignity, but art has 
 rescued and preserved it in significant marbles ; truth 
 survives in the midst of deception, and the original will 
 be restored from the copy. And as noble art survives 
 noble nature, so she precedes it, animating and creat- 
 ing in her inspiration. Before truth sends its triumph- 
 ant light into the recesses of the heart, the imagina- 
 tion intercepts its rays ; and the summit of humanity 
 is radiant, while the damp night still lingers in the 
 valleys. 
 
 But how can the artist protect himself from the cor- 
 ruptions of his age, which on all sides surround him ? 
 By despising its judgment. Let him look upwards to 
 his dignity and the law, not downwards to his pros- 
 perity and his wants. Alike free from the vain activ- 
 ity, that would fain leave its traces on the fleeting 
 moment, and from the impatient enthusiasm, that ap- 
 plies the scale of the absolute to the paltry product of 
 time, let him leave to the understanding, which is here 
 at home, the sphere of the actual ; but let him strive 
 to evolve the ideal from the union of the possible with 
 the necessary. This let him express in fiction and 
 truth, in the play of his fancy and in the gravity of his 
 deeds, in all sensible and spiritual forms, and cast it 
 silently into infinite time. 
 
 But every one whose soul glows with this ideal, does 
 not possess the creative tranquillity and patience, to im- 
 press it upon the silent stone, or pour it out in sober 
 
38 
 
 ^ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 words, and commit it to the trusty hands of time. Far 
 too impetuous to preserve this peaceful medium, the 
 divine productive faculty often rushes upon the present 
 and active life, and undertakes to refashion the form- 
 less material of the moral world. Human misery 
 speaks appealingly to a feeling man, human degradation 
 still more touchingly ; enthusiasm is enflamed, and 
 ardent longing strives impatiently in the vigorous soul 
 to become a deed. But does he ask himself whether 
 this disorder in the moral world offends his reason, or 
 does not rather grieve his self-love. If he does not 
 yet know it, he will discover it in the zeal with which 
 he labors after definite and accelerated effects. The 
 pure moral instinct seeks the absolute, it has no time ; 
 and the future is as the present, as soon as it necessa- 
 rily results from the present. To an unlimited reason 
 the intention coincides with the fulfilment, and when 
 the course is chosen, it is accomplished. 
 
 Then I would say to the young disciple of Truth and 
 Beauty, who would know how to satisfy the noble im- 
 pulse of his heart, through every opposition of the 
 century, I would say, give the world beneath your in- 
 fluence, a direction towards the good, and the tranquil 
 rhythm of time will bring its development. You have 
 given it this direction, if as a teacher you elevate its 
 thoughts to the necessary and eternal ; if, while acting 
 or composing, you transform the necessary and eternal 
 into an object of its impulse. The fabric of error and 
 caprice will fall, it must — nay, it has already fallen, 
 when you are sure that it declines ; but it must decline 
 
./ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 39 
 
 not only in the outward but in the inner man. Create 
 the conquering truth in the modest stillness of your 
 soul, array it in a form of beauty, that not only thought 
 may pay it homage, but sense lovingly comprehend its 
 presence. And lest you should chance to take the 
 pattern you would give it from reality, do not venture 
 into its hazardous society, till you are sure of an ideal 
 retinue in your heart. Live with your century, but 
 be not its creature ; bestow upon your contemporaries 
 not what they praise, but what they need. Share 
 with a noble resignation their punishment, without 
 sharing their fault, and bend with freedom beneath 
 the yoke, which with equal ill grace they miss or suf- 
 fer. You will prove to them, by the resolute spirit 
 with which you slight their fortune, how little their 
 misery resulted from your effeminacy. Imagine them 
 as they should be, if you are to influence them, but 
 regard them as they are, if you are tempted to work 
 for them. Through their dignity seek their approba- 
 tion, but impute their fortune to their unworthiness ; 
 thus, on the one hand, your own nobility will arouse 
 theirs, and their demerit, on the other, will not annul 
 your design. In the graceful play of your fancy they 
 would tolerate your principles, from whose naked seve- 
 rity they would shrink ; their taste is purer than their 
 heart, and here you must seize the timorous incon- 
 stant. You will in vain attack their opinions, in vain 
 condemn their deeds, but you can make essay of your 
 forming hand in their leisure. Banish caprice, frivo- 
 lity, rudeness, from their pleasures, and you will ban- 
 
40 
 
 ^ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 ish them imperceptibly from their actions, finally even 
 from their inclinations. Wherever you find them, en- 
 circle them with noble, great and spiritual forms ; 
 invest them with the symbols of all that is excellent, 
 till reality bends to the ideal, and nature to art. 
 
TENTH LETTER. 
 
 Then you agree with me in this respect, convinced 
 by the contents of my previous letters, that man may 
 be drawn upon two opposite courses from his destina- 
 tion, that our age is actually pursuing both these by- 
 paths, and has fallen a prey, on one side, to rudeness, 
 on the other, to perverseness and relaxation. Beauty 
 must restore it from this twofold confusion ; but how 
 can the culture of Beauty oppose at once two distinct 
 errors, and unite in itself two most contrary disposi- 
 tions ? Can it fetter nature in the savage, or free it 
 in the barbarian? Can it at the same time bind and 
 loose ? and if it does not really accomplish both, how 
 can so great an effect as the education of humanity be 
 reasonably expected from her? 
 
 Indeed one must have heard to satiety the assertion, 
 that morals are refined by an expanded taste for the 
 beautiful, so that no new proof of this appears to be 
 necessary. We rely upon daily experience, which 
 almost universally shows clearness of intellect, quick- 
 ness of perception, liberality and even dignity of con- 
 duct, united with a cultivated taste, and commonly the 
 very opposite, with a taste that is uncultivated. We * 
 appeal with sufficient confidence to the example of the 
 most refined of all the nations of antiquity, with whom 
 
42 ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 # 
 
 the perception of beauty was perfectly developed, and 
 to the contrary example of people partly savage, partly 
 barbarous, who expiate their insensibility to beauty by 
 a rude or austere character. Yet not the less does it 
 sometimes occur to speculators, either to deny the 
 fact, or to doubt the lawfulness of the conclusion. 
 Their opinion of that wildness with which unpolished 
 nations are reproached, is not so utterly bad, nor do 
 they think so favorably of that refinement, which is 
 commended in the polished. There were men even 
 in antiquity, who esteemed polite culture by no means 
 a benefit, and therefore were strongly inclined to for- 
 bid the introduction of the imaginative arts into their 
 republic. 
 
 I speak not of those who only revile the graces, hav- 
 ing never experienced their favor. How should they, 
 who know no other measure of worth than the toil of 
 acquisition and its palpable results, be capable of esti- 
 mating the calm operation of taste upon the outward 
 and inward man, while they regard the fortuitous dis- 
 advantages of polite culture, without its essential ben- 
 efits. The man without perception of form despises 
 all grace in eloquence as corruption, all elegance in 
 conversation as hypocrisy, all delicacy and loftiness of 
 demeanor as exaggeration and affectation. He can 
 never forgive it in the favorite of the graces, that, as a 
 companion, he adorns all circles, as a man of business 
 moulds all heads to his designs, as an author, imprints, 
 perhaps, his spirit on the whole of his century, while 
 he, the victim of drudgery, with all his knowledge can 
 
^ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 43 
 
 command no attention, nor move so much as a stone 
 from its place. And since he can never acquire from 
 the former the genial secret of being agreeable, no- 
 thing else remains for him but to mourn over the per- 
 versity of human nature, which honors the appearance 
 more than the substance. 
 
 But there are more respectable voices, who declare 
 against the tendencies of Beauty, and come prepared 
 with formidable arguments drawn from experience. 
 " It cannot be denied,'"' they say, " that the charms 
 of Beauty can subserve praiseworthy designs, in proper 
 hands, but it is equally conformable to their nature, 
 to subserve the very opposite in depraved hands, and 
 to employ their fascinating power in the service of 
 error and wickedness. For the reason that taste re- 
 spects not the substance but only the form, it gives the 
 mind at last a dangerous tendency to neglect, for the 
 most part, all reality, and to sacrifice truth and moral- 
 ity for an attractive exterior. It confounds all actual 
 distinctions of things, and attaches merit only to ap- 
 pearance. How many gifted men," they continue, 
 " are seduced from a serious and steady activity by 
 the alluring potency of Beauty, or at least to dissipate 
 their powers ! How many weak intellects are for this 
 reason alone at variance with homely reality, since it 
 pleases the fancy of poets, to portray a world where 
 everything wears a different aspect, where no expedi- 
 ency binds opinion, no art subjects nature. What 
 dangerous logic have the passions acquired, since they 
 have been arrayed in the most attractive colors in the 
 
44 
 
 .ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 poet's painting, and commonly maintain the field in 
 the struggle with principle and duty ! What indeed 
 has society gained, since Beauty gives laws to that 
 intercourse which truth once governed, and since the 
 outward impression commands the respect which 
 should only be united to merit. It is true, we now see • 
 all the virtues flourish, whieh strike favorably in ap- 
 pearance, and lend a worth to society ; but we behold 
 too all extravagances in full sway, and all vices in 
 vogue which recommend themselves by a fair outside." 
 In fact it must awaken reflection, when we find hu- 
 manity prostrate in almost every epoch of history, 
 where the arts flourish and taste is supreme ; and not 
 a single example occurs, where a high degree and 
 great universality of aesthetic culture has gone hand in 
 hand with political freedom and civil virtue, or refined 
 manners with good manners, or polished demeanor 
 with truth. 
 
 So long as Athens and Sparta maintained their in- 
 dependence, and reverence for the laws was the basis 
 of their constitution, taste was immature, art in its in- 
 fancy, and Beauty was far from swaying the disposi- 
 tion. It is true, poetry had essayed an elevated flight, 
 but only in the soarings of a genius which we know 
 is closely connected with a state of rudeness, and is a 
 light which frequently shines from the midst of dark- 
 ness ; which then testifies rather against than for- the 
 taste of its age. As the golden age of art advanced 
 under Pericles and Alexander, and the influence of 
 taste extended more widely, we find no more the Gre- 
 
^ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 45 
 
 cian energy and freedom ; eloquence adulterated truth, 
 wisdom was an offence in the mouth of a Socrates, and 
 virtue in the life of a Phocion. The Romans, we 
 know, were obliged to exhaust their strength in civil 
 wars, and enervated by eastern luxury, to bow beneath 
 the yoke of a fortunate dynasty, before we see the tri- 
 umph of Grecian art over the rigidity of their charac- 
 ter. And the dawn of civilization did not break over 
 Arabia, until the energy of its warlike spirit had be- 
 come relaxed beneath the sceptre of the Abassides. 
 The fine arts did not appear in modern Italy, till the 
 powerful alliance of the Lombards was broken, till 
 Florence had submitted to the Medici, and the spirit 
 * of independence in all those vigorous states had given 
 place to inglorious submission. It is well-nigh su- 
 perfluous to cite the examples of more modern na- 
 tions, whose refinement increased in proportion to 
 the decrease of their self-dependence. Wherever we 
 turn our eyes in the past, we discover that taste 
 and freedom desert each other, and "that Beauty 
 founds her dominion only upon the ruins of heroic 
 virtue. 
 
 And yet this very energy of character, with which 
 aesthetic culture is commonly purchased, is the most 
 powerful incentive to all that is great and excellent in 
 man, the want of which no other, though a greater, 
 preeminence can supply. Then if one is directed only 
 by that which former experience teaches concerning 
 the influence of Beauty, he can in fact be little encour- 
 aged to cultivate feelings which are so dangerous to 
 
46 
 
 ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 man's true culture ; and would rather dispense with the 
 flattering charm of Beauty, even at the peril of rude- 
 ness and austerity, than experience its enervating 
 effects with all the advantages of refinement. But 
 perhaps experience is not the tribunal, before which 
 a question like this should be decided ; and before we 
 allow any weight to its testimony, it must first be 
 placed beyond a doubt, that the beauty against which 
 all those former examples bear, is the same Beauty 
 concerning which we speak. But this appears to pre- 
 sume a conception of Beauty, drawn from some other 
 source than experience ; since by it we shall discover, 
 whether that called so in experience, is justly entitled 
 to its name. 
 
 This pure idea of Beauty, if such a one can be found, 
 must be sought then, since it can be deduced from no 
 actual case, but rather rectifies and guides our judgment 
 concerning such, by means of abstraction, and can al- 
 ready be inferred from the possibility of the sensuo- 
 rational nature; in a word — Beauty must discover 
 itself to be a necessary condition of humanity. There- 
 fore we must elevate ourselves to a pure conception 
 of humanity, and since experience only discloses sin- 
 gle conditions of single men, but never humanity, we 
 must seek to discover from these its individual and 
 changeable modes, the absolute and permanent, and 
 to apprehend the necessary conditions of its being, by 
 a rejection of all accidental limits. This transcen- 
 dental path will, it is true, separate us for a time from 
 the familiar sphere of phenomena, and from the living 
 
ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 47 
 
 present, and delay us on the open field of abstract 
 conceptions. But we strive thence after a stable basis 
 of knowledge, which nothing shall ever agitate. He 
 who never ventures beyond the actual, will never make 
 a prize of truth. 
 
ELEVENTH LETTER. 
 
 When abstraction mounts to the limit of its power, 
 it attains to two ultimate conceptions, beyond which 
 it is impossible to proceed. It distinguishes in man 
 something that is permanent, and something that 
 changes incessantly. It calls the permanent his per- 
 son, the changeable his condition. 
 
 Person and condition — self and its definitions — 
 which we consider as one and the same in the ab- 
 solute being, are ever two in the finite. The con- 
 dition varies amid all the stability of the person, the 
 person is unmoved through all the variations of condi- 
 tion. We pass from rest to activity, from passion to 
 indifference, from harmony to contradiction, but we 
 are still the same, and whatever immediately results 
 from us, remains. In the absolute subject alone, all 
 its various modes consist with the personality, since 
 they result from the personality. The divinity is all 
 that it is, because it is ; consequently it is all forever, 
 because it is eternal. 
 
 Since in man, as a finite being, person and condi- 
 tion are distinct, so neither can the condition rest upon 
 the person, nor the person upon the condition. Sup- 
 pose the last, and person would become variable ; sup- 
 pose the first, and condition would be unalterable ; 
 
ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 49 
 
 then in each case, either the personality or the lim- 
 itation ceases. We are, not because we think, will, 
 feel ; we think, will, feel, not because we are. We 
 are, because we are ; we feel, think and will, because 
 there is something else besides ourselves. 
 
 Person, then, must be its own ground, since the 
 permanent cannot result from the changeable ; and 
 thus we should have, firstly, the idea of the absolute, 
 self-founded Me, that is, freedom. Condition must have 
 a ground ; and since it depends not upon Person, con- 
 sequently is not absolute, it must result (from some- 
 thing) ; and so we should have, secondly, the condi- 
 tional state of all dependent Me, or becoming, that is, 
 time. That time is the condition of all becoming, is 
 an identical proposition, since it only affirms this, the 
 result is the condition to some result. 
 
 Person, which discovers itself in the eternally per- 
 manent Me, and only in this, cannot become, cannot 
 begin, in time, since on the contrary, time must com- 
 mence in that, for what is permanent must be the 
 ground of the changeable. Something must change, 
 if there would be change ; then this something cannot 
 itself constitute the change. When we say, the rose 
 blossoms and fades, we make the rose the permanent 
 in this transformation, and bestow upon it a person, as 
 it were, in which both the above conditions are appar- 
 ent. That man first becomes, is no objection, since 
 man is not only person generally, but person which 
 finds itself in a definite condition. But every condi- 
 4 
 
.ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 tion, every definite existence arises in time, and so 
 then must man, as a phenomenon, have a beginning, 
 although the pure intelligence within him is eternal. 
 Without time, that is, without first becoming, he would 
 never be a definite existence ; his personality would 
 exist, it is true, potentially, but not in the actual. 
 The permanent Me becomes an appearance only in the 
 results of its ideas. 
 
 Then the material of activity, or reality, which the 
 highest Intelligence creates out of himself, man must 
 first receive, and, indeed, he receives it by means of 
 observation, as something sensible beyond him in 
 space, and as something variable within him in time. 
 His permanent Me accompanies this variable substance 
 within him, and to remain essentially himself in every 
 change, to turn all his observations into experience, that 
 is into unity of knowledge, and to make each of his 
 modes in time precedents for all time, is the prescrip- 
 tion of his rational nature. He exists, only in a state 
 of change or of permanence. Man, presented in his 
 perfection, would accordingly be the permanent unity, 
 which remains eternally the same amid the waves of 
 mutation. 
 
 Although an infinite being, a divinity, cannot become, 
 yet that tendency must be called divine, which has for 
 its infinite task, to develop the special tokens of di- 
 vinity, absolute promulgation of capacity, (reality of 
 all that is possible) and absolute unity of manifestation, 
 (necessity of all that is real). Man indisputably bears 
 a potential divinity in his personality ; the path to 
 
ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 51 
 
 divinity, if one can call that a path, which never finds 
 its goal, is opened to him in the senses. 
 
 His personality, considered for itself alone, and in- 
 dependent of all sensible substance, is only the dispo- 
 sition for a possible, infinite development ; and so long 
 as he neither sees nor feels, he is nothing more than 
 form and latent faculty. His sensuous impressibility, 
 considered for itself alone and distinct from the self- 
 activity of the spirit, prevails no farther than to place 
 him, who without it is only form, in communication 
 with matter, but by no means uniting him to matter. 
 So long as he only feels, only desires and acts from 
 mere desire, he is nothing more than world, if we in- 
 clude under this name only the formless contents of 
 time. It is indeed his sensation alone, which converts 
 his capacity into activity, but it is only his personality, 
 which secures his efficiency to himself. Then in or- 
 der not to be mere world, he must impart form to 
 matter ; in order not to be mere form, he must give 
 actuality to his internal disposition. He realizes form 
 when he creates time, and contrasts the changeable 
 with the permanent, the manifoldness of the world 
 with the eternal unity of his Me ; he gives a form to 
 matter, when again he abolishes time, maintains per- 
 manency in change, and subjects the manifoldness of 
 the world to the unity of his Me. 
 
 Hence result two opposing demands in man, the 
 two fundamental laws of sensuo-rational nature. The 
 first insists upon absolute reality ; it would convert all 
 that is purely formal into world, and make all its dis- 
 
52 
 
 ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 positions apparent ; the second insists upon absolute 
 formality ; it would resolve everything that is mere 
 world into itself, and bring harmony into all its muta- 
 tions ; in other words, it would alienate all within, and 
 form all without. Both intentions, considered in their 
 complete fulfilment, lead back to the conception of 
 divinity, from which I started. 
 
TWELFTH LETTER. 
 
 We are incited to the performance of this twofold 
 task of bringing into reality the necessary in ourselves, 
 and of subjecting the actual out of ourselves to the law 
 of necessity, by two opposing powers, which we call 
 very properly, impulses, since they impel us to realize 
 their object. The first of these impulses, which I will 
 call the sensuous, results from man's physical being 
 or from his sensuous nature, and is occupied in estab- 
 lishing him within the bounds of time and introduc- 
 ing him to matter ; not giving him matter, since for 
 that a free activity of person is appointed, which mat- 
 ter acknowledges and distinguishes from the perma- 
 nent itself. But matter means here nothing but muta- 
 tion or reality, which occupies time ; consequently 
 this impulse demands that there should be mutation, 
 that time should have contents. This condition of 
 time as merely occupied, is called perception, and 
 through that alone the physical being announces it- 
 self. 
 
 Since everything which exists in time is successive, 
 it follows that something is, all else excluded. When 
 we catch the tone of an instrument, only that single 
 one of all the tones it can possibly give, is actual ; so 
 when man perceives the present, the whole infinite 
 
54 
 
 ^ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 extent of his possibility is restricted to that single mode 
 of being. Then wherever this impulse works in ex- 
 clusive directions, there the highest limitation neces- 
 sarily exists ; man in this condition is nothing but a 
 simple quantity, an occupied moment of time — or 
 rather he is not, since so long as perception rules 
 him and time carries him along, his personality is 
 removed. 1 
 
 The dominion of this impulse stretches to the extent 
 of man's finiteness, and since all form appears only in 
 a material, and all that is absolute only through limited 
 media, so in fact humanity depends upon the sensuous 
 impulse at last for its whole manifestation. But, not- 
 withstanding that alone rouses and unfolds the disposi- 
 tions of humanity, yet it is that only, which makes its 
 consummation impossible. It binds the high-soaring 
 spirit to the world of sense with adamantine chains, and 
 calls abstraction from the freest roving into the infinite 
 back to the restraints of the present. Thought, it is 
 true, may for a moment elude it, and a vigorous will 
 
 1 For this condition of self-absence under the dominion of percep- 
 tion, language has the very striking expression — to be beside one's 
 self, that is, to be out of his Me. Notwithstanding this form of speech 
 can only be used where perception amounts to actual engrossment, 
 and this condition is more perceptible from its duration, yet every 
 one is beside himself, so long as he only perceives. To return from 
 this condition to presence of mind, is properly called, to come to him- 
 self, that is to return to his Me, to reestablish his person. We do not 
 say of one who lies in a swoon, he is beside himself, but he is out of 
 himself, that is, he is deprived of his Me, the former not being in the 
 latter. Hence one who recovers from a swoon is only with himself, 
 which may still consist with his being beside himself. 
 
JSSTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 55 
 
 may triumphantly oppose its demands ; but subjected 
 nature soon recovers its privileges, to strive after a re- 
 ality of existence, a substance to our various know- 
 ledge, and an aim for our activity. 
 
 The second of these impulses, which can be called 
 the form-impulse, results from the absolute being of 
 man or from his rational nature, and is engaged in 
 placing him in freedom, introducing harmony in the di- 
 versity of his manifestation, and maintaining his person 
 in every variation of condition. Now since the last as 
 an absolute and indivisible unity can never be in con- 
 tradiction with itself, since through all eternity we are 
 ourselves, then this impulse, which insists upon main- 
 taining the personality, can never demand any other 
 thing, than it must demand through all eternity ; then 
 it decides forever, as it decides for the present, and en- 
 joins for the present, what it enjoins forever. Conse- 
 quently it embraces the whole results of time, that is to 
 say — it abolishes time and change — it will have the 
 actual, necessary and eternal, and the eternal and ne- 
 cessary, actual ; in other words — its aim is Truth and 
 Right. 
 
 As the first impulse only creates cases, the other gives 
 laws; laws for every judgment concerning cognitions, 
 laws for every will concerning actions. Suppose that 
 we recognize an object, that we attribute an objective 
 validity to a subjective condition, or that we act from 
 cognitions, that we make the objective the determining 
 ground of our condition — in either case we remove 
 this condition from the jurisdiction of time, and con- 
 
56 
 
 .(ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 cede to it a reality for all men and all time, that is, uni- 
 versality and necessity. Feeling can only say — that 
 is true for this subject and at this moment, and another 
 moment, another subject can come to disprove the as- 
 sertion of the present perception. But when thought 
 once declares — that is, it decides forever and aye, and 
 the validity of its declaration is warranted by the per- 
 sonality which defies all change. Inclination can only 
 say — that is well for your individuality and your 
 present need, but your individuality and present need 
 is hurried along with the progress of change, which 
 will make what you earnestly covet to-day, the object 
 of your future aversion. But when the moral feeling 
 says, that shall be, it decides forever and aye ; when 
 you recognize truth, because it is truth, and practise 
 justice because it is justice, you have converted a sin- 
 gle case into a precedent for all cases, and have lived 
 out one moment as eternity. 
 
 Thus to whatever extent the form-impulse carries 
 its authority, and the pure object acts within us, there 
 is the highest amplitude of being, there vanish all re- 
 straints, there has man elevated himself from a simple 
 quantity, to which the needy sense confined him, to 
 an ideal unity, embracing the whole realm of phe- 
 nomena. By this operation we are no more in time 
 but time is in us, with its unending procession. We 
 are individuals no more, but a race ; our spirit has 
 issued the decision for all spirits, our action represents 
 the choice of all hearts. 
 
THIRTEENTH LETTER. 
 
 At first sight nothing appears to be more opposite 
 than the tendencies of these two impulses, one aiming 
 at change, the other at immutability. And yet both 
 these instincts exhaust the conception of humanity, 
 and a third fundamental impulse, reconciling both, is 
 absolutely an unsupposable idea. Then how can we 
 restore the unity of human nature, which appears to 
 be completely destroyed by this primitive and radical 
 antipathy ? 
 
 It is true, their tendencies conflict, but, what is wor- 
 thy of remark, not in the same objects, and things that 
 never approach, can never interfere. The sensuous 
 impulse demands change, it is true, but not that it 
 should extend itself to person and its province ; not 
 that there should be mutation among principles. The 
 form-impulse tends to unity and permanence, but it 
 will not have the condition fixed as well as the per- 
 son, it does not desire an identity of perception. Thus 
 they are not opposed by nature, and if, nevertheless, 
 they so appear, it first happens through a willing trans- 
 gression of nature, while they misunderstand them- 
 selves, and wander from their spheres. 1 It is the 
 
 1 As soon as we maintain a primitive, and therefore necessary 
 antagonism of both impulses, there is really no other method of pre- 
 
58 
 
 .ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 office of culture, to watch over this, and to secure each 
 of these impulses within its proper limits, dispensing 
 strict impartiality to both, and not only maintaining 
 the rational impulse against the sensuous, but also the 
 latter against the former. Thus its business is two- 
 fold ; first, to preserve perception against the encroach- 
 ments of freedom ; second, to secure the personality 
 
 serving the unity in man, than by unconditionally subordinating the 
 sensuous to the rational impulse. But the result will be no har- 
 mony, only uniformity, and man still remains forever divided. Un- 
 doubtedly there must be subordination, but it must be mutual : since 
 if the limited can never support the absolute, or freedom depend 
 upon time, it is equally certain that the absolute by itself can never 
 support the limited, that condition in time can never depend upon 
 freedom. Then both principles are at once subordinate and coordi- 
 nate, that is, they are in alternation ; without form no matter, with- 
 out matter, no form. (This idea of reciprocity and its whole import- 
 ance, is found excellently defined in Fichte's Basis of Collective 
 Science, Leipzig, 1794.) We do not know, indeed, the mode of per- 
 son in the realm of idea, but we certainly know that it cannot reveal 
 itself in the realm of time, without having recourse to matter; then 
 in this realm, matter will not only have something determinate 
 beneath the form, but also beside, and independent of the form. It 
 is just as necessary that the reason should not presume to determine 
 anything in the province of feeling, as that feeling should decide 
 nothing in the province of reason. As soon as we claim a province 
 for each of these, we exclude the other from it, and place limits to 
 them, which can only be transgressed to the injury of both. 
 
 In a transcendental philosophy, where everything depends upon 
 freeing form from substance, and preserving what is necessary pure, 
 from all that is accidental, it is too often the custom, to consider 
 material only as a hindrance, and to establish a necessary opposition 
 between the reason and perception, since in this affair it may be an 
 impediment. Such a representation, it is true, exists by no means 
 in the spirit of the Kantian system, though it may be found in the 
 letter. 
 
^ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 59 
 
 against the power of perceptions. Tt succeeds in the 
 former by developing the feeling, in the latter by de- 
 veloping the reason. 
 
 Since world is extension in time and change, so the 
 perfection of that faculty which unites man with the 
 world, must be the greatest possible mutability and 
 extensiveness. Since person is that which continues 
 through change, so the greatest possible self-depend- 
 ence and intensity must constitute the perfection of 
 that faculty, which is in opposition to mutation. The 
 more multiform and restless the susceptibility, and the 
 more surfaces it presents to the actual, so much the 
 more world does man apprehend, so many more dispo- 
 sitions does he unfold in himself ; the more power and 
 depth of personality, and the more freedom of reason 
 he gains, so much the more world does man compre- 
 hend, so much more form does he create out of him- 
 self. Thus his culture will consist in this ; first, to 
 provide the susceptive faculty with numerous points of 
 contact with the world, and to stretch passivity oh the* 
 part of feeling to its highest point ; second, to secure 
 to the permanent faculty the greatest possible inde- 
 pendence of the susceptive, and to stretch activity on 
 the part of the reason to its highest point. When 
 both qualities unite, then man will join the utmost 
 self-dependence and freedom with the greatest fulness 
 of being, and, instead of being merged in the world, 
 will rather attract to himself its whole infinity of 
 modes, and subject them to the unity of his reason. 
 
 Man can invert this relation, and consequently fail 
 
60 
 
 2ESTIIETIC CULTURE. 
 
 of his destination in a twofold manner. He can be- 
 stow the intensity which the active power requires 
 upon the passive, anticipate the subjective by the ob- 
 jective impulse, and make the susceptive faculty the 
 determinative. He can confer the extensiveness which 
 is due to the passive power, upon the active, anticipate 
 the objective impulse by the subjective, and substitute 
 the determinative for the susceptive faculty. In the 
 first case he cannot be himself, nor in the second any- 
 thing else ; consequently in both cases neither, or a 
 nullity. 1 
 
 1 The injurious influence of an overweening sensuousness upon our 
 thoughts and actions, is evident to every one ; but the pernicious 
 effects of an overweening rationality upon our knowledge and con- 
 duct, although ever so important and of frequent occurrence, is not 
 so evident. Permit me here, to allude to only two, from the great 
 crowd of pertinent cases, which may illustrate the danger of reflec- 
 tion and volition anticipating intuition and perception. 
 
 One of the most prominent reasons why our physical sciences ad- 
 vance so slowly, is evidently the universal and almost insurmount- 
 able propensity to teleological judgments, (final causes) by which, 
 as soon as they are elementally used, the susceptive is displaced by 
 the determinative faculty. However emphatically and variously 
 nature may affect our organs, all her manil'oldness is lost upon us, 
 because we seek nothing in her, but what we have placed in her, 
 because we do not permit her to affect us inwardly from without, 
 but rather strive towards her from tcilhin, with an impatient and 
 froward reason. And should any one appear, who approaches her 
 with calm, pure and open senses, and for that reason meets with a 
 multitude of phenomena, which, in our system of anticipation we 
 have overlooked, we are highly astonished that so many eyes should 
 have noticed nothing in such a clear daylight. This eager struggle 
 after harmony, before we have collected the single tones which 
 should form it, this violent usurpation of reflection in a province, 
 where all its authority must be conditional, is the cause of the steril- 
 
Esthetic culture. 
 
 61 
 
 Suppose the sensuous impulse becomes determina- 
 tive, sense the lawgiver, and person subject to the 
 world, it would cease to be objective in the same pro- 
 portion as it becomes mere force. As soon as man is 
 only a content of time, he is no longer, and conse- 
 
 ity of so many thinking heads for the best of science ; and it is hard 
 to say, whether sensuousness which assumes no form, or reason 
 which waits for no contents, has most impeded the extension of our 
 knowledge. 
 
 It is just as hard to determine whether our practical philanthropy 
 is more chilled and disturbed by the violence of our desires, or by 
 the rigidity of our principles, more by the egoism of our senses, or 
 by the egoism of our reason. To make ourselves sympathizing, be- 
 nevolent, active men, feeling and character must be united, just as 
 susceptibility of sense must coincide with energy of intellect, to 'jive 
 us experience. How can we be just, kind and humane towards oth- 
 ers, with ever so praiseworthy maxims of conduct, if we want the 
 ability, truly and really to comprehend foreign natures, to appro- 
 priate foreign situations, and to make foreign feelings our own ? 
 But this ability will be repressed, as well in the education we re- 
 ceive as in that we give to ourselves, according as we seek to break 
 the force of desires, and establish the character upon principles As 
 it is with difficulty that we remain firm to our principles amid the 
 ardor of feelings, we prefer the more convenient medium of making 
 the character more secure by blunting the feelings ; for indeed it is 
 infinitely easier to enjoy tranquillity before a disarmed rival, than to 
 govern an impetuous and active foe. In this operation, then, con- 
 sists for the most part, that which we call forming- a man ; and truly 
 in the best sense of the phrase, when it signifies a cultivation of the 
 inner, and not merely of the outer man. A man so formed will, it 
 is evident, be secured from being rude nature, and from appearing as 
 such ; but at the same time his principles will arm him against 
 every perception of nature, and humanity from without will reach 
 him just as little as humanity from within. 
 
 A very pernicious abuse is made of the ideal of perfection, by ap- 
 plying it with all its severity, in judging other men, and in cases 
 
62 
 
 jESTHETIC culture. 
 
 quently has no contents. His condition too, is removed 
 with his personality, since both are in reciprocity — 
 since the mutable demands a permanent, and limited 
 reality an infinite. Suppose the form-impulse becomes 
 susceptive, that is, if reflection anticipates perception, 
 and person substitutes itself for the world, it would 
 cease to be subjective and a self-dependent power in 
 proportion as it usurped the place of the objective, 
 since the permanent demands the mutable, and abso- 
 lute reality limits to its development. As soon as man 
 is only form, he has no form ; and with his condition 
 his person is consequently removed. In a word, reality 
 is without him and he is susceptible only so far as he 
 is self-dependent ; and only so far as he is susceptible, 
 is reality within him, is he a thinking power. 
 
 Thus both impulses require limitations, and, so far 
 as they are considered as energies, abatement ; the 
 one, that it may not intrude within the province of 
 legislation, the other, that it may not intrude into the 
 province of perception. This abatement of the sensu- 
 ous instinct need by no means be the effect of physical 
 
 where we should lahor in their behalf. The former leads to fanati- 
 cism, the latter to coldness and austerity. In truth, one would make 
 his social obligations uncommonly light, by substituting in thought 
 the ideal man, who probably can help himself, for the actual man, 
 who demands our aid. Strictness to oneself joined with tender- 
 ness towards others, forms the truly excellent character. But for 
 the most part, the man who is mild towards others, will be so to- 
 wards himself, and he who is severe towards himself will be the 
 same towards others ; a character which is tender towards itself and 
 severe towards others, is of all the most contemptible. 
 
ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 63 
 
 inability and a dulness of the perceptions, which every- 
 where only deserves contempt ; it must be an operation 
 of freedom and activity of person, which tempers the 
 sensuous by its moral intensity, and by controlling im- 
 pressions, lessens its depth, in order to give it surface. 
 The character must set bounds to the temperament, 
 since the sense need to lose only in spirit. Nor need this 
 abatement of the form-impulse be the effect of a spirit- 
 ual inability and a feebleness of thought or volition, 
 which would debase humanity. Fulness of percep- 
 tions must be its laudable source ; sensuousness must 
 triumphantly maintain its province, and resist the vio- 
 lence which spirit would fain inflict upon it by its 
 encroaching activity. In a word, personality must 
 keep the subjective impulse, susceptiveness or nature 
 the objective impulse, each within its proper limits 
 
FOURTEENTH LETTER. 
 
 We have now attained the idea of such a reciprocity 
 between both impulses, where the action of the one at 
 the same time confirms and confines the action of the 
 other, and where each one reaches singly its highest 
 development only according to the energy of the 
 other. 
 
 It is true, this reciprocity of both impulses is but a 
 task of the reason, which man can only fully accomplish 
 in the consummation of his being. It is in the most 
 peculiar sense of the word, the idea of his humanity 
 consequently something infinite, to which in the course 
 of time he will continually approximate, but never 
 attain. " He should not strive fcr form at the expense 
 of his reality, nor for reality at the expense of form ; 
 he should rather seek the absolute by a definite exist- 
 ence, and a definite through an infinite existence. He 
 ought to set himself over against a world, since he is 
 person, and should be person, and since a world is his 
 opposite. He ought to feel, since he has conscious- 
 ness, and he should be conscious, since he feels." He 
 can never learn that he is actually commensurate with 
 this idea, therefore in the full signification of the word, 
 a man, so long as he excludes either one of these two 
 impulses, or only satisfies them alternately ; for so long 
 
.ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 65 
 
 as he only feels, his person or his absolute existence 
 remains to him a mystery, and so does his condition or 
 his existence in time, so long as he only thinks. But 
 should cases occur where he effected at the same 
 time this twofold experience, being at the same time 
 conscious of his freedom and sensible of his being, at 
 the same time regarding himself as matter and as 
 spirit — he would have in these cases, and positively 
 only in these, a complete intuition of his humanity, 
 and the object which provided him with this intuition, 
 would be to him as a symbol of his perfected destiny, 
 consequently (since this can only be attained in infi- 
 nite time) a forth-setting of the Infinite. 
 
 Suppose that cases of this kind could actually oc- 
 cur, they would awake in him a new impulse, which, 
 from the fact that the other two operate in unison, 
 would be opposed to either one of them, considered 
 singly, and would properly amount to a new impulse. 
 The sensuous impulse will have mutation, that time 
 may have contents ; the form-impulse will have time 
 abolished, that there may be no mutation. Then that 
 impulse, in which both act united, (I may be allowed 
 to call it Play 'impulse, till I have justified the appella- 
 tion,) the play-impulse, will aim at abolishing time in 
 time (or actual mode) and at reconciling Becoming 
 with absolute existence, mutation with identity. 
 
 The sensuous impulse will become defined, it will 
 receive its object ; the form-impulse will itself define, 
 it will produce its object. Then the play-impulse will 
 5 
 
66 AESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 endeavor so to receive, as itself would have produced, 
 and so to produce, as sense labors to receive. 
 
 The sensuous impulse excludes from its subject all 
 self-activity and freedom, the form-impulse excludes 
 from its subject all dependence, all passivity. But ex- 
 clusion of freedom is physical, exclusion of passivity 
 is moral, necessity. Then both impulses compel the 
 mind, the former by the laws of nature, the latter by 
 the laws of reason. The play-impulse, then, as that 
 in which both act united, will at the same time mo- 
 rally and physically compel the mind ; as it abolishes 
 all accident, it will also abolish compulsion, and place 
 man, both morally and physically, in freedom. When 
 we embrace with passion any one, who deserves our 
 contempt, we feel painfully the compulsion of nature. 
 When we are hostilely disposed towards another, who 
 extorts our esteem, we feel painfully the compulsion of 
 reason. But as soon as our inclination coincides with 
 our esteem, both the constraint of nature and of reason 
 vanish, and we begin to love him — that is, at the same 
 time to play with our inclination and our esteem. 
 
 While farther the sensuous impulse compels us 
 physically, and the form-impulse morally, so the former 
 leaves our formal, the latter our material disposition 
 contingent ; that is, it is contingent, whether our hap- 
 piness shall agree with our perfection, or the latter 
 with the former. Then the play-impulse, in which 
 both act united, will at the same time make our formal 
 and our material disposition, our perfection and our 
 happiness, contingent ; then since it makes both con- 
 
ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 67 
 
 tingent, and since contingency also vanishes with ne- 
 cessity, it will again abolish the contingency in both, 
 consequently bringing form into matter, and reality 
 into form. In the same degree that it deprives the 
 feelings and affections of their dynamical influence, it 
 will harmonize them with the ideas of reason ; and in 
 the same degree that it deprives the laws of reason of 
 their moral compulsion, it will reconcile them with the 
 interest of sense. 
 
FIFTEENTH LETTER, 
 
 I approach still nearer the goal, towards which I 
 lead you by a path that has little to interest. Should 
 you feel inclined to follow me a few steps further, a 
 much wider field of view will open itself, and a pleas- 
 anter prospect will perhaps reward the toil of the 
 journey. 
 
 The object of the sensuous impulse, expressed in a 
 general idea, is called life, in its widest signification ; 
 an idea implying all material existence, and all that is 
 immediately present to the sense. The object of the 
 form-impulse, expressed generally, is called shape, as 
 well in a free as literal signification ; an idea which 
 includes all formal qualities of things, and all their 
 relations to reflection. The object of the play-im- 
 pulse, expressed in a general proposition, can then be 
 called living shape, an idea which serves to indicate 
 all aesthetic qualities of phenomena, and in a word, 
 what in its widest signification we call Beauty. 
 
 According to this explanation, if it should be one, 
 Beauty will neither be extended over the whole pro- 
 vince of life, nor only confined to that province. A 
 block of marble, although it is inert and lifeless, can 
 no less on that account become a living shape be- 
 neath the architect and sculptor ; a man, although he 
 
^ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 69 
 
 lives and has shape, is therefore for a long while no 
 living shape. That requires that his shape should be 
 life, and his life, shape. So long as we only think of 
 his shape, it is lifeless, mere abstraction ; so long as 
 we only perceive his life, it is shapeless, mere impres- 
 sion. He is a living shape, only when his form lives 
 in our perception, and his life shapes itself in our un- 
 derstanding, and this will always be the case, where we 
 decide that he is beautiful. 
 
 But because we know how to declare the elements 
 which produce Beauty by their union, their genesis is 
 by no means yet explained ; for it would be requisite 
 to that end, that we should comprehend that union 
 itself, which, as is generally the case with all alterna- 
 tions between the finite and infinite, remains inscruta- 
 ble. The reason makes the demand on transcen- 
 dental grounds ; there ought to be a partnership between 
 the objective and subjective impulses, that is, a play- 
 impulse; since only the unity of reality with form, of 
 accident with necessity, of passivity with freedom, 
 fulfils the conception of humanity. The reason must 
 make this demand, since, according to its nature, it 
 strives for perfection and for the removal of all limits, 
 but human nature leaves unsatisfied every exclusive 
 activity of either impulse, and settles a limit in itself. 
 Accordingly, so soon as the reason pronounces the 
 decision, there shall exist a humanity, — it has thereby 
 established the law, — there shall be Beauty. Expe- 
 rience can declare to us if Beauty exists, and we 
 shall know it, as soon as we are taught whether a 
 
70 
 
 iESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 humanity exists. But neither reason nor experience 
 can teach us how Beauty can exist, or how a humanity 
 is possible. 
 
 Man, we know, is neither exclusively matter, nor 
 exclusively spirit. Beauty, then, as consummation 
 of his humanity, can neither be exclusively mere life, 
 as has been maintained by ingenious observers, who ad- 
 hered too scrupulously to the testimony of experience, 
 — a conclusion to which the taste of the age would 
 fain compel them ; nor ca^i it be exclusively mere 
 shape, as has been decided by speculative philoso- 
 phers, who removed themselves too far from expe- 
 rience, and by philosophizing artists, who in their 
 interpretation of it were too much influenced by the 
 requirement of art ; 1 it is the common object of 
 both impulses, that is, of the play-impulse. This 
 name is fully justified by the use of language, which 
 is wont to signify by the word play (Spiel), all that 
 is contingent neither subjectively or objectively, and 
 yet neither externally nor internally constrained. As 
 the mind, through intuition of the beautiful, finds 
 itself in a happy medium between law and need, so 
 
 1 Burke, in his philosophical inquiries into the origin of our ideas 
 of the Sublime and Beautiful, makes beauty to consist in mere life. 
 Every adherent of the dogmatic system, who has ever made 
 known his belief on this subject, makes it to consist, as far as I 
 know, in mere shape ; and, among other artists, Baphael Mengs, in 
 his Thoughts on Taste in Painting. Thus the critical philosophy 
 has opened the way in this department, as well as in every other, 
 to the conduct of empiricism back to principles, and speculation to 
 experience. 
 
ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 71 
 
 for the reason that it shares itself between both, is 
 the constraint of both removed. In its demands upon 
 the subjective, as upon the objective impulse,^it is 
 serious, since the one, by perception, is related to 
 reality, the other to the necessity of things : since the 
 first is directed, through action, to the maintenance of 
 life, the second to the support of dignity — thus both 
 of them to truth and perfection. But according as 
 dignity blends with life, the latter becomes more indif- 
 ferent, and duty compels no longer when inclination 
 attracts : in like manner the mind receives the reality 
 of things, the material truth, calmly and freely, as 
 soon as the latter finds the formal truth, the law of 
 necessity ; and it feels itself no longer overtasked by 
 abstraction, as soon as it can accompany direct intu- 
 ition. In a word, when the actual comes into com- 
 munication with ideas, it loses its seriousness, since 
 it becomes little, and when the necessary coincides 
 with perception, it also puts away the same, since it 
 becomes light (leicht). 
 
 But you may have been tempted long ago to make 
 the objection, whether Beauty is not debased, by mak- 
 ing it consist in mere play, and whether those friv- 
 olous objects which hitherto have been in possession 
 of this word, are not equally exalted ? Does it not 
 contradict the rational conception and the dignity of 
 Beauty, if, while it is considered as an instrument of 
 culture, it is restricted to a mere play — and does it not 
 contradict our experimental ideas of play, which may 
 exist with the exclusion of all taste, to confine it 
 merely to Beauty 1 
 
72 
 
 ^ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 But what is the meaning of pure play, since we 
 know that in every condition of man it is play, and 
 , only. play, that makes him complete and unfolds at 
 once his twofold nature ? What you call restriction, 
 according to your idea of the case, I call extension) 
 according to mine, which I have established by proof. 
 Then I would rather say exactly the reverse — man 
 is only serious with the agreeable, the good, the per- 
 fect ; but with Beauty he plays. Certainly we need 
 not here call to mind the sports which are in vogue in 
 actual life, and which commonly are directed only to 
 very material objects ; but in vain, too, should we seek 
 in actual life for the Beauty, which is our present 
 theme. Actually existing Beauty is worthy of an ac- 
 tually existing play-impulse ; but through the ideal of 
 Beauty, which the reason exhibits, an ideal of the play- 
 impulse is also manifested, which man should have be- 
 fore his eyes in all his sports. 
 
 We should never err, if we sought a man's ideal of 
 Beauty in the same direction in which he satisfies his 
 play-impulse. If the Greeks were amused by the blood- 
 less strife of strength, fleetness, agility, and the 
 nobler contest of talent, at the Olympic games, and 
 if the Romans enjoyed the death-struggle of a 
 conquered gladiator or of his Lybian rival, we can 
 comprehend, from this single trait, why we must seek 
 the ideal shapes of a Venus, a Juno, an Apollo, not 
 in Rome, but in Greece. 1 But now the reason speaks; 
 
 1 To confine ourselves to modern times, let us compare together 
 the races in London, the bull-fights in Madrid, the former specta- 
 
.ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 73 
 
 the Fair shall not be mere life and mere shape, but 
 living shape, that is, Beauty ; at the same time, it 
 dictates to man the twofold law of absolute formal- 
 ity and absolute reality. Consequently it decides, that 
 man shall only play with Beauty, and shall play only 
 with Beauty. 
 
 Then to sum up all briefly, man only plays, when, 
 in the full signification of the word, he is a man, and 
 he is only entirely a man when he plays. This prin- 
 ciple, which at this moment perhaps appears paradox- 
 ical, will contain a great and deep meaning, when 
 we have advanced so far as to apply it to the twofold 
 seriousness of duty and destiny ; it will uphold, I as- 
 sure you, the whole fabric of aesthetic art, and of the 
 yet difficult art of life. But this principle is only 
 startling in science ; it long ago lived and acted in the 
 art and the feeling of the Greeks, as their most distin- 
 guished master ; but they transplanted to Olympus 
 what should have flourished upon earth. Guided by 
 truth itself, they caused both the seriousness and the 
 toil, which furrow the cheeks of mortals, and the vain 
 pleasure which smoothes the vacant countenance, to 
 disappear from the forehead of the celestials, — they 
 freed the ever-happy from the fetters of all motive, all 
 
 cles in Paris, the gondola contests at Venice, the baiting matches 
 at Vienna, and the gay, attractive life of the Corso at Rome, and 
 it will not he difficult to portray the different shades of taste of these 
 various nations. In the mean time, far less uniformity is manifest 
 in the common sports of these different countries, than among the 
 sports of the more polished classes in the same countries, for which 
 we can easily account. 
 
74 
 
 iESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 duty, all care, — and made indolence and indifference 
 the enviable lot of divinity; a merely human name 
 for the freest and noblest existence. In their higher 
 conception of necessity, which embraced both worlds, 
 both the material constraint of natural, as well as the 
 spiritual constraint of moral, laws, was merged ; and 
 true freedom was first educed from the unity of both 
 these necessities. Animated by this spirit, they erased 
 from the lineaments of their ideal all traces of will, 
 together with inclination, or rather they made both 
 unrecognizable, since they knew how to ally both in 
 the closest union. It is neither grace, nor is it dig- 
 nity, that speaks to us from the noble countenance of 
 a Juno Ludovisi ; it is neither, because it is, at the 
 same time, both. While the feminine deity solicits 
 our adoration, the godlike woman inflames our love; 
 but while we wholly resign ourselves to the heavenly 
 graciousness, the heavenly self-sufficiency repels us. 
 The whole shape rests and dwells within itself, a per- 
 fected creation — as if it were beyond all space, self- 
 sustained, uncontradicted ; there is no power, strug- 
 gling with adverse powers — no weak side, where 
 finiteness could make invasion. Irresistibly seized 
 and attracted by the graciousness, and repelled by the 
 self-sufficiency, we find ourselves at the same time in 
 a condition of the highest peace and the highest emo- 
 tion, and there results that wonderful feeling, for 
 which the intellect has no conception, and language 
 no name. 
 
SIXTEENTH LETTER. 
 
 We have seen Beauty resulting from the reciprocity 
 of two opposite impulses, and from the union of two 
 opposite principles ; then we must seek its highest 
 ideal in the most perfect possible alliance and equi- 
 poise of reality and form. But this only exists as an 
 idea, which can never be fully realized in the actual, 
 where a preponderance of one element over the other 
 will always remain ; and the utmost to be gained in 
 experience will consist in an oscillation between two 
 principles, now reality being superior, and now form. 
 Then Beauty in the ideal is always only indivisible 
 and single, since it can give only a single equipoise : 
 on the contrary, Beauty in actual life will always be 
 twofold, since the equipoise can be overcome in a 
 twofold manner, by oscillation to this side and to 
 that. 
 
 I observed in one of the foregoing letters, and it 
 follows necessarily from the connection of the pre- 
 ceding one, that we should expect from Beauty at the 
 same time a relaxing and an intensive action ; the 
 former, in order to preserve both the subjective and 
 the objective impulses in their limits, — the latter, in 
 order to maintain both in their power. But both 
 these modes of action of Beauty should, according to 
 the idea, be actually only a single one. It should re- 
 
76 
 
 ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 lax, for the reason that it braces equally both natures 
 
 — and it should brace, since it equally relaxes both 
 natures. This already follows from the idea of a re- 
 ciprocity, by whose means both parts, at the same 
 time, necessarily qualify and are qualified by each 
 other, and whose purest product is Beauty. But ex- 
 perience affords us no example of such a perfect 
 reciprocity ; for here, more or less, the overpoise will 
 always create a deficiency, and the deficiency an over- 
 poise. So that whatever in the ideal of Beauty, only 
 as represented, is becoming different, exists as an ac- 
 tual difference in the Beauty of experience. The 
 ideal Beauty, although indivisible and single, manifests 
 in a different relation both a reductive and energetical 
 quality ; in experience it gives a reductive and ener- 
 getical Beauty. So it is, and so it will be, in all the 
 cases where the absolute is transferred to the limits of 
 time, and ideas of the reason are to become realized 
 in humanity. Thus the reflecting man imagines vir- 
 tue, truth, felicity ; but the acting man will practise 
 only virtues, comprehend only truths, enjoy only 
 happy clays. To lead the latter back into the former, 
 
 — to substitute morality for morals, felicity for pros- 
 perity, knowledge for information, is the business of 
 physical and moral culture ; out of beauties to educe 
 Beauty, is the problem of aesthetic culture. 
 
 As little can energetical Beauty preserve man from 
 a certain residue of rudeness and austerity, as the re- 
 ductive protects him from a certain degree of effemi- 
 nacy and enervation. As the tendency of the first is 
 
ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 77 
 
 to strengthen the disposition, both physically and mo- 
 rally, and increase its elasticity, it too easily happens, 
 that the obstacles of temperament and character di- 
 minish the sensibility for impressions, that the finer 
 humanity meets with a subjection that should befall 
 rude nature alone, and that rude nature receives an 
 accession of power, that only ought to avail the free 
 Person ; hence we find in the periods of power and 
 fulness, true greatness of representation joined with 
 the gigantesque and fantastical, and elevation of sen- 
 timent with the most fearful outbursts of passion ; 
 hence, too, we find nature, in the periods of principle 
 and form, as often oppressed as ruled, as often out- 
 raged as surpassed. And as the tendency of the 
 reductive Beauty is, to relax the disposition both mo- 
 rally and physically, it happens as easily, that energy 
 of feeling is stifled with violence of desire, and that 
 the character shares a loss of power which should 
 befall only the passions ; hence we observe in the so- 
 called refined periods, that softness frequently degen- 
 erates into effeminacy, plainness into shallowness, 
 correctness into emptiness, liberality into caprice, 
 lightness into frivolity, calmness into apathy; the most 
 despicable caricature trenching close upon the noblest 
 humanity. Then reductive Beauty is essential for 
 man, under the constraint either of matter or of form; 
 since he is long affected by greatness and power, before 
 he begins to appreciate harmony and grace. Ener- 
 getical Beauty is essential for man, in the indulgence 
 of taste ; since in a state of refinement he is too prone 
 
78 
 
 ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 to neglect a power which he brought off from a state 
 of rudeness. 
 
 And now I believe that that contradiction is ex- 
 plained and answered, which we are accustomed to 
 meet with in the opinions of men concerning the 
 influence of Beauty, and in their estimation of aesthetic 
 culture. This contradiction is explained, when we 
 remember that beauty is twofold in experience, and 
 that both parties predicate concerning the whole 
 genus, what each can only prove concerning a particular 
 kind. And this contradiction is removed, when we 
 distinguish the twofold exigency of humanity, to 
 which that twofold Beauty corresponds. Then both 
 parties will probably be in the right, if they only first 
 settle with each other what kind of beauty and what 
 form of humanity they have in their thoughts. 
 
 In the progress of my inquiries, I shall pursue the 
 same path that nature, in an aesthetic respect, takes 
 with men, and shall rise from the species of Beauty 
 to the idea of the genus itself. I shall examine the 
 effects of reductive Beauty upon intended man, (in- 
 tentus — angespannten) and of energetical Beauty upon 
 the opposite, in order, finally, to dissolve both op- 
 posing modes of Beauty into the unity of the ideal 
 Beauty, just as the two opposite forms of humanity 
 disappear in the unity of the ideal man. 
 
SEVENTEENTH LETTER. 
 
 So long as we only deduced generally the universal 
 idea of Beauty from the conception of human nature, 
 we needed to impute no other limits to the latter, than 
 are directly established in its constitution, and are 
 inseparable from the idea of finiteness. Unconcerned 
 about the accidental restrictions which it might sustain 
 in actual development, we drew our conception of it 
 directly from the reason, as the source of all necessity; 
 and the ideal of Beauty was simultaneous with the ideal 
 of Humanity. 
 
 But we now descend from the realm of ideas to the 
 arena of reality, in order to discover man in a definite 
 condition, consequently under limitations, which result 
 not originally from his abstract conception, but from 
 external circumstances, and a contingent use of his 
 freedom. But however manifoldly the idea of huma- 
 nity may be restricted in him, its simple contents 
 already teach us, that in its totality only two opposite 
 deviations from itself can occur. Should his perfec- 
 tion consist in the accordant energy of his sensuous 
 and spiritual powers, he can only fail of this perfection 
 either by a want of harmony or of energy. Thus, 
 before we have examined the testimony of experience, 
 we are beforehand certain, through the pure reason, 
 
80 
 
 jESTHETIC culture. 
 
 that we shall find the actual, consequently the limited 
 man, either in a condition of intensity or of relaxa- 
 tion, according as either the partial activity of single 
 powers destroys the harmony of his being, or the 
 unity of nature establishes itself upon the equable 
 relaxation of his sensuous and spiritual powers. Both 
 opposite limits, as now ought to be proved, are re- 
 moved by Beauty, which restores harmony to the 
 intended man, and energy to the relaxed man ; and in 
 this manner, according to its nature, leads the re- 
 stricted back to an absolute condition, and creates 
 man as a perfect whole within himself. 
 
 Then it by no means falsifies in Beauty the concep- 
 tion which we entertained of it in Speculation ; only 
 that we find it far less applicable here, than there, 
 where we needed to apply it to the pure conception of 
 humanity. In man, as presented by experience, 
 Beauty finds an already depraved and perverse matter, 
 which robs it of its ideal perfection, in proportion as 
 he blends with that his individual disposition. Hence 
 everywhere in reality it will appear only as a parti- 
 cular and limited species, never as pure genus ; in 
 intended minds it will part with its freedom and man- 
 ifoldness, in relaxed minds, with its active power ; 
 but this contradictory appearance will never mislead 
 us, who are by this time familiar with its true charac- 
 ter. Far from defining its conception with the crowd 
 of critics, from isolated phenomena, and making itself 
 responsible for the deficiency, which man displays 
 under its influence, we know rather, that it is man 
 
ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 81 
 
 who transfers to Beauty the incompleteness of his in- 
 dividuality, who by his subjective limitation perpetu- 
 ally opposes its consummation, and reduces its absolute 
 ideal to two restricted modes of development. 
 
 It was affirmed, that the reductive Beauty is requi- 
 site for an intended mind, and the energetical for a 
 relaxed mind. But I call man intended, as well 
 when he is found under the constraint of perceptions, 
 as when under the constraint of ideas. Every exclu- 
 sive domination of one of his two ground impulses, is 
 a condition of force and constraint for him ; and 
 freedom only consists in the cooperation of both his na- 
 tures. The man who is unduly ruled by feelings, or 
 the sensuously intended man, is then relaxed, and 
 placed in freedom by form ; he who is unduly ruled 
 by laws, or the spiritually intended man, is relaxed 
 and placed in freedom by matter. Then, in order to 
 satisfy this twofold problem, the reductive Beauty will 
 manifest itself in two distinct shapes. First, as 
 peaceful form, it will mollify savage life, and lead the 
 way from perception to thoughts ; second, as living 
 image, it will endow abstract form with sensible pow- 
 er — lead back conception to intuition, and law to 
 feeling. It performs the first service for the child of 
 nature, the second for the child of art. But since 
 in both cases it does not possess perfect control over 
 its material, but depends upon that which either 
 formless nature, or contra-natural art affords, it will 
 bear in both cases marks of its origin, and lose itself 
 6 
 
82 
 
 iESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 on the one hand more in material life, on the other, 
 more in pure abstract form. 
 
 To be able to form a conception in what manner 
 Beauty may become a means to abolish that twofold 
 intensiveness, we must discover its origin in the 
 human mind. Resolve, then, for a short sojourn in 
 the realm of speculation, before leaving it entirely, 
 to sally forth more confidently into the field of ex- 
 perience. 
 
EIGHTEENTH LETTER. 
 
 The sensuous man is led by Beauty to form and 
 reflection ; the spiritual man is re-conducted by 
 Beauty to matter, and the world of sense is restored. 
 
 It appears to result from this, that there must be a 
 mean condition between matter and form — between 
 passion and action, and that Beauty places us in this 
 condition. The majority of mankind form this idea 
 of Beauty, as soon as they begin to reflect upon its 
 operations, and refer to it all experiences. But on 
 the other hand, nothing is more absurd and contra- 
 dictory than such an idea, since the distance between 
 matter and form, passion and action, is infinite, and 
 can positively be mediated by nothing. How do we 
 remove this contradiction ? Beauty combines the 
 two opposite conditions of perception and reflection, 
 and yet really affords no mean between the two. The 
 former is made certain by experience, the latter di- 
 rectly by reason. 
 
 This is the particular point, whither finally the whole 
 question of Beauty tends, and should we succeed in 
 solving this problem satisfactorily, we shall have found 
 at the same time the clue to the whole labyrinth of aes- 
 thetics. 
 
 But we meet here with two very different operations, 
 
84 
 
 ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 which must necessarily support each other in this in- 
 quiry. Beauty, in the first place, combines two con- 
 ditions, which are diametrically opposite, and can 
 never become one. We must proceed upon this op- 
 position ; we must comprehend and recognize it in its 
 whole clearness and force, so that both conditions may 
 be precisely defined — else we confound, but do not 
 unite. Secondly, Beauty combines these two discord- 
 ant conditions, and thus removes the disagreement. 
 But while both conditions remain in lasting opposition, 
 they are only to be combined by being abolished. 
 Then our second business is, to make this union 
 perfect, to carry it through so clearly and completely, 
 that both conditions will entirely vanish in a third, 
 leaving in the whole no trace of the division — else we 
 dismember, but do not unite. All the disputes which 
 ever reigned in the philosophical world, upon the con- 
 ception of Beauty, and which reign in part at the 
 present day, have only this origin, that the inquiries 
 commenced either not with a rigorous discrimination, 
 or resulted in a combination not sufficiently perfect. 
 Those philosophers who blindly trust the guidance of 
 their feeling in a consideration of this subject, can at- 
 tain to no conception of Beauty, since they distinguish 
 no single whole in the sum total of sensible impres- 
 sions. The others who follow intellect exclusively, can 
 never attain a conception of Beauty, since they perceive 
 in the same total nothing but parts, and spirit and mat- 
 ter in their most perfect unity remain to them forever 
 distinct. The first fear to abolish dynamical Beauty, 
 
^ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 85 
 
 that is, as an active power, if they should separate, 
 what is associate in feeling ; the others fear to abolish 
 logical Beauty, that is, as a conception, if they should 
 combine what is distinct in intellect. The former will 
 imagine Beauty as it acts ; the latter will leave it to 
 act, as it is imagined. Then both must miss the truth 
 — the former, since they imitate infinite nature with 
 their circumscribed reflective faculty ; the latter, since 
 they would restrict infinite nature according to their 
 laws of thought. The first fear to deprive Beauty of its 
 freedom, by a too severe dismemberment ; the others 
 fear to destroy the definiteness of its conception by a 
 too rash combination. But the former do not consider, 
 that the freedom in which they justly place the exist- 
 ence of Beauty, is not anarchy, but harmony of laws — 
 not caprice, but the deepest necessity ; the latter do 
 not reflect, that the definiteness which they demand 
 from Beauty with equal justice, does not consist in the 
 exclusion of certain realities, but in the absolute inclu- 
 sion of all — that it is not restriction, then, but infinity. 
 We shall avoid the rocks, on which both are ship- 
 wrecked, if we start from the two elements, in which 
 Beauty divides itself for the intellect, then elevating 
 ourselves to the pure aesthetic unity, through which it 
 manifests itself to the perception, and in which both 
 those conditions entirely vanish. 1 
 
 1 The above parallel will have afforded an inference to the atten- 
 tive reader, that the sensuous aestheticians, who allow more force to 
 the testimony of experience than to reasoning, separate themselves 
 far less from the truth according to fact, than their opponents, al- 
 
86 
 
 ./ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 though they cannot compare with the latter in insight; and we find 
 the same relation everywhere between nature and science. Nature 
 (sense) everywhere combines, the intellect separates ; but the reason 
 combines again ; hence man, before he begins to philosophize, is 
 nearer the truth than the philosopher, who has not yet concluded 
 his research. We can for this reason, without further examination, 
 be convinced of the error of a system, as soon as it contradicts com- 
 mon observation, in its result; but with equal justice we may sus- 
 pect it, when form and method, according to common observation, are 
 in its favor. Those authors may console themselves with the latter, 
 who cannot deliver a philosophical deduction, as many readers seem 
 to expect, like a fireside conversation. With the former one may 
 6ilence those who would found new systems at the expense of the 
 human understanding. 
 
NINETEENTH LETTER. 
 
 We discern in man, generally, two distinct condi- 
 tions of passive and active determinableness, and as 
 many conditions of passive and active determinateness. 
 The exposition of this principle leads us soonest to the 
 goal. 
 
 The condition of the human spirit before all deter- 
 minateness, which is given to it by outward impres- 
 sions, is an unlimited determinableness. The Infinite 
 of space and time is granted for the free use of his 
 imagination, and since, according to supposition, no- 
 thing is placed in this wide realm of the Possible, con- 
 sequently nothing excluded, we can call this condition 
 of undeterminateness, a void infinity, which is by no 
 means to be confounded with an infinite void. 
 
 Now suppose his sense is affected, and a single ac- 
 tuality obtains out of the infinite crowd of possible de- 
 terminations. Something manifests itself. What was 
 nothing but a mere possibility in the previous condi- 
 tion of simple determinableness, has now become an 
 active power — acquires a content ; but at the same 
 time, it maintains, as active power, a limit, as when 
 mere possibility, it was unlimited. Then Reality is 
 there, but infinity is lost. In order to delineate a 
 shape in space, we must confine endless space; in 
 
88 
 
 .ESTHETIC culture. 
 
 order to exhibit a special phase in time, we must 
 divide the entirety of time. Then we attain to a reality 
 only by limits, to position or actual establishment only 
 by negation or exclusion, to determinateness only by 
 the abolition of our free determinableness. 
 
 But no reality will exist in eternity from a mere ex- 
 clusion, or no manifestation from pure sensuous per- 
 ception, if something were not already extant, by which 
 to exclude — if the positive were not deduced from 
 negation, entity from nullity, by an absolute action 
 of spirit : this action of mind is called reflecting or 
 thinking, and its result is Thought. 
 
 There is no space for us, before we define a situation 
 in space, but we should never define a situation with- 
 out absolute Space — and the same with time. There 
 is no time for us, before we have the present moment, 
 but without eternity we should never have a manifesta- 
 tion of the moment. Then we really attain to the 
 whole only through the part, to the unlimited only 
 through the limited ; but also, we only attain to the 
 part through the whole, only to the limited through the 
 unlimited. 
 
 AY hen then it is asserted concerning the Beautiful, 
 that it affords man a passage from perception to reflec- 
 tion, it is by no means to be understood, as if the 
 Beautiful could fill up the gulf which separates percep- 
 tion from reflection, passion from action ; this gulf is 
 infinite, and nothing universal can result from the sin- 
 gle in eternity, nothing necessary from the fortuitous, 
 without the mediation of a new and independent 
 
AESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 89 
 
 faculty. Thought is the immediate action of this abso- 
 lute faculty, which, it is true, must be induced by the 
 senses to develop itself, but in its development depends 
 so little upon them, that it rather announces itself 
 only through its opposition to them. The independ- 
 ence with which it acts, excludes every foreign inter- 
 ference; and Beauty can become a means, to lead man 
 from matter to form, from perceptions to principles, 
 from a limited to an absolute being, not in so far as it 
 helps in thinking (which contains an evident contradic- 
 tion) but only in so far as it procures freedom for the 
 reflective faculties to develop according to their own 
 laws. 
 
 But this supposes, that the freedom of the reflective 
 powers can be restricted, which seems to conflict with 
 the idea of its independent ability. An ability, namely, 
 which receives nothing from without as the material of 
 its activity, can only be restrained by withdrawal of 
 material, thus only negatively ; and it argues miscon- 
 ception of the nature of a spirit, if we attribute a force 
 to the sensuous passion, which could oppress posi- 
 tively the freedom of the mind. It is true, experience 
 affords numerous examples, where the intellectual 
 powers seem subdued in proportion to the impetuous 
 action of the sensuous powers ; but instead of deducing 
 this weakness of spirit from the strength of passion, 
 we should rather explain this overweening strength of 
 passion by that weakness of spirit ; since the senses 
 can no otherwise display a force against man, than so 
 far as spirit has freely ceased to maintain itself as such. 
 
90 
 
 .ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 But while by this explanation I seek to meet a diffi- 
 culty, I have apparently involved myself in another, 
 and have saved the independence of the mind only at 
 the cost of its unity. For how can the mind obtain 
 out of itself at the same time principles of activity 
 and of inactivity, without dividing and opposing itself. 
 
 Here we must remember, that we have before us the 
 finite, not the infinite spirit. The finite spirit is that 
 which only becomes active through passivity, which 
 only attains the absolute through the limited, only acts 
 and creates so far as it receives material. Then such 
 a spirit will combine an impulse for the actual or lim- 
 ited with an impulse for form or the absolute, as being 
 the condition, without which it can neither possess nor 
 satisfy the latter impulse. How far two such opposite 
 tendencies can exist together in the same being, is a 
 problem which may indeed puzzle the metaphysician, 
 but not the transcendental philosopher. The latter by 
 no means pretends to explain the possibility of things, 
 but is content with establishing the knowledge by 
 which the possibility of actual life is apprehended. 
 And since life would be just as little possible without 
 that mental contrariety as without absolute mental 
 unity, so he sets forth both ideas with perfect author- 
 ity, as equally necessary conditions of actual life, with- 
 out troubling himself further with their compatibility. 
 Finally, this in-dwelling of two primary impulses in 
 no way contradicts the absolute unity of spirit, if one 
 only distinguishes himself from both impulses. It is 
 true, they both exist and act in him, but he himself is 
 
^ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 91 
 
 neither matter nor form, neither perception nor rea- 
 son — a fact which those never appear to have consid- 
 ered, who only allow the human spirit to act, where its 
 procedure agrees with reason, and declare him to be 
 purely passive where that contradicts reason. 
 
 Each of these primary impulses, as soon as it is un- 
 folded, strives, according to its nature and necessarily, 
 towards satisfaction, but for the reason that both neces- 
 sarily strive, and yet both for opposite objects, this two- 
 fold constraint mutually cancels itself, and between 
 both the Will maintains a perfect freedom. Then it is 
 the Will which maintains itself against both impulses 
 as a force (as ground of the actual), but neither of the 
 two can act for itself as a force against the other. The 
 violent man is not withheld from injustice by the posi- 
 tive inclination to justice, in which he is by no means 
 deficient, and the excitable man is not led to violate 
 his principles by the most lively incentive to pleasure. 
 There is in man no other force than his Will, and that 
 only which abolishes man, namely, death and each 
 deprivation of consciousness, can take away his inmost 
 freedom. 
 
 A necessity without us defines our condition, our 
 existence in time, by means of sensuous perception. 
 This is entirely involuntary, and so we must be pas- 
 sive beneath its operation. In like manner a necessity 
 within us reveals our personality, by the instigation of 
 that sensuous perception and by opposition to the 
 same ; for the consciousness cannot depend upon the 
 Will, which it supposes. This primitive announcement 
 
92 
 
 ^ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 of personality is not our merit, and its want is not our 
 fault. Reason, that is, absolute consequence and uni- 
 versality of consciousness, is only demanded of him 
 who is self-conscious ; previously he is not a man, and 
 no act of humanity can be expected from him. The 
 metaphysician can declare the restrictions which the 
 free and independent spirit suffers from perception, as 
 little as the natural philosopher can apprehend the 
 infinity which discovers itself on occasion of this 
 restriction in personality. Neither abstraction nor 
 experience conduct us back to the source from which 
 our ideas of universality and necessity flow ; their early 
 appearance in time removes it from the observer, and 
 their transcendent origin from the metaphysical in- 
 quirer. But enough, that self-consciousness exists, and 
 that contemporaneous with its unchangeable unity is 
 exhibited the law of unity for all, that is for man, 
 and for all, that should become through him, for his 
 cognition and action. Unavoidably, unvitiably, incon- 
 ceivably do the ideas of truth and right appear already 
 in the period of sensuousness, and we perceive the 
 eternal in time, and the necessary in the series of 
 chance, without being able to say whence and how it 
 arose. Thus feeling and consciousness appear, en- 
 tirely without the assistance of the subject, and the 
 origin of both lies as much beyond our will, as it lies 
 beyond the sphere of our knowledge. 
 
 But if both are actual, and if man, by means of per- 
 ception, has made experience of a definite existence, 
 and by self-consciousness experience of his absolute 
 
AESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 93 
 
 existence, so will both his primary impulses be quick- 
 ened together with their objects. The sensuous im- 
 pulse awakes with the experience of life (with the 
 commencement of the individual), the rational with 
 the experience of principle (with the commencement 
 of personality), and now first, when both have come 
 into existence, is his humanity constructed. Till this 
 has taken place, everything within him results from 
 the law of necessity ; but now the hand of nature 
 abandons him, and it is his concern to maintain the 
 humanity which she founded and revealed within him. 
 That is, as soon as two opposing impulses in him are 
 active, both lose their necessitation, and the opposition 
 of two necessities gives birth to Freedom. 1 
 
 1 I would remark, in order to prevent all misconception, that so 
 often as mention is here made of freedom, that is not meant which 
 necessarily appertains to man, considered as an intelligence, and 
 which can neither be given to nor taken from him ; but that which is 
 based upon his compound nature. When man for the most part only 
 acts rationally, he demonstrates thereby a freedom of the first kind ; 
 when he acts rationally within the restrictions of matter, and materi- 
 ally under the laws of reason, he demonstrates thereby a freedom of 
 the second kind. One might simply explain the latter by a natural 
 possibility of the former. 
 
TWENTIETH LETTER. 
 
 That freedom cannot be subject to influence, results 
 already from its simple idea ; but that freedom itself 
 is not a work of man, but an operation of nature, (this 
 word taken in its widest signification), and that, then, 
 it can be accelerated and retarded by natural causes, 
 follows with like necessity from the preceding. It first 
 commences when man is complete, and both his pri- 
 mary impulses have unfolded ; then it must be want- 
 ing, so long as he is incomplete, and one of his im- 
 pulses is excluded, and it can be restored by all that 
 secures to him his completeness. 
 
 Now suppose really a moment to occur, as well in 
 ♦he whole genus as in the single man, in which man is- 
 
 complete and one of his instincts excluded. We know 
 that he commences with mere life, in order to end 
 with form ; that he is an individual sooner than Per- 
 son, that he proceeds from the limited to the infinite. 
 The sensuous impulse then comes into action sooner 
 than the rational, since perception precedes conscious- 
 ness, and in this priority of the sensuous impulse we 
 find the explication to the whole history of human 
 freedom. 
 
 Suppose then a moment when the sensuous impulse 
 acts as nature and as necessity, since the form-impulse 
 
.ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 95 
 
 is not yet in active opposition ; when sensuousness is 
 a force, since the man has not yet begun — then in the 
 man himself there can be no other force but the Will. 
 But in the reflective condition, on the contrary, to 
 which man should now pass, the reason should be a 
 force, and the place of the physical should be usurped 
 by a logical and moral necessity. Then that percep- 
 tive force must be annihilated, before its law can be 
 removed. Thus it does not follow, that something 
 commences, which not yet was — but something which 
 was, must previously cease. Man cannot pass imme- 
 diately from perception to reflection ; he must retrace 
 one step, since only when one determination is re- 
 moved, can the opposite succeed. Then in order to 
 exchange passivity for self-activity, a passive for an 
 active determination, he must instantly be free from 
 all determinations, and pass through a condition of 
 mere determinableness. Consequently in a certain 
 sense he must return to that negative condition of mere 
 undeterminateness, in which he was found, before he 
 had received a sensuous impression. But this condi- 
 tion was utterly void of contents, and it is now requi- 
 site to combine an equal undeterminateness, and an 
 equal unlimited determinableness with the greatest 
 possible capacity (Gchalt) since something positive 
 ought directly to result from such a condition. The 
 determination which he may receive through sensation, 
 must then be retained, since he ought not to lose 
 reality; but at the same time it must be abolished so 
 far as it is a restriction, that an unlimited determina- 
 
96 
 
 AESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 bleness may ensue. Thus the problem is, at the same 
 time, to annihilate and preserve the determination of 
 condition, which is only possible by setting another in 
 opposition. The scales of a balance stand poised, 
 when they are empty ; but they also stand poised, 
 when they contain equal weights. 
 
 Thus the mind passes from perception to reflection 
 by an intermediate inclination (Stimmung), in which 
 sensuousness and reason are active at the same time, 
 but for this reason mutually destroy their determining 
 power, and effect a negation through an opposition. 
 This intermediate inclination, in which the mind is 
 neither physically nor morally constrained, and yet is 
 active in both ways, preeminently deserves to be called 
 a free inclination ; and if we call the condition of sen- 
 suous determination the physical, but that of reflective 
 determination the logical and moral condition, we 
 must call this condition of real and active determina- 
 bleness, the aesthetic 1 condition. 
 
 1 The following may serve as explanation for the reader, who im- 
 perfectly comprehends the pure signification of this word, so much 
 abused through ignorance. All things which can ever be objects of 
 perception, may be considered under four different relations. A fact 
 can relate directly to our sensuous condition, (our existence and well- 
 being), that is its physical quality. Or it can relate to the under- 
 standing, and furnish us with a cognition ; that is its logical quality. 
 Or it can relate to our will, and be considered as an object of choice 
 for a rational being; that is its moral quality. Or finally, it can 
 relate to the ent irety of our different powers, without being a definite 
 object for any single one of them ; that is its aesthetic quality. A 
 man can recommend himself to us by his obligingness; we may 
 regard Mm through the medium of his conversation ; he may inspire 
 
.ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 97 
 
 us with respect by his character, but finally, independent of all this, 
 and without ever having regard in our judgment either to any law or any 
 design, he may please us, in pure contemplation, through his empiri- 
 cal expression. We criticise him aesthetically in the latter quality^ 
 So there is a culture for health, a culture for understanding, a culture 
 for morality, a culture for taste and for beauty. The latter has for 
 its design, to bring out the totality of our sensuous and spiritual 
 powers in the greatest possible harmony. Meanwhile, since we are 
 disposed to combat the idea of arbitrariness in the idea of the aesthe- 
 tic, misled by a false taste, and still more confirmed in this error by 
 false reasoning, I here remark in addition, (although these letters 
 upon aesthetic culture are concerned with almost nothing else than 
 the confutation of this error), that the mind in aesthetic conditions 
 acts indeed freely, and in the highest degree free from all compulsion, 
 but in nowise free from laws, and that this aesthetic freedom differs 
 from logical necessity in reflection and from moral necessity in voli- 
 tion, only in this point, that the laws which guide the operation of the 
 mind, do not become manifested, and, since they meet with no oppo- 
 sition, they do not have the appearance of compulsion. 
 
 7 
 
TWENTY-FIRST LETTER. 
 
 There is, as I remarked in the beginning of the 
 previous letter, a twofold condition of determinable- 
 ness and a twofold condition of determinateness. I 
 can now substantiate this principle. 
 
 The mind is determinable only so far as generally it 
 is not determined ; but it is also determinable so far 
 as it is not exclusively determined, that is, not limited 
 by its determination. The former is mere indetermi- 
 nateness, (it is without limits, because it is without 
 reality) ; the latter is the aesthetic determinableness, 
 (it has no limits since it combines all reality). 
 
 The mind is determined so far, generally, as it only 
 is limited ; but it is also determined so far as it limits 
 itself by a single absolute faculty. It finds itself in the 
 first case, if it perceives — in the second, if it reflects. 
 Then what reflection is with reference to determina- 
 tion, the aesthetic condition is with reference to deter- 
 minableness ; the former is restriction from an inter- 
 nal, infinite power, the latter is negation from an 
 internal, infinite fulness. Just as perception and re- 
 flection come in contact at the only point, where the 
 mind in both conditions is determined, and man is ex- 
 clusively something — either individual or Person, — 
 but otherwise are infinitely separated from each other ; 
 
.ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 99 
 
 in like manner does the aesthetic determinableness coin- 
 cide with mere indeterminateness in the only point, 
 where both exclude that definite existence, while in all 
 other points they are as distinct as nullity and totality, 
 consequently infinitely distinct. Then if the latter, 
 indeterminateness from deficiency, is conceived of as 
 a void infinity, the aesthetic freedom of determinate- 
 ness, which is its real counterpart, must be considered 
 as an occupied infinity ; a representation which coin- 
 cides strictly with that instilled by the previous in- 
 quiries. 
 
 Man, then, in the aesthetic condition is null, so far 
 as he regards a single result, and not the whole ability, 
 and has in view the deficiency in himself of each par- 
 ticular determination. Hence we must allow the per- 
 fect propriety of those, who declare Beauty and the 
 inclination which it imparts to the mind, when con- 
 sidered with reference to knowledge and disposition, to 
 be utterly negative and fruitless. Their views are 
 perfectly just, since Beauty actually affords no single 
 result, either for the intellect or for the will ; it carries 
 out no single design, either intellectual or moral ; it 
 discovers no single truth — helps us to perform no 
 single duty, and is, in a word, equally incapable of 
 establishing the character or enlightening the head. 
 Then so far as a man's personal worth or dignity only 
 depends upon himself, aesthetic culture leaves it en- 
 tirely indeterminate, and nothing farther is gained, 
 than to make it possible for him, on the side of na- 
 ture, to make out of himself what he will — than 
 
100 
 
 ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 fully to restore to him the freedom to be, what he ought 
 to be. 
 
 But by this means something infinite is attained. 
 For as soon as we call to mind that this very freedom 
 is taken from him by the unequal compulsion of nature 
 in perception, and by the excluding legislation of rea- 
 son in reflection, we must consider the ability which 
 is restored to him in the aesthetic inclination, as the 
 highest of all gifts — as the gift of humanity. He 
 certainly possesses in disposition this humanity, before 
 each definite condition into which he can arrive, but in 
 fact he loses it with every definite condition into which 
 he comes, and it must be restored to him each time 
 anew by the aesthetic life, if he would pass over to an 
 opposite condition. 1 
 
 Then it is not only poetically allowable, but also 
 philosophically correct, to call Beauty our second 
 creatress. For although she has made humanity only 
 
 1 It is true, the rapidity with which certain characters proceed from 
 perception to reflection and resolution, will permit us hardly, or not 
 at all, to recognize the aesthetic state, through which in this time 
 they must necessarily pass. Such minds cannot long endure the 
 condition of indeterminateness, and press impatiently after a result, 
 which they do not find in the boundlessness of the aesthetic condi- 
 tion. On the contrary, the aesthetic condition displays itself in a far 
 greater surface among those who find more satisfaction in the feeling 
 of entire ability, than in any one of its single operations. The latter 
 can endure restriction with as little pleasure as the first regard 
 vacuity. I hardly need mention that the first are calculated for de- 
 tail and subordinate occupations, the latter — supposing that they 
 combine reality with this ability — for entirety and distinguished 
 parts. 
 
AESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 101 
 
 possible to us, and for the rest has left it to our free 
 will, how far we will make it actual, she has it in 
 common with our original creatress, Nature — who, 
 in like manner, has only bestowed the ability for hu- 
 manity, but has left its use to our own volition. 
 
TWENTY-SECOND LETTER. 
 
 If, then, the aesthetic inclination of the mind must 
 be considered in one respect as null, as soon, namely, 
 as we direct our attention to single and definite ac- 
 tions, it is still to be regarded in another respect as a 
 condition of the highest reality, so far as we thereby 
 consider the absence of all limits, and the totality of 
 powers, which are mutually active in that condition. 
 Then we can as little blame those who declare the 
 aesthetic state to be the most, fruitful with respect to 
 knowledge and morality. Their views are perfectly 
 just, since a mental inclination which comprehends 
 in itself the wholeness of humanity, must also necessa- 
 rily include all its single manifestations, according to 
 ability ; a mental inclination which removes all limits 
 from the wholeness of human nature, must necessarily 
 remove them also from all its single manifestations. 
 For the reason that it takes no single function of hu- 
 manity exclusively under its protection, it is well-dis- 
 posed towards each one without distinction, and favors 
 no single one preeminently, since it is to all the basis 
 of possibility. All other exercises give the mind a 
 particular dexterity, but also confine it within a partic- 
 ular limit ; the aesthetic alone leads to the unlimited. 
 Every other condition to which we can arrive, refers 
 
iESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 103 
 
 us to a previous one, and requires for its development 
 a subsequent one ; the aesthetic alone is a whole in 
 itself, since it combines within itself all the conditions 
 for its origin and duration. Here alone do we feel 
 ourselves snatched as it were from time ; and our hu- 
 manity unfolds itself with a purity and integrity, as if 
 it had yet experienced no detriment from the in-work- 
 ing of external powers. 
 
 Whatever flatters our senses in immediate per- 
 ception, opens our tender and susceptible mind to 
 every impression, but also in the same degree makes 
 us less capable of effort. Whatever exerts our .re- 
 flective powers and invites to abstract conceptions, 
 strengthens our spirit to every kind of resistance, but 
 hardens it too in the same proportion, and deprives of 
 as much susceptibility as it gains of greater self-activ- 
 ity. For this reason, one as well as the other neces- 
 sarily lead at last to exhaustion, since neither matter 
 can continue long without plastic power, nor power 
 without susceptible matter. If on the contrary we 
 have given ourselves up to the enjoyment of genuine 
 Beauty, at such a moment we are equally master of 
 our passive and active powers, and with equal facility 
 do we address ourselves to the Serious and to Sport — 
 to calm and to emotion — to compliance and to resist- 
 ance — to abstract reflection and to intuition. 
 
 This lofty equanimity and freedom of spirit, united 
 with power and activity, is the state in which a genu- 
 ine work of art should leave us, and there is no surer 
 touchstone of the true aesthetic quality. If, after an 
 
104 
 
 ^ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 enjoyment of this kind, we find ourselves preeminently 
 disposed to some one particular mode of feeling or 
 action, unfit for and averse to another, it constitutes 
 an unerring proof, that we have not experienced a 
 purely (Esthetic action ; whether it be attributable to 
 the object or to our mode of perception, or (as is most 
 always the case) at the same time to both. 
 
 As there is no pure aesthetic action to be met with 
 in reality, (for man can never escape from dependence 
 upon powers), the excellence of a work of art can only 
 consist in its greater propinquity to that ideal of aes- 
 thetic purity ; and with all the freedom which may be 
 secured to it, we shall still leave it in a certain state 
 and with a peculiar direction. The more universal, 
 then, the state, and the less confined the direction is, 
 which is given to our mind by a definite species of art, 
 and by any of its definite products, the nobler is that 
 species and the more eminent such a product. We 
 can try this with works of different arts, and with 
 different works of the same art. We retire from ex- 
 quisite music with a lively perception, from a beautiful 
 poem with quickened imagination, from noble sculp- 
 ture and architecture with excited intellect ; but who- 
 ever would invite us to abstract reflection directly after 
 lofty musical enjoyment, to the performance of a 
 formal duty of every-day life directly after superior 
 poetical enjoyment, or would inflame our imagination 
 and surprise our feelings directly after the contempla- 
 tion of superior works of painting or sculpture, would 
 make but an indifferent choice of time. The reason 
 
/ 
 
 .ESTHETIC CULTURE. 105 
 
 is, that even the most elevated music stands in a greater 
 affinity to the senses through its method of influence, 
 than true aesthetic freedom allows — that the most suc- 
 cessful poem always participates more with the capri- 
 cious and fortuitous play of the imagination, as its 
 medium, than is permitted by the internal necessity of 
 genuine Beauty — that the most eminent piece of 
 sculpture — and this perhaps particularly — is nearly 
 allied to the gravity of science by the precision of its 
 conception. In the mean time these special affinities 
 gradually disappear with the loftier standard attained 
 by a work from these three kinds of art, and it is a 
 necessary and natural result of their perfection, that, 
 without abandoning their objective limits, the different 
 arts always become more similar in their action upon 
 the mind. Music in its loftiest excellence must be- 
 come shape, and affect us with the tranquil power of 
 an antique ; the plastic art in its highest consummation 
 must become music, and move us by direct sensuous 
 presence ; poetry in its most perfect development, 
 must influence us with all the potency of music, but 
 at the same time, like the plastic art, must surround 
 us with a clear tranquillity. Consummate style in 
 every art manifests itself, in knowing how to remove 
 its specific limits, without also abolishing its specific 
 advantages, while a skilful improvement of its pecu- 
 liarity bestows upon it a more universal character. 
 
 And the artist must not only overcome by his treat- 
 ment the limits, which the specific character of his 
 kind of art brings with it, but also those which belong 
 
106 
 
 AESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 to the particular material which he elaborates. In a 
 genuine work of art the subject should effect nothing, 
 but the form everything ; since the entirety of man is 
 acted upon by form alone, but only single powers by 
 the subject. However noble and comprehensive then 
 the subject may be, it is always confined in its influ- 
 ence upon the spirit, and true aesthetic freedom is to be 
 expected only from form. Herein then consists the 
 art-secret of the master, that by the form he abolishes 
 the subject ; and the more imposing, assuming, attract- 
 ive the subject is in itself, the more absolutely that it 
 intrudes its operation, or the more inclined the ob- 
 server is, to merge himself immediately in the subject, 
 the more triumphant is the art which repels the former, 
 and maintains authority over the latter. The mind of 
 the spectator and hearer must remain entirely free and 
 inviolable, it should pass from the magic circle of the 
 artist, pure and perfect as from the hands of the Crea- 
 tor. The most frivolous object must be so handled, 
 that we remain disposed to pass immediately from that 
 to one of sober earnest. The gravest subject "must be 
 so handled, that we retain the capability of exchanging 
 it immediately for the lightest sport. The arts of 
 Emotion, such as tragedy, are no exception ; for, in 
 the first place, those arts are not entirely free, since 
 they are enlisted in the service of a particular design 
 (the pathetic), and then too no real connoisseur will 
 deny, that works, even those of the latter class, are 
 more perfect, the more they respect the freedom of the 
 mind in the highest storm of emotion. There is a fine 
 
^ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 107 
 
 art of the passions, but a fine pathetic art is a contra- 
 diction, since the infallible effect of Beauty is freedom 
 from passion. No less contradictory is the idea of a 
 fine teaching (didactic) or improving (moral) art, 
 since nothing conflicts more with the conception of 
 Beauty, than to give the mind a definite tendency. 
 
 Yet a want of form is not always evinced by a work, 
 when it produces an effect by its subject alone ; for it 
 may as often result from a deficiency of form in the 
 critic. If the latter is either too intended or too re- 
 laxed, and accustomed to regard things either only by 
 the intellect or only by the senses, he will confine him- 
 self only to the parts even in the most successful 
 whole, and only to the subject-matter in the fairest 
 form. Affected only by the rude clement, he is first 
 obliged to destroy the aesthetic organization of a work, 
 before he can find satisfaction in it, and to pick out 
 laboriously the single traits, which the master with in- 
 finite art had caused to disappear in the harmony of 
 the whole. His interest therein is either positively 
 moral or positively physical ; only it is not — what it 
 should be — aesthetical. Such readers relish a serious 
 and pathetic poem, like a sermon, and a naif or comi- 
 cal one, like an intoxicating drink ; and were they 
 sufficiently tasteless, to require edification from a tra- 
 gedy and epic, were it even a Messiah, so they would 
 infallibly take offence at a song of Anacreon or 
 Catullus. 
 
TWENTY-THIRD LETTER. 
 
 I again resume the thread of my inquiries, which I 
 have interrupted only to make the application of the 
 principles established, to practical art and to a criti- 
 cism of its works. 
 
 Then the passage from the passive condition of per- 
 ception to the active one of reflection and volition, 
 is only effected by an intermediate condition of aes- 
 thetic freedom, and although this condition determines 
 of itself nothing either for our judgments or disposi- 
 tions, consequently leaving our intellectual and moral 
 worth entirely problematical, yet it is the necessary 
 stipulation, by which alone we can attain to a judg- 
 ment and a disposition. In a word, there is no other 
 way of making the sensuous man rational, than by first 
 making him aestheticaL 
 
 But, you may object, ought this mediation to be ac- 
 tually indispensable ? Should not truth and duty be 
 able to effect an entry into the sensuous man for and 
 by themselves alone ? To this I must reply ; that if 
 they cannot, they must in fact impute it only to their 
 own determining power, and nothing would be more at 
 variance with my previous assertions, than if they had 
 the appearance of favoring the opposite opinion. It 
 has been explicitly proved that Beauty affords no re- 
 
AESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 109 
 
 suit either to the intellect or the volition, that it inter- 
 feres in no operation either of reflection or resolution, 
 that it only imparts to both the ability, but leaves the 
 actual use of this ability wholly undefined. Thus all 
 external assistance is removed, and the pure logical 
 form, the idea, must address itself directly to the in- 
 tellect, the pure moral form, the law, directly to the 
 volition. 
 
 But to effect this — to produce a pure form for the 
 sensuous man — this I maintain, can only be rendered 
 possible by the aesthetic inclination of the mind. Truth 
 is nothing that can be externally perceived like reality 
 or the sensuous existence of things ; it is something 
 that self-acting and independent reflection educes, and 
 it is this self-activity, this freedom, that we miss in the 
 sensuous man. The latter is already defined (physi- 
 cally), and consequently has no longer any free deter- 
 minableness ; which he must necessarily first recover, 
 before he can exchange the passive for an active deter- 
 mination. But he can only recover it, either by resign- 
 ing the passive determination which he had, or by 
 already containing ivithin himself the active, to which 
 he should pass. If he only resigned his passive deter- 
 mination, he would at the same time resign the possi- 
 bility of an active one, since thought and form re- 
 quire subject-matter for th Mr manifestation. Then he 
 must contain the latter within himself, he must at the 
 same time be passively and actively defined, that is, 
 he must become aesthetical. 
 
 Then by the aesthetic state of the mind is the self- 
 
110 
 
 jESTHETIC culture. 
 
 activity of the reason displayed on the field of sensu- 
 ousness, the force of perception already weakened 
 within its own sphere, and the physical man so far en- 
 nobled, that the spiritual need only unfold itself from 
 the former according to the laws of freedom. Hence 
 the step from the sesthetical to the logical and moral 
 condition (from Beauty to truth and duty), becomes in- 
 finitely easier, than was the step from the physical to 
 the sesthetical condition, (from the mere blind life to 
 form). Man can achieve this step by his pure free- 
 dom, since he only need to receive and not to give, 
 only to disunite his nature, not to amplify it ; the ses- 
 thetical man will decide and act with universal vali- 
 dity, as soon as he wills so to do. Nature must facili- 
 tate the step from rude matter to Beauty, where an en- 
 tirely new activity should be developed within him, and 
 his will cannot exercise authority over an inclination, 
 which is only imparted to it by his existence. In order 
 to conduct the aesthetic man to insight and lofty senti- 
 ment, we only need present to him forcible incentives ; 
 but to obtain the same from the sensuous man, we 
 must first change his nature. To make the former a 
 hero or a philosopher, often nothing is needed but the 
 demands of an elevated situation, (which most inti- 
 mately affects the volition) ; but, for a similar result, 
 we must first transplant the latter beneath another sky. 
 
 Then the most important task of culture, consists in 
 subjecting man to form while yet in his pure physical 
 life, and in making him aesthetical, so far only as the 
 realm of Beauty can ever extend — since the moral 
 
ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 Ill 
 
 condition can unfold itself only from the aesthetical, 
 and not from the physical condition. If man would 
 possess the ability in every single case, to make his 
 judgment and his will the judgment of the race, to find 
 the passage to an infinite from every limited existence, 
 to rise from every condition of dependence to freedom 
 and independence, he must beware that he is at no 
 moment a mere individual, serving only the laws of 
 nature. Should he be capable and ready to soar from 
 the narrow sphere of nature's aims to those of reason, 
 he must have already trained himself within the first 
 for the last, and have prosecuted his physical determi- 
 nateness with a certain spiritual freedom — that is, 
 according to the laws of Beauty. 
 
 And indeed he can accomplish this without contra- 
 dicting in the least his physical aim. The demands of 
 his nature only extend to that which he works, to the 
 contents of his action ; the design of nature determines 
 nothing concerning the manner of his action, or its 
 form. The demands of reason, on the contrary, are 
 strongly directed to the form of his activity. Then, 
 however necessary it is for his moral determinateness, 
 that he should be purely moral, that he should evince 
 an absolute self-activity, it is of little consequence for 
 his physical determinateness, whether or not he is 
 purely physical, whether he maintains a state of abso- 
 lute passivity. With respect then to the latter, it is 
 entirely at his option, whether he will prosecute it 
 merely as a sensuous being, and as a power of nature, 
 (as a power, namely, which only acts according as it 
 
112 
 
 ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 is acted upon), or whether at the same time as abso- 
 lute power, as a rational being; and there need be no 
 question which of the two is more conformable to his 
 dignity. But rather, as much as it humbles and de- 
 bases him, to do that from sensuous motives, which he 
 should have imposed upon himself from pure motives of 
 duty, so much does it honor and ennoble him to strive 
 after conformity, harmony and boundlessness, where 
 the common man only stifles a lawful inclination. 1 In 
 
 1 This spiritual and resthetical free treatment of common reality, 
 wherever it is to be met with, is the token of a noble soul. Gene- 
 rally we call a mind noble, which possesses the gift of trans- 
 forming - the most limited occupation, and the most trifling object into 
 an infinite one, by its method of treatment. We call that form noble, 
 which impresses the seal of self-dependence upon that which natu- 
 rally only subserves (is merely a means). A noble spirit is not satis- 
 fied with being free itself; it would place all other things around it, 
 even the inanimate, in freedom. But Beauty is the only possible ex- 
 pression of freedom in actual life. The predominant expression of 
 intellect in a face, a work of art, and the like, — can never acquire 
 the character of nobility, neither is it ever beautiful, since, instead of 
 concealing, it makes conspicuous, the dependence, which is con- 
 founded with conformity to a design. 
 
 It is true, the moral philosopher teaches us, that one can never do 
 more than his duty ; and he is perfectly right, if he means only the 
 relation which actions have to moral law. But it is said of actions, 
 which, relating merely to a design, yet pass out beyond this design 
 into the super-sensuous, (which here can be called nothing else than 
 carrying out the physical aesthetically) that they exceed duty, while 
 the latter can only prescribe the inviolability of the will, but not the 
 previous inviolability of nature. So that indeed there is no moral, 
 but there is an aesthetical, excess of duty, and such a deportment is 
 called noble. But, because an overplus is always perceptible in him 
 who is noble, — which possesses too a free, formal value, when it 
 need only have a material value, or which unites to an internal value 
 
AESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 113 
 
 a word — perception should have nothing to define in 
 the province of truth and morality ; but form and the 
 play-impulse should exist and govern in the sphere of 
 felicity. 
 
 Already here, then, in the neutral field of physical 
 life, must man commence his moral being ; while yet 
 in his passivity he must begin his self-activity — and 
 while still within his sensuous restrictions he must 
 commence his intellectual freedom. Already he must 
 impose the law of his will upon his inclinations; he 
 must, if I may be allowed the expression, play the bat- 
 tle against matter within its own borders, that he may 
 be spared from resisting the fearful foe on the holy soil 
 of freedom ; he must learn to desire nobly, that he may 
 not be forced to will loftily. This is accomplished by 
 
 which it ought to have, also an external value which it might dis- 
 pense with, — many have confounded sesthetical with moral over- 
 plus — and, seduced by the appearance of what is noble, have intro- 
 duced a caprice and chance into morality itself, whereby it would be- 
 come entirely abolished. 
 
 A noble deportment is to be distinguished from an elevated one. 
 The former is the result of moral obligation, but not so the latter, 
 although we respect it unduly higher than the former. But we do 
 not respect it because it exceeds the rational idea of its Object, (the 
 moral law), but the actual idea of its Subject, (our knowledge of 
 the quality and vigor of human will) ; so inversely we do not value 
 noble deportment, because it transgresses the nature of the Subject, 
 from which it rather must result entirely unconstrained, but because 
 it passes beyond the nature of its Object, (the physical design) into 
 the super-sensuous. In the one case, it may be said, we are aston- 
 ished at the victory which the object obtains over man ; in the other, 
 we wonder at the scope which man gives to the object. 
 
 8 
 
114 
 
 ESTHETIC CULTURE, 
 
 aesthetic culture, which subjects all that in which 
 human caprice is unconstrained by the laws of Nature, 
 or the laws of Beauty by those of reason, — and 
 which already reveals the internal, in the form which 
 it gives to the external, life. 
 
TWENTY-FOURTH LETTER. 
 
 There may be distinguished three different mo- 
 ments or epochs of development, through which the 
 single man as well as the whole race must pass neces- 
 sarily and in a prescribed order, if they would complete 
 the whole circle of their destiny. It is true, the single 
 periods can now be protracted, now abridged, through 
 accidental causes, which lie either in the influence of 
 external things or in man's free caprice, but none can 
 be entirely omitted ; and the order too in which they 
 follow each other, can neither be inverted by nature 
 or the will. Man in his physical condition, endures 
 only the force of nature ; he frees himself from this 
 force in the cesthetical, and governs it in the moral, 
 condition. 
 
 What is man, before Beauty steals from him his free 
 enjoyment, and tranquil form tempers his savage life 1 
 Is he not ever uniform in his designs, ever vacillating 
 in his decisions, selfish, without being yet himself, un- 
 restrained, without being free, a slave without sub- 
 serving a principle ? In this epoch the world is merely 
 fate to him, but no object ; all has an existence for 
 him, only so far as it makes him to exist: — what 
 neither gives nor takes, is to him non-extant. Every 
 phenomenon stands before him, single and isolated, 
 
116 
 
 AESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 as he finds himself in the scale of being. All that is, 
 is to him only through the emphasis of the moment ; 
 each change is to him a fresh creation, since, through 
 failure of the Necessary within, he wants that external 
 necessity, which gathers all mutable shapes into one 
 universe, and retains eternal law upon the stage, while 
 the individual melts away. In vain does nature dis- 
 play her rich manifoldness before his senses ; in her 
 majestic fulness he sees only his booty, in her power 
 and greatness only his foe. He either throws himself 
 upon the outward, invading it with wild desire, or the 
 outward presses ruinously upon him, and is thrust back 
 with aversion. In both cases direct contact is his re- 
 lation to the world of sense, and being for ever dis- 
 turbed by its pressure, unceasingly distressed by impe- 
 rious need, he finds rest nowhere but in exhaustion, 
 and no limits but in sated desire. 
 
 His truly are the Titan's mighty heart 
 And forceful life — a heritage assured ; 
 Yet God has forged a brazen ring around 
 His brow, and hidden from his gloomy eye 
 Patience and wisdom, counsel and restraint. 
 Each passion swells to madness, and unchecked 
 His madness rages. 1 
 
 Unacquainted with Ms own human dignity, he is far 
 from revering it in others, and conscious of his own 
 wild passion, he fears it in every creature that resem- 
 bles him. He never beholds others in himself, but 
 
 1 Altered from Goethe's " Iphigenie auf Tauris." A. I. Sc. iii. 
 
AESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 117 
 
 only himself in others ; and society, instead of ex- 
 panding him to a genus, only confines him more and 
 more closely to his individuality. Thus unworthily 
 restricted, he wanders through his starless life, till an 
 auspicious nature tosses the dull load of matter from 
 his beclouded senses, till reflection distinguishes him- 
 self from, things, and objects at last manifest them- 
 selves in his reflected consciousness. 
 
 This condition of rude nature as here portrayed, is 
 certainly not referrible to any particular age or nation ; 
 it is a mere idea, but one which in single features co- 
 incides most strictly with experience. We may say 
 that man was never in a condition so utterly brutal, 
 but he has never entirely avoided it. We find even in 
 the rudest subjects scarcely discernible traces of ra- 
 tional freedom, just as moments are not wanting in the 
 most cultivated, which remind us of that gloomy state 
 of nature. It is in fact peculiar to man, to combine 
 the highest and the lowest in his nature, and if his 
 dignity depends upon a rigid distinction of the one 
 from the other, his happiness depends upon an apt re- 
 moval of this distinction. Culture, which ought to har- 
 monize his dignity with his happiness, must then take 
 care to preserve the highest purity of these two princi- 
 ples in their most intimate union. 
 
 Therefore the first appearance of reason in man, is 
 not also the commencement of his humanity. That is 
 first determined by his freedom, and the reason first 
 begins by removing the limits to his sensuous depend- 
 ence ; a phenomenon which does not yet appear to me to 
 
118 
 
 ^ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 be unfolded according to its importance and universal- 
 ity. The reason, we know, makes itself recognized in 
 man by the demand of the absolute, (the self-grounded 
 and necessary), which, as it cannot be satisfied in any 
 single condition of his physical life, is compelled ut- 
 terly to leave to him the physical, and to ascend from 
 restricted reality to ideas. But although the real in- 
 tention of that demand is, to free him from the fetters 
 of time and elevate him from a sensuous to an ideal 
 world, yet through a misconception, (hardly avoidable 
 in this epoch of prevailing sensuousness), it may direct 
 itself toward the physical life, and, instead of making 
 man independent, plunge him in the most fearful 
 bondage. 
 
 And this in fact takes place. Man deserts the nar- 
 row limits of the present, in which mere animality had 
 enclosed him, upon the wings of imagination, with as- 
 pirations after a boundless future ; but while the infi- 
 nite dawns upon his dazzled imagination, his heart has 
 not yet ceased to live in the partial, and to serve the 
 present moment. The desire for the absolute sur- 
 prises him in the midst of his animality — and since all 
 his endeavors in this miserable condition tend only to- 
 wards the material and finite, and are restricted only 
 to his individual being, he is only induced by this de- 
 mand, to give his individuality a boundless extension, 
 instead of abandoning it — to strive after an exhaust- 
 less substance instead of form — after an ever during 
 mutation instead of the immutable, and after an abso- 
 lute establishment of his finite being. The same im- 
 
ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 119 
 
 pulse which inclines him to thought and action, which 
 ought to lead to truth and morality, now brings, when 
 related to his passivity and perception, nothing but a 
 boundless longing, an absolute need. The first fruits 
 then, which he earns in the spirit-world are care and 
 fear ; both being operations of reason, not of sensuous- 
 ness, — but of a reason which mistakes its object, and 
 applies its Imperative immediately to substance. All 
 unconditioned systems of happiness are fruits of this 
 tree — they may have for their object the present day 
 or a whole life, or, what makes them no more respect- 
 able, a whole eternity. A boundless duration of exist- 
 ence and well-being, merely for the sake of existence 
 and well-being, is only an ideal of desire — conse- 
 quently a demand which can only be started by an ani- 
 mality striving after the absolute. Without then gain- 
 ing anything for his humanity by such a manifestation 
 of reason, one loses thereby only the happy confine- 
 ment of the animal ; instead of which he merely pos- 
 sesses the unenviable advantage, of missing the posses- 
 sion of the present in his aspiration for the distant, and 
 yet without seeking in the whole boundless distance 
 anything but the present. 
 
 But even if the reason should not mistake its object, 
 nor err in its interrogation, yet sensuousness for a long 
 time would falsify the answer. As soon as man has 
 begun to use his intellect, and to combine the actual 
 modes around him, according to cause and design, the 
 reason, conformably to its ideas, insists upon an absolute 
 combination and an unconditioned cause. Man must 
 
120 
 
 ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 have already transgressed his sensuousness, before he 
 can only raise such a demand ; but this very demand 
 has the effect to bring back the wanderer. Here then 
 would be the point, where he must entirely desert the 
 world of sense, and soar to the realm of pure idea ; for 
 the intellect remains forever stationary within the con- 
 ditioned, forever interrogating, without arriving at a 
 result. But as the man, of whom we speak here, is 
 not yet capable of such an abstraction, whatever he 
 does not find in his sensuous cognitive sphere, or does 
 not yet seek above that in the sphere of pure reason, he 
 will seek and to all appearance find beneath that, within 
 his sphere of feeling. Sensuousness indeed shows him 
 nothing, which might be its own cause, or give law to 
 itself, but it shows him something, which knows of no 
 cause and respects no law. As then he can bring the 
 interrogating intellect to repose through no final and 
 interior cause, he brings it at least to silence through 
 the idea of causelessness ; and he remains stationary 
 within the blind necessitation of matter, as he cannot 
 yet comprehend the elevated necessity of reason. Since 
 sensuousness knows no other aim than its own interest, 
 and feels impelled to it by no other cause than blind 
 chance, it makes the former the determinator of its 
 actions, and the latter the ruler of the world. 
 
 Even moral law itself, the holy in man, cannot, at its 
 first appearance in the sensuous world, escape this cor- 
 ruption. As it is only prohibitory, and declares against 
 the interest of his sensuous self-love, it must seem to 
 him — so long as there is anything foreign, to which 
 
^ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 121 
 
 he has not attained — to regard that self-love as that 
 which is foreign, and the voice of reason as his true 
 self. He is then sensible only of the fetters which that 
 voice imposes upon him, not of the infinite freedom 
 which it creates for him. Without respecting in him- 
 self the dignity of a legislator, he is only sensible cf 
 the constraint and the powerless resistance of a subject. 
 Since the sensuous precedes the moral impulse in his 
 experience, he gives to the law of necessity a beginning 
 in time, a positive origin ; and makes, by the most un- 
 happy of all errors, the unchangeable and eternal in 
 himself an accident of the finite. He persuades him- 
 self to regard the ideas of right and wrong as statutes, 
 emanating from a will, and not valid in themselves and 
 to all eternity. As he transgresses nature in the ex- 
 planation of single natural phenomena, and seeks with- 
 out her, for that which can only be found in her inmost 
 conformableness, even so he transgresses reason in the 
 explanation of moral phenomena, and, while seeking in 
 this path a divinity, sacrifices his humanity. No won- 
 der, if a religion which is bought by a rejection of his 
 humanity, should prove worthy of such an origin, or if he 
 should not consider absolute nor binding to all eternity, 
 the laws which he did not hold binding from all eter- 
 nity. He has to do, not with a holy, but only with a 
 powerful, being. The spirit of his worship then is fear, 
 which debases him, and not reverence, which would 
 elevate him in his own estimation. 
 
 Although these manifold deviations of man from the 
 ideal of his destiny cannot exist in the same epoch, while 
 
122 
 
 ./ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 he is traversing many grades from voidness of reflec- 
 tion to error, from a lack of will to a perversity of will, 
 yet all these are proper* results of the physical condi- 
 tion, because in all men the life-impulse plays the mas- 
 ter over the form-impulse. But suppose that the reason 
 has not yet declared itself in man, and that the physi- 
 cal still sways him with blind necessity, or that the 
 reason has not yet sufficiently rid itself of the senses, 
 and that the moral yet serves the physical ; — in both 
 cases the only ruling principle within him is a mate- 
 rial one, and the man, at least according to his last 
 tendency, is a sensuous being — with this only differ- 
 ence, that in the first case he is an irrational, in the 
 second a rational, animal. But he should be neither, 
 he should be man. Nature should not govern him ex- 
 clusively, nor the reason conditionally. The legisla- 
 tion of both should subsist in a perfect independence 
 of the other, and yet in perfect harmony. 
 
TWENTY-FIFTH LETTER. 
 
 So long as man in his first physical condition, is 
 only passively receptive of the world of sense, only per- 
 ceives, he is still completely one with it ; and there is 
 no world for him, because he himself is only world. 
 If, in his aesthetical state, he places or contemplates it 
 beyond himself, his personality is for the first time dis- 
 tinct, and there appears to him a world, because he has 
 ceased to identify himself with it. 1 
 
 Contemplation (reflection) is the first unconstrained 
 relation of man to the universe which surrounds him. 
 While desire directly embraces its object, reflection re- 
 moves its own to a distance, and by thus anticipating 
 the passions, secures it for a true and inalienable pos- 
 session. The necessity of nature, which governed him 
 
 1 I have previously remarked, that both these periods are indeed 
 necessarily distinct in idea, but are more or less mingled in experi- 
 ence. And we must not imagine, that any time has occurred when 
 man found himself only in this physical condition, or a time when 
 he had entirely freed himself from it. As soon as man sees an object, 
 he is no longer in a condition merely physical, and so long as he will 
 continue to see an object, he will not entirely escape a physical state, 
 since his seeing only depends upon his perception. Those three mo- 
 ments which I mentioned in the commencement of the twenty-fourth 
 letter, are then, it is true, three different epochs for the development 
 of entire humanity, but they are to be distinguished in every single per- 
 ception of an object, and in a word, are the necessary conditions of 
 that knowledge which we obtain through the senses. 
 
124 
 
 ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 with absolute power in a merely perceptive condition, 
 is displaced by reflection — an instantaneous calm en- 
 sues in the senses ; time itself, the ever changing, is 
 stationary, while the scattered rays of consciousness are 
 gathered, and Form, an image of the infinite, is reflect- 
 ed from the mirror of the finite. As soon as it be- 
 comes light in man, all outward darkness vanishes; as 
 soon as inward calm possesses him, the storm in the 
 universe abates, and the conflicting powers of nature 
 find rest within permanent limits. No wonder then, 
 that the primitive poets spoke of this great occurrence 
 in the inward life, as of a revolution in the outward 
 world, and represented Thought, which subdues the de- 
 crees of Time, under the sensuous image of Jupiter, 
 terminating the reign of Saturn. 
 
 From being a slave of nature, while he only perceives 
 it, man becomes its lawgiver, as soon as he reflects 
 upon it. Nature which formerly ruled him only as 
 force, now stands before him as object. What is ob- 
 ject to him, has no power over him, since in order to 
 become object, it must experience his own (power). 
 So far and so long as he gives form to matter, he is 
 impassive to its operations ; because spirit can sustain 
 injury only from that which takes away its freedom, — 
 and he establishes his own freedom while fashioning the 
 formless. Fear has its seat, only where the mass pre- 
 vails, all rude and shapeless, its dim outlines wavering 
 between insecure limits ; man is superior to every chi- 
 mera of nature, as soon as he can give it form and con- 
 vert it into his object. As he begins to maintain his 
 
^ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 125 
 
 independence against nature as phenomenal, he also 
 maintains his dignity against nature as a force, and 
 rises with noble freedom against its deities. They cast 
 aside the spectre-masks, which had frightened his 
 childhood, and in representing his conceptions, sur- 
 prise him with his own image. The divine prodigy of 
 the oriental, which blindly ruled the world with brute 
 force, is fused beneath the Grecian fancy into the 
 friendly contour of humanity, the empire of the Titans 
 falls, and infinite power is tamed by infinite form. 
 
 But while I only sought an outlet from the material 
 world and an entrance into the spiritual, the course of 
 my imagination has already led me within the latter. 
 Beauty, which we seek, lies already behind us, and we 
 have overleaped it, in passing directly from mere life to 
 the pure shape and the pure object. Such a feat is not 
 in the power of human nature, to keep pace with 
 which, we must return again to the world of sense. 
 
 Beauty is entirely the work of free contemplation, 
 and we advance with it into the world of idea, — but, 
 what is worthy of notice, without thereby leaving the 
 sensuous world, as is the case in the recognition of 
 truth. The latter is the pure precipitate of all that is 
 material and accidental — pure object, having laid 
 aside all subjective limits, and pure self-activity un- 
 mixed with passivity. It is true, there is a return to 
 sensuousness from the highest abstraction, for thought 
 affects the inward perception, and the conception of 
 logical and moral unity results in a feeling of sensuous 
 agreement. But when we are pleased with cognitions, 
 
126 
 
 ^ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 we distinguish strictly our conception from our percep- 
 tion, and regard the latter as something contingent, 
 which might well be omitted, without our cognition 
 ceasing, or truth not becoming truth. But it would be 
 an utterly fruitless attempt, to wish to separate this re- 
 lation to the perceptive faculty from the conception of 
 Beauty ; for it is not sufficient to that purpose, to con- 
 sider one as the effect of the other, but we must regard 
 them both mutually and at the same time as effect and 
 as cause. In our satisfaction at cognitions we distin- 
 guish without trouble the passage from activity to p as- 
 sivity, and actually observe that the first is over, when 
 the latter appears. On the contrary, in our delight at 
 Beauty no such succession between activity and pas- 
 sivity can be distinguished, and reflection is here so 
 thoroughly blended with feeling, that we think the form 
 is directly perceivable. Beauty then is indeed object 
 for us, since reflection is the condition by which we 
 perceive it ; but at the same time it is a condition of 
 our subject, because feeling is the condition by which 
 we have a conception of it. Then it is form indeed, 
 since we contemplate it, but at the same time it is life, 
 since we feel it. In a word, it is at the same time our 
 condition and our act. 
 
 And because it is both at the same time, it affords us 
 a triumphant proof, that passivity by no means excludes 
 activity, or matter form, or the limited the infinite, — 
 that consequently the moral freedom of man is by no 
 means abolished by his necessary physical dependence. 
 It proves this, and I may add, it alone can prove it to 
 
^ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 127 
 
 us. Since perception is not necessarily one with re- 
 flection, in the enjoyment of truth or of logical unity, 
 but conditionally follows upon it, so it can only prove 
 to us, that a sensuous may follow upon a rational na- 
 ture, and inversely, — not that both may exist together 
 — not that they influence each other reciprocally — 
 not that they are absolutely and necessarily to be com- 
 bined. On the contrary we must rather infer from this 
 exclusion of feeling, and perceive from that exclusion 
 of thought, that it results from an incompatibility in 
 both their natures, that is, so long as the analyst can 
 really adduce no better proof for the deduction of pure 
 reason in humanity, than that it is so ordained. But 
 since now an actual association and interchange of mat- 
 ter with form, and of passivity with activity, precedes 
 enjoyment of Beauty or of asthctic unity, it follows that 
 we demonstrate thereby the compatibility of both na- 
 tures, the practicability of the infinite in the finite — 
 consequently, the possibility of the noblest humanity. 
 
 Then we need be no longer embarrassed to find a 
 passage from sensuous dependence to moral freedom, 
 when it occurs, by means of Beauty, that the latter may 
 perfectly consist with the former, and man, to manifest 
 himself as spirit, need not shun matter. But if he is 
 already free in communion with sensuousness, as the 
 fact of Beauty teaches, and if freedom is something ab" 
 solute and supersensuous, qualities that necessarily ac- 
 company its idea — then there can be no longer a ques- 
 tion, how he may succeed in elevating himself from the 
 ^ limited to the absolute, in opposing to sensuousness his 
 
 # 
 
123 
 
 ./ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 reflection and volition, since it has already been brought 
 to pass through Beauty. In a word, we need no longer 
 ask, how he passes from Beauty to truth, because the 
 ability to do so already exists in the former — but, how 
 he may construct a passage from a common to an aes- 
 thetic reality, — from a sense of mere life to a sense of 
 Beauty. 
 
TWENTY-SIXTH LETTER. 
 
 As the aesthetic inclination of the mind, as I have 
 explained in the preceding letters, gives the first im- 
 pulse to freedom, it is easy to perceive that it cannot re- 
 sult from freedom, and consequently can have no moral 
 origin. It must be a gift of nature ; favoring accident 
 alone can loose the bonds of the physical condition, 
 and lead the savage to the shrine of Beauty. 
 
 The germ of Beauty will unfold, as little where a 
 penurious nature robs man of every solace, as where a 
 prodigal one releases him from every proper exertion 
 — as little where dull sensuousness feels no want, as 
 where violent desire finds no satiety. The tender bud 
 will lovingly expand, not where man the troglodyte 
 immures himself in caverns, forever single, and never 
 finding humanity beyond himself, nor where man the 
 nomad roves in caravans, forever plural, and never 
 finding humanity within himself — but there only, where 
 he communes with himself in his own dwelling, and 
 when he issues from it, speaks in sympathy with the 
 whole race. Where a genial climate prepares the 
 senses for every tender emotion, and invigorating 
 warmth inspires exuberant matter — where the reign 
 of blind substance in the lifeless creation is already 
 overthrown, and triumphant form ennobles even the 
 basest natures, — in those fortunate circumstances and 
 9 
 
130 
 
 ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 in that favored zone, where only activity leads to plea- 
 sure, and only pleasure to activity, where heavenly or- 
 der flows out of life itself, and only life unfolds itself 
 from the law of order, where the imagination forever 
 shuns reality, and yet is never untrue to the simplicity 
 of nature, — there alone will sense and spirit, percep- 
 tive and creative power, display themselves in that 
 happy equality, which is the soul of Beauty and the 
 condition of humanity. 
 
 And what phenomenon is that, by which the access of 
 the savage to humanity announces itself? So far as 
 we consult history, we find it the same in all races, who 
 have arisen from the slavery of the animal condition — 
 delight in show, inclination for ornament and for play. 
 
 The greatest stupidity and the greatest intelligence 
 have herein a certain affinity with each other, that both 
 seek only the solid, and are utterly insensible to mere 
 show. The former can be waked from its repose, only 
 by the immediate sensible presence of an object, and 
 the latter can be brought to repose, only by tracing 
 back its ideas to the data of experience ; in a word, 
 dulness can never lift itself above reality, and intellect 
 can never remain stationary beneath the truth. So far 
 then as need of reality and attachment to the actual are 
 results of deficiency, so far is indifference to reality and 
 interest in show a true enlargement of humanity and a 
 decisive step towards culture. In the first place, it is 
 a production of an external freedom ; for the imagina- 
 tion is bound with tight fetters to the actual, so long as 
 necessity controls and want is pressing; and it displays 
 
/ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 131 
 
 its unlimited faculties only when want is appeased. 
 But it is also produced by an internal freedom, since it 
 reveals to us a power, which is put into motion by 
 itself, independently of an external substance, and 
 which possesses sufficient energy to repel the approaches 
 of matter. The reality of things is the work of things ; 
 the show of things is the work of man: and a mind 
 that is entertained with show, is no longer pleased by 
 that which it receives, but by that which it does. 
 
 It is self-evident, that we here speak only of aesthetic 
 show, which we distinguish from reality and truth, and 
 not of logical show, which we confound with them — the 
 former of which we consequently love, because it is 
 show, and not because we esteem it anything better. 
 The first only is play, as the last is merely deceit. To 
 attach any consequence to show of the first kind, can 
 never injure truth, since we never incur the risk of 
 substituting it for that which is the only method of in- 
 juring truth — namely, a contempt for all the fine arts 
 generally, whose existence depends upon show. Mean- 
 while it sometimes happens to the intellect, to carry its 
 zeal for reality to just such a pitch of intolerance, and 
 to condemn all the fine arts of show, because it is 
 merely show ; but this only happens when the intellect 
 recollects the above supposed affinity. I will take this 
 opportunity to speak particularly of the necessary lim- 
 its of show in the fine arts. 
 
 Nature itself is that which elevates man from reality 
 to show, in providing him with two senses, which con- 
 duct him, only through show, to a knowledge of the ac- 
 
132 
 
 .ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 tual. Importunate matter is repelled from the senses 
 by the eye and ear, and the object with which we come 
 in direct contact through the lower senses, is placed at 
 a distance. What we see by the eye, is different from 
 that which we perceive ; for the intellect overleaps the 
 medium (light) and apprehends the objects. The ob- 
 ject of touch is a force, which we suffer ; the object of 
 the eye and ear is a form, which we create. While 
 man is yet a savage, he finds pleasure only in the sense 
 of feeling, which, in this period, the sense of show only 
 subserves. Either he does not elevate himself to see- 
 ing, or he finds no satisfaction in it. As soon as he 
 begins to enjoy with the eye, and seeing acquires for 
 him a substantial value, he is aesthetically free, and the 
 play-impulse has developed itself. 
 
 As soon as the play-impulse has become active, 
 which finds satisfaction in show, the imitative forming 
 impulse ensues, which treats show as something sub- 
 stantial. When man has so far succeeded, as to dis- 
 tinguish show from reality, form from body, he is in a 
 condition to separate them from himself; which, in dis- 
 tinguishing them, he has already done. Then the abil- 
 ity for imitative art is generally bestowed with the 
 ability to appreciate form ; the motive to this depends 
 upon another tendency, which I need not discuss here. 
 Whether the aesthetic art-impulse should unfold itself 
 early or late, will depend only upon the degree of love, 
 with which man is capable of contenting himself with 
 mere show. 
 
 As all actual existence is referrible to nature, as a 
 
^ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 133 
 
 foreign force, but all show to man originally, as crea- 
 tive subject, he exercises only his absolute right of 
 possession, when he reclaims show from the actual, 
 and deals with it according to his own laws. He can 
 unite with unbounded freedom what nature has sepa- 
 rated, if it only unites in his reflection, and can separate 
 what nature has combined, if he can only make the 
 distinction in his understanding. Here nothing need 
 be inviolate to him, but his own law — if he only re- 
 gards the boundary line which divides his province 
 from actual existence or the laws of nature. 
 
 He exercises the human right of sovereignty in the 
 art of show, and the more strictly he there makes the 
 distinction of mine and thine, the more carefully he 
 separates shape from actual existence, and the more 
 substantiality he knows how to give it, so much the 
 more will he not only enlarge the sphere of Beauty, but 
 preserve the limits of truth itself; for he cannot purify 
 show from reality, without at the same time making 
 reality independent of show. 
 
 But he really possesses this sovereign right only in 
 the world of shotv, in the unsubstantial realm of the 
 imagination, and only so long as he scrupulously ab- 
 stains theoretically, from predicating Existence thereon, 
 and so long as he renounces practically, any attempt at 
 imparting Existence thereby. Hence you see, that the 
 poet transgresses his proper limits, equally when he im- 
 putes existence to his ideal, and when he designs 
 thereby a determinate existence. For he cannot ac- 
 complish both any otherwise than either by exceed- 
 
134 
 
 ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 ing his poetic right, encroaching into province of ex- 
 perience through the ideal, and pretending to define 
 existence through the mere possibility of actual exist- 
 ence, — or by resigning his poetic right, allowing ex- 
 perience to encroach upon the province of the ideal, 
 and confining possible detenninableness to the condi- 
 tions of reality. 
 
 Show is aesthetic, only so far as it is upright (posi- 
 tively renouncing all claims to reality), and only so far 
 as it is inch pendent (dispensing with all support of 
 reality). As soon as it is false and feigns reality, and 
 as soon as it is adulterated, and requires reality for its 
 operation, it is nothing but a vile instrument for mate- 
 rial purposes, and can demonstrate nothing for freedom 
 of the spirit. An restc, it is not necessary, that the 
 object in which we find the show qf Beauty, should be 
 destitute of reality, if only in our judgment we have 
 no regard to this reality ; for so far as we regard that, 
 it is not aBsthetical. Indeed an animate female beauty 
 will charm us as well and perhaps a little better, than 
 a mere picture, however beautiful ; but in so far as it 
 pleases us better than the latter, it pleases us no more 
 as independent show, it pleases no more the pure, 
 aesthetic feeling, which the living may please only as an 
 actual mode, the actual only as idea : but in fact a dis- 
 proportionately higher degree of polite culture is re- 
 quired, to perceive in the living itself only the pure 
 show, than to dispense with life in the latter. 
 
 In whatever single man or whole people we find the 
 upright and independent show, there we may infer the 
 
AESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 135 
 
 existence of spirit and taste and every congenial excel- 
 lence, — there we may see the ideal swaying the actual, 
 honor triumphing over worldly possession, reflection 
 over enjoyment, and the dream of immortality over ex- 
 istence. There the public voice will be the only fear- 
 ful thing, and an olive-wreath more honorable than a 
 purple robe. Only impotency and perversity take re- 
 fuge in false and needy show ; and single men as well 
 as whole people, who either " assist reality by show or 
 (aesthetic) show by reality " — both are intimately allied 
 — prove at the same time their moral worthlessness 
 and their aesthetic incapacity. 
 
 To the question then, " how far may shoio exist in 
 the moral world" the answer is both brief and conclu- 
 sive, in so far as it is aesthetic show, that is, show which 
 will neither spurn reality nor needs to be spurned by 
 it. Then aesthetic show can never become dangerous 
 to the truth of morality ; and where we find it other- 
 wise, it can be shown without difficulty, that the show 
 was not aesthetical. For example, none but a stranger 
 to polite intercourse, would regard the assurances of 
 civility, which is an universal form, as tokens of personal 
 regard, and when deceived, find fault with the decep- 
 tion. But only a bungler in polite intercourse would 
 call falsehood to his aid, in order to be polite, and flat- 
 ter, in order to be agreeable. A sense for independ- 
 ent show is wauting in the first, hence he can only 
 give significance to it by supposing it reality ; and re- 
 ality is wanting to the second, and he would readily 
 compensate it by show. 
 
136 
 
 AESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 Nothing is more common, than to hear from certain 
 frivolous critics of the age the complaint, that all so- 
 lidity has vanished from the world, and that the essence 
 is neglected for the show. Although I do not feel my- 
 self called upon, to vindicate the age against this as- 
 persion, it is sufficiently evident from the wide exten- 
 sion which these severe censors give to their complaint, 
 that they not only blame the age for the false, but also for 
 the upright show : anil even the exceptions which they 
 make at any time in favor of Beauty, relate rather to 
 dependent than to independent show. They not only 
 inveigh against the deceitful coloring, which conceals 
 the truth and pretends to spurn reality ; they also wax 
 violent against the beneficent show, which fills vacuity 
 and covers wretchedness, and against that ideal, which 
 ennobles a common reality. A false morality justly 
 orfends their austere sense of truth ; only it is a pity, 
 that they should esteem courtesy a part of this falseness. 
 They are displeased that external glitter so often eclipses 
 true merit, but they are no less chagrined, that we should 
 demand show from merit, and not excuse the internal ca- 
 pacity from manifesting agreeable form. They miss the 
 hearty, the substantial and the cordial of former times, 
 but they might also see restored the sharpness and 
 coarseness of the first manners, the ungainliness of old 
 forms, and the old gothic exuberance. By criticisms 
 of this kind they evince a respect for substance in itself, 
 unworthy of a humanity, which rather should value 
 material only so far as it is susceptible of receiving 
 shape and of enlarging the realm of ideas. Then the 
 
AESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 137 
 
 taste of the century need not lend a ready ear to such 
 voices, if it only in other respects stands before a bet- 
 ter tribunal. Not that we impute a value to aesthetic 
 show (we have long done this imperfectly), but that we 
 have not yet applied it to pure show, that we have not 
 sufficiently distinguished existence from phenomenon, 
 thereby settling the boundaries of both forever, — this 
 it is, with which a rigorous judge of Beauty might re- 
 proach us. And this reprehension we shall deserve, 
 so long as we cannot enjoy the beautiful in animated 
 nature, without coveting it, or admire the beautiful in 
 imitative art, without demanding its utility — so long as 
 we allow no single, absolute legislation to the fancy, 
 and direct it to its own dignity, by the respect which 
 we create for its works. 
 
TWENTY-SEVENTH LETTER. 
 
 Fear nothing for reality and truth, if the lofty idea 
 which I have inculcated in the preceding letters upon 
 aesthetic show, should become universal. It will not 
 become so, so long as man is sufficiently unpolished, to 
 be able to abuse it ; and should it become so, it can 
 only be effected by a culture which at the same time 
 makes every abuse impossible. More power of ab- 
 straction, more freedom of heart, more energy of will 
 is demanded in striving for independent show, than man 
 requires in restricting himself to reality ; and the latter 
 must already lie behind him, if he would press forward to 
 the former. How badly then would he calculate, who 
 should take the road to the ideal, in order to avoid the 
 road to the actual ! Then we might not have much 
 to dread for reality, from show, as it is here represent- 
 ed ; but so much the more fear for show from reality. 
 Chained to the material, man is all this time only serv- 
 ing his own designs, before he allows to show a special 
 personality in the art of the Ideal. He requires for the 
 last a total revolution in his whole mode of perception, 
 without which he would never find himself on the icay 
 to the ideal. Where then we discover a disinterested, 
 free estimation of pure show, we can there infer such 
 an inversion of his nature and the proper commence- 
 
ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 139 
 
 ment of humanity. But traces of this kind are really 
 found in the first rude trials which he makes for the re- 
 finement of his being, — made too at the risk of impair- 
 ing its sensuous capacity. Generally as soon as he be- 
 gins to prefer shape to substance, and hazard reality 
 for show (but which therefore he must recognize), the 
 circle of his animal being uncloses, and he finds him- 
 self upon a path that never ends. 
 
 Not content with that only which satisfies nature 
 and meets the present need, he desires a superfluity ; 
 at first indeed only a superfluity of substance, in order 
 to hide from desire its true limits, and to insure enjoy- 
 ment enough for the present want, but soon a super- 
 fluity in the substance, an aesthetic surplus, in order to 
 content also the form-impulse, and to extend enjoy- 
 ment to every possible want. When only collecting 
 material for a future use and anticipating this in im- 
 agination, he transgresses indeed the present moment, 
 but without transgressing time ; he enjoys more, but 
 still no differently than before. But while he draws 
 shape into his enjoyment, and at the same time regards 
 the form of objects which satisfy his desires, he has not 
 only enhanced his enjoyment in extent and degree, but 
 also ennobled it in hind. 
 
 Indeed, nature has already yielded necessity to the 
 irrational, and cast a gleam of freedom into the gloom 
 of animal existence. If no hunger gnaws the lion, and 
 no beast of prey provokes to battle, his slumbering 
 energy creates for itself an object ; he fills the echoing 
 waste with vehement roaring, and his exuberant power 
 
140 
 
 ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 satiates itself in an aimless effusion. The insect re- 
 vels joyously in the sunshine, and certainly it is not 
 the note of desire only which we hear in the bird's 
 melodious warbling. In these emotions there is unde- 
 niable freedom, but not generally freedom from need, 
 only from a definite, external need. The beast labors, 
 when a want is the incitement to its activity, and it 
 plays, when profusion of vigor is this incitement, when 
 superfluous life is its own stimulus to activity. Even 
 in inanimate nature, such a luxury of power and laxity 
 of determinateness is manifest, which in that material 
 sense we may properly call play. The tree puts forth 
 countless buds, which are never developed, and extends 
 more roots, twigs and leaves for nourishment, than are 
 demanded for its individual preservation or that of its 
 species. Whatever of its prodigal fulness it restores 
 unused and unenjoyed to the elements, may be lavish- 
 ed by animate nature in joyous emotion. Thus nature 
 already gives us in its material kingdom a prelude of 
 the unlimited, and removes there the fetters in part, 
 which in the kingdom of Form it entirely throws aside. 
 It finds a passage to aesthetic play from the constraint of 
 need, or physical seriousness, through the constraint of 
 superfluity, or physical play ; and before it soars in the 
 lofty freedom of Beauty away from the fetters of each 
 design, it approaches this state of independence, at 
 least from afar, in the free emotion, which is both end 
 and means. 
 
 The imagination of man, like his corporeal organs, 
 has also its free emotion and its material play, in which 
 
^ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 141 
 
 it merely enjoys its native power and liberty, without 
 any reference to shape. Yet so far as this play of 
 fancy includes nothing of form, and its whole attraction 
 consists in an unconstrained flow of images, it pertains, 
 although peculiar to man alone, merely to his animal 
 life, and only demonstrates his immunity from every 
 external sensuous constraint, without yet developing an 
 independent creative power. 1 The imagination in its 
 attempt at a formal freedom, makes at length a leap to 
 aesthetic play, from this free play of ideas, which is of 
 a kind entirely material, and is explained by the sim- 
 ple laws of nature. We must call it a leap, since an 
 entirely new power comes here into requisition ; for 
 the directing spirit for the first time interferes in the 
 operations of a blind instinct, subjects the arbitrary pro- 
 cess of the imagination to its immutable, eternal unity, 
 and infuses its self-dependence into the changeable, 
 
 1 Most of the sports which are in vogue in common life, depend 
 either entirely upon this feeling of the free play of ideas, or derive 
 from it their greatest attraction. But however little it evinces in it- 
 self a higher nature, and however readily the weakest souls are ac- 
 customed to resign themselves to this free current of images, yet this 
 independence of the fancy of external impressions, is at least the neg- 
 ative condition for its creative faculty. The plastic art elevates it- 
 self to the ideal, only while tearing itself from reality, and the ima- 
 gination must have freed itself from foreign laws, by its reproductive 
 process, before it can act according to its own laws, in its productive 
 quality. Indeed a still greater step is to be taken from mere lawless- 
 ness to a self-dependent internal conformity, — and an entirely new 
 power, the ability for ideas, must here be brought into play : but this 
 power can now unfold itself with more facility, since the senses do 
 not oppose it, and the indefinite borders, at least negatively, upon the 
 infinite. 
 
142 
 
 .ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 and its infiniteness into the sensuous. But so long as 
 rude nature, which knows no other law than restlessly 
 to hasten from change to change, is still too powerful, 
 it will oppose that necessity by its unsteady caprice, 
 that stability by its unrest, that self-dependence by its 
 neediness, and that elevated simplicity by its insatiety. 
 Then the aesthetic play-impulse will be hardly recog- 
 nized in its first attempts, as the sensuous impulse in- 
 cessantly interposes with its capricious humor and its 
 wild desire. Hence we see the uncultivated taste em- 
 bracing first the novel and surprising, the extravagant, 
 wonderful and bizarre, the vehement and wild; and 
 avoiding nothing so much as calmness and simplicity. 
 It fashions grotesque shapes, delights in harsh transi- 
 tions, exuberant forms, dazzling contrasts, glaring 
 lights, pathetic tones. In this epoch it only calls that 
 beautiful which excites it, which gives it substance, — 
 but which excites to a self-acting opposition, and gives 
 it substance for a possible image, for otherwise it would 
 not possess for it the character of Beauty. Then a re- 
 markable alteration takes place in the form of its de- 
 cisions ; it seeks these objects not since they give it 
 something to endure, but something to act upon ; they 
 please it not because they meet a want, but because 
 they satisfy a law which speaks, although still gently, 
 in its bosom. 
 
 Soon man is no longer satisfied, that things please 
 him ; he himself wishes to please, at first indeed only 
 by that which is his own, but finally by that which he 
 is. What he possesses or produces, need bear no 
 
ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 143 
 
 longer the traces of servitude, the straightened form of 
 his design ; next to the service which it renders, it 
 must also reflect the ingenious intellect which con- 
 ceived it, the ready hand which performed it, and the 
 serene and free spirit which selected and expressed it. 
 Now the ancient German seeks for splendid skins, 
 stately antlers, ornamental drinking horns; and the 
 Caledonian chooses the finest cockles for his feasts. 
 Weapons themselves need no longer be mere objects 
 of terror, but of pleasure also, and the cunning shoul- 
 der-belt will be no less noticeable, than the deadly edge 
 of the sword. Not content with introducing an ces- 
 thetic surplus into the necessary, the play-impulse 
 finally rids itself entirely from the fetters of exigency, 
 and Beauty for her own sake becomes the object of its 
 endeavor. Man adorns himself. Unconstrained joy is 
 reckoned among his wants, and the unnecessary soon 
 makes the best part of his pleasures. 
 
 As form gradually approaches him from without, in 
 his dwelling, his furniture, his garments, it begins at 
 last to take possession of himself, — at first only trans- 
 forming the outward, at last also the inward man. 
 The unchartered elasticity of joy resolves itself into the 
 dance, shapeless gesture into a graceful, harmonious 
 language of action ; the chaos of sound unfolds itself 
 to the perception, and begins to obey time and ac- 
 knowledge harmony. The Trojan host stormed forth 
 to the battle field with shrill cries like an army of 
 cranes, but the Greeks approached with a calm and 
 noble movement. There we see only the excess of 
 
144 
 
 ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 blind force, here the triumph of form and the simple 
 majesty of law. 
 
 Now a fairer necessity knits the sexes together, and 
 sympathy of heart assists in preserving the alliance, 
 which was only begun by the capricious and fickle 
 moods of desire. Shape, released from its gloomy fet- 
 ters, is recognized by the tranquil eye, soul looks into 
 soul, and a generous interchange of inclination sup- 
 plants a selfish traffic in pleasure. Desire enlarges and 
 elevates itself to love, as humanity beams from its ob- 
 ject ; and a sordid advantage over sense is despised for 
 a nobler triumph over will. The need of pleasing sub- 
 jects the man of force to the mild jurisdiction of taste ; 
 he can make booty of pleasure, but love must be a gift. 
 He can only strive to reach this loftier prize through 
 form, and not through matter. He must cease to af- 
 fect, as a force, the feeling, and as phenomenon, to op- 
 pose the intellect ; if he would satisfy freedom, he must 
 concede it. As Beauty nullifies the conflict of nature 
 in its simplest and purest example, in the eternal con- 
 trariety of sex, so also it nullifies it — or at least tends 
 to do so — in the complicated whole of society, and 
 to reconcile all the gentle and the violent in the moral 
 world, according to the model of that free union which 
 it forms between manly power and womanly tenderness. 
 Weakness now becomes inviolate, and licentious 
 strength is rebuked ; the generosity of knightly manners 
 ameliorates the right of nature. The graceful blush of 
 modesty disarms the one whom no force can terrify, 
 and tears quench a revenge which no blood could ap- 
 
ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 145 
 
 pease. Hatred itself regards the gentle appeal of 
 honor, the sword of the conqueror spares a disarmed 
 foe, and a hospitable hearth smokes for the stranger, on 
 the dreaded shore where death was once his only 
 welcome. 
 
 The aesthetic formative impulse establishes insensibly 
 a third joyous empire of play and of show, between the 
 formidable realm of powers and the sacred realm of 
 l aw — a n empire wherein it releases man from all the 
 fetters of circumstance, and frees him, both physically 
 and morally, from all that can be called constraint. 
 
 If man, in the dynamical state of right, meets man as 
 a power, and circumscribes his operations, or opposes 
 him in the ethical state of duty with the majesty of 
 law, and fetters his will, — he need only appear to him 
 in the circle of polished intercourse, in the aesthetic 
 state, as shape, only confront him as an object for the 
 free play-impulse. To give freedom by freedom is the 
 fundamental law of this empire. 
 
 The dynamical state can only make society possible, 
 while restraining nature by nature ; the ethical state 
 can only make it (morally) necessary, while subjecting 
 the single to the universal will ; the aesthetic state 
 alone can make it actual, since it fulfils the will of the 
 whole through the nature of the individual. If need 
 already impels man to society, and reason plants social 
 principles within him, yet Beauty alone can impart to 
 him a social character. Taste alone introduces har- 
 mony into society, since it establishes harmony in the 
 individual. All other representative forms mutilate 
 10 
 
146 
 
 ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 man, since they are founded either exclusively upon 
 the sensuous, or upon the spiritual part of his being ; 
 only the expression of Beauty makes a whole out of 
 him, since thereto, both his natures must harmonize. 
 All other forms of communication mutilate society, 
 since they relate either exclusively to the private sus- 
 ceptibility, or to the dexterity of single members — con- 
 sequently, to that which is distinctive between man 
 and man ; only the communication of Beauty can com- 
 bine society, since it relates to that which is common 
 to all. We enjoy the pleasures of sense only as indi- 
 viduals, without the participation of the generic nature 
 which dwells within us ; then we cannot extend to uni- 
 versality our sensuous pleasures, because we cannot 
 make our individuality universal. We enjoy the 
 pleasures of cognition only generically, and while 
 carefully removing from our judgment every trace of 
 the individual ; then we cannot make our rational 
 pleasures universal, because we cannot exclude, as 
 from our own judgment, the traces of individuality in 
 that of others. Beauty alone we enjoy at the same 
 time as individual and as genus ; that is, as represent- 
 atives of the race. Sensuous good can only make one 
 happy person, since it founds itself upon inclination, 
 which is always accompanied by exclusion ; and it can 
 only make this one partially happy, because the person- 
 ality does not participate. Absolute good can make 
 happy only under conditions, which are not universally 
 to be predicated ; for truth is only the reward of de- 
 nial, and only a pure heart believes in a pure will. 
 
./ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 147 
 
 Beauty alone blesses all the world, and every being for- 
 gets its limitations, while under her enchantment. 
 
 No preeminence, no absolute monarchy is tolerated, 
 so far as taste governs, and the empire of beauty in 
 show is diffused. This empire extends upwards to the 
 place where reason rules with absolute necessity, abol- 
 ishing all matter ; and downwards where the native 
 impulse controls with blind necessitation, and form is 
 still in embryo ; nay, taste itself still preserves its execu- 
 tive power upon these distant confines, where its legis- 
 lative power is taken away. Isolated desires must re- 
 nounce their selfishness, and the agreeable, which other- 
 wise only entices the senses, must also cast the toils of 
 grace over the spirit. Duty, the stern voice of neces- 
 sity, must alter its reproachful formula, which resist- 
 ance alone can justify, and honor willing nature by a 
 nobler confidence. Taste conducts knowledge from 
 the mysteries of science forth beneath the open heaven 
 of common sense, and converts the property of the 
 schools into a common good for the whole human 
 family. Even the loftiest genius must resign its par- 
 ticular elevation, and descend familiarly to the compre- 
 hension of a child. Power must submit while the 
 Graces bind it, and the self-willed lion must obey the 
 reins of Love. To this end it draws its favoring veil 
 over physical need, which offends the dignity of a free 
 spirit in its naked shape, and conceals from us the de- 
 grading relationship with matter, by a delicious illusion 
 of freedom. Even mercenary art, borrowing its wings, 
 lifts itself from the dust ; and the fetters of corporeity, 
 
14S ESTHETIC CULTURE. 
 
 touched by its wand, drop from the inanimate as well 
 as animate. In the aesthetic state, all, even the sub- 
 serving tool, is a free citizen, possessing equal rights 
 with the noblest ; and the intellect, which forcibly 
 moulds the passive mass to its designs, must consult 
 with it concerning its destination. Here, then, in the 
 empire of aesthetic show, is that ideal of equality ful- 
 filled, which the enthusiast would so gladly see realized 
 in actual life ; and if it is true, that polite manners at- 
 tain their earliest and most perfect maturity, in the 
 vicinity of the throne, we must also recognize here the 
 benevolent dispensation, which often appears to restrict 
 man in the actual, only to excite his development in 
 the ideal, world. 
 
 But does such a state of beauty in show exist, and 
 where is it to be found ? In every finely strung soul it 
 exists as a necessity ; but as a fact, one would rind it, 
 like the pure church and the pure republic, only in 
 select circles, where the demeanor is formed, not by 
 the lifeless imitation of foreign manners, but by the in- 
 trinsic beauty of nature, — where man passes through 
 the most intricate circumstances with cool simplicity 
 and tranquil innocence, and is neither compelled to 
 insult another's freedom, in order to maintain his own, 
 nor to manifest grace at the expense of dignity. 
 
UPON 
 
 THE NECESSARY LIMITS 
 
 IN THE USE OF 
 
 BEAUTIFUL FORMS. 
 
LIMITS 
 
 OF TASTE. 
 
 The abuse of Beauty, and the pretensions of the 
 imagination to appropriate for itself the legislative, 
 where it only possesses the executive, power, have been 
 so detrimental both in life and in science, that it is of 
 the utmost importance properly to define the limits, 
 which are requisite to the use of beautiful forms. 
 These limits are already embraced in the nature of 
 Beauty, and we need only call to mind how taste exerts 
 its influence, to be able to define liow far it may ex- 
 tend it. 
 
 The operations of taste are generally undertaken, 
 to bring into harmony, and to combine in an internal 
 alliance, the sensuous and spiritual powers of man. 
 Where then such an internal alliance between reason 
 and sense has a legitimate design, an influence is to be 
 allowed to taste. But suppose cases, where, either to 
 accomplish a design, or to satisfy a duty, we must act 
 as pure rational beings, free from all sensuous influ- 
 ence, and where then the alliance between spirit and 
 
152 
 
 LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 matter must be for the time destroyed, — there taste 
 finds its limits, which it cannot transgress, without 
 either frustrating a design, or removing us from our 
 duty. But such cases actually occur, and they are 
 already prescribed to us in our destiny. 
 
 Our destiny (Bestimmung) is, to acquire cognitions 
 and to act from them. For both a dexterity is requi- 
 site, to exclude the sense from that which the spirit 
 does, since perception must be abstracted from every 
 cognition, and desire from every moral volition. 
 
 When we cognize, we are in a state of activity, and 
 our attention is directed to an object, to a relation be- 
 tween separate modes. When we perceive, we are in 
 a state of passivity, and our attention (so to call that, 
 which is not a conscious operation of the spirit) is only 
 directed to our condition, so far as that is affected 
 by being receptive of an impression. As we can only 
 perceive and not cognize Beauty, we remark in it no 
 relation to other objects, and refer its mode ( Vorstel- 
 lung) not to other modes, but to our perceptive self. 
 We experience nothing in a beautiful object, but from 
 it we experience a change in our condition, of which 
 perception is the expression. Then our knowledge is 
 not extended by decisions of taste, and no cognition, 
 not even of Beauty itself, is obtained by the percep- 
 tion of Beauty. Where then cognition is the aim, 
 taste can be of no service to us, at least no direct and 
 immediate service ; rather is cognition discontinued, 
 just so long as we are occupied with Beauty. 
 
 But it will be objected, of what service then is an 
 
LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 153 
 
 elegant investiture of ideas, if the intention of the ex- 
 position, which can be nothing else than to educe cog- 
 nition, is rather thereby hindered than assisted ? 
 
 Certainly, beauty of investiture can promote intel- 
 lectual conviction just as little as the elegant arrange- 
 ment of a repast serves to satiate the guest, or the 
 exterior polish of a man to decide his internal worth. 
 But just as on the one hand, the fine disposition of a 
 table entices the appetite, and on the other, a recom- 
 mendatory exterior generally awakes and excites atten- 
 tion to the man, so by an attractive exhibition of truth 
 we are favorably inclined to open our soul to it ; and 
 the hindrances in our disposition, which otherwise 
 would have opposed the difficult prosecution of a 
 long and rigorous chain of thought, are removed. The 
 subject never gains by beauty of form, nor is the under- 
 standing assisted in its cognition by taste. The sub- 
 ject must recommend itself directly to the understand- 
 ing through itself, while beauty of form addresses the 
 imagination, and flatters it with a show of freedom. 
 
 But this innocent condescension toward the senses, 
 which is only allowable in the form, without thereby 
 changing the subject at all, is subjected to great re- 
 strictions, and can be completely destructive of design, 
 according to the kind of cognition and the degree of 
 conviction which one proposes in communicating his 
 thoughts. 
 
 There is a scientific cognition, which rests upon 
 positive ideas and recognized principles, and a popular 
 cognition, which only depends upon feelings more or 
 
154 LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 less developed. What is often very conducive to the 
 latter, may be diametrically opposed to the former. 
 
 Where one seeks to effect a strict conviction from 
 principles, it is not done by displaying truth only 
 according to the subject, but the proofs of truth must 
 also be contained with it, in the form of the exposition. 
 But this means nothing else than that not only the sub- 
 ject, but also its statement, must be in conformity to the 
 laws of thought. The conceptions must also be united 
 in the exposition with the same rigid necessity with 
 which they depend upon each other in the intellect, 
 and stability in statement must correspond to stability 
 in idea. But now that freedom, which is allowed to 
 the imagination in cognitions, strives with the rigid 
 necessity, according to which the intellect concate- 
 nates its judgments and conclusions. The imagination 
 continually strives, in conformity with its nature, after 
 intuitions — that is, after complete and universally 
 definite representations, and is incessantly employed 
 in exhibiting the universal in a single case, confining 
 it to space and time, securing to the conception an 
 individuality, and giving the abstract a corporeity. It 
 likes freedom, too, in its combinations, and thus re- 
 cognizes no other law than the serial chance of space 
 and time ; for this is the only principle of coherency, 
 which remains to us in our representations, if we rea- 
 son away all that is conception, all that internally 
 connects them. In a manner quite the reverse, the 
 intellect is busied with partial representations or con- 
 ceptions, and its endeavors tend to distinguish char- 
 
LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 155 
 
 acteristics in the animate whole of an intuition. Since 
 the intellect unites things according to the internal 
 relations, which can only be discovered by dissection, 
 it can combine only so far as it previously separated — 
 that is, only by partial representations. The intellect 
 observes a rigid necessity and legality in its combina- 
 tions, and it can only be satisfied by a permanent 
 association of ideas. But this association will be 
 destroyed, as often as the imagination inserts entire 
 representations (single cases) in this chain of abstrac- 
 tions, and mingles the serial chance of time with the 
 rigid necessity of an actual connexion (in fact). 1 
 Hence it is unavoidably necessary that the imagination 
 should renounce its capricious character, where there 
 is to be strict consequence of thought, and learn to 
 subordinate and sacrifice its struggle after the greatest 
 possible sensuousness in representations, and the great- 
 est possible freedom in their combination, to the wants 
 of the intellect. For this reason the exposition must 
 be so managed as to crush that effort of the imagina- 
 tion, by excluding everything individual and sensuous, 
 and as well to restrict its restless poetic-impulse by 
 definiteness in expression, as the advances of its ca- 
 
 1 An author who is engaged in strict scientific inquiries, will on 
 that account make a reluctant and sparing use of examples (By-play, 
 Beispiel). What obtains with perfect truth in the universal, is lia- 
 ble to qualifications in each particular case ; and as circumstances 
 occur in each particular case, which are contingent in respect to the 
 general idea it is meant to elucidate, it is always to be feared, that 
 these contingent relations may become incorporated with that general 
 idea, and deduct somewhat from its universality and necessity. 
 
156 
 
 LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 price in combination by conformity to law. To be 
 sure, it will not be subjected to this yoke without resist- 
 ance, but we here reasonably reckon upon a self-denial 
 and a serious resolution of the hearer or reader, not 
 to regard, for the sake of the facts, the difficulties 
 which are inseparable from form. 
 
 But where such a resolution can not be presupposed, 
 and where We can indulge no hope, that interest in the 
 subject will be sufficiently strong, to encourage this 
 exertion, there indeed we must refrain from the com- 
 munication of a scientific cognition, but gain instead 
 somewhat more freedom as to exposition. In this case 
 we resign the form of science, which tasked the imagi- 
 nation too severely, and which can only be made 
 tolerable through the importance of the aim, and we 
 select instead the form of Beauty, which, independent 
 of all subjects, is its own recommendation. Since the 
 facts will not protect the form, the form must disregard 
 the facts. 
 
 Popular instruction is compatible with this freedom. 
 As the demagogue or popular author (an appellation, 
 under which I comprehend each one, who does not 
 address exclusively the learned) speaks to a public not 
 previously prepared, and does not select his reader like 
 the other, but must take him as he finds him, he can 
 only presuppose in him the universal conditions of 
 thought, only the universal incentives to attention, but 
 no peculiar aptness in reasoning, no acquaintance yet 
 with definite conceptions, no interest in definite objects. 
 Then too he cannot presume at hazard that the imagi- 
 
LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 157 
 
 nation of those whom he wishes to instruct, will combine 
 the requisite meaning with his abstractions, and furnish 
 a subject to the general conceptions, to which the scien- 
 tific exposition is limited. In order to proceed more 
 securely, he prefers to give at once both the intuitions 
 and the single cases, to which those conceptions relate ; 
 and he leaves it to his reader's intellect, to fashion 
 therefrom the conception extempore. Then the imagi- 
 nation will be brought into play much more by the 
 popular exposition, but still only rcproductively , (re- 
 newing communicated representations), and not pro- 
 ductively (demonstrating its self-creating power). 
 Those single cases or intuitions are much too strictly 
 estimated with reference to the present design, and 
 much too accurately adjusted for the use that should 
 be made of them, for the imagination ever to forget 
 that it acts in the service of the intellect. It is true, 
 the exposition keeps somewhat nearer to life and the 
 world of sense, but is not yet lost in it. Then the 
 statement still continues to be only didactic ; for, in 
 order to be beautiful, it fails of the two most eminent 
 qualities, sensuousness in expression, and freedom in 
 motion. 
 
 The statement is free, when the intellect defines 
 indeed with precision the consecution of ideas, but ac- 
 cording to laws so hidden, that the imagination appears 
 to act in a manner entirely capricious, and to follow 
 only the serial chance of time. The statement is sensu- 
 ous, if it conceals the universal in the particular, and 
 resigns to the fancy the living image (the entire repre- 
 
158 
 
 LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 sentation), where the only object is the conception, 
 (the partial representation). Then the sensuous repre- 
 sentation, regarded from one point of view, is rich, 
 since where only a determination is required, it affords 
 a complete image, an entirety of determinations, an in- 
 dividual ; but, regarded from another point of view, it 
 is again limited and poor, since it only maintains of one 
 individual and of a single case, what is yet to be under- 
 stood of a whole sphere. Thus it abridges the intel- 
 lect exactly in proportion to the surplus it gives to the 
 imagination, for the more complete a representation is 
 in contents, the less is its extent. 
 
 It is the interest of the imagination, to change its 
 objects arbitrarily ; the interest of the intellect is to 
 unite its own objects with rigid necessity. As much 
 as both these interests appear to conflict, there is still 
 a point of union between them, and to discover this, is 
 the peculiar merit of beautiful style. 
 
 In order to satisfy the imagination, the discourse 
 must have a material part or body, which is supplied 
 by the intuitions, from which the intellect separates the 
 single characteristics or conceptions ; for, however ab- 
 stractly we may reflect, there is always at last some- 
 thing sensuous which lies at the bottom of our reflec- 
 tion. But only the imagination flies from intuition to 
 intuition, unconstrained and irregularly, and obeys no 
 other connexion than that of the succession of time. 
 Then the intuitions which afford the material part 
 to the discourse, stand in no actual connexion with 
 each other, but appear rather to exist for themselves 
 
LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 159 
 
 as independent members and as proper wholes ; they 
 betray the entire disorder of an imagination at play 
 and only conforming to itself, so that the attire has 
 aesthetic freedom, and the want of fancy is satisfied. 
 We might say that such an exposition is an organic 
 product, where not only the whole lives, but the single 
 members have also their proper existence ; the merely 
 scientific exposition is a mechanical work, where the 
 members, in themselves lifeless, impart to the whole, by 
 their intimate union, an artificial life. 
 
 On the other hand, in order to satisfy the intellect 
 and educe cognition, the discourse must have a spirit- 
 ual part, significance, and this it acquires through the 
 conceptions, by whose means those intuitions are re- 
 lated to each other and united in a whole Now if be- 
 tween these conceptions, as the spiritual part of the 
 discourse, the closest connexion exists, while their 
 corresponding intuitions, as the sensuous part of the 
 discourse, only appear to coexist by an arbitrary play 
 of the fancy, — the problem is solved, and the intellect 
 is satisfied by conformity, while the fancy is flattered 
 by non-conformity. 
 
 Let one seek to discover the magic of beautiful dic- 
 tion, and he will always find that it is contained in 
 such a felicitous relation between external freedom and 
 internal necessity. The individualizing of objects, 
 and the figurative or informed expression, chiefly con- 
 tribute to this freedom of imagination, the former by 
 elevating the sensuousness, and the latter by creating 
 it where it is not. While we represent a genus by an 
 
160 
 
 LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 individual, and exhibit an universal idea in a single 
 case, we take from fancy the fetters which the intellect 
 had imposed upon it, and give it ample power to de- 
 monstrate itself creatively. Ever striving after com- 
 pleteness of determinations, it now obtains and uses the 
 right to restore, to animate, to transform at pleasure, 
 the image committed to it, and to accompany it in all 
 its combinations and transformations. It may for a" 
 moment forget its subordinate part, and conduct itself 
 like an arbitrary sovereign, since a sufficient security 
 against it exists in the rigorous, internal connexion, so 
 that it can never entirely escape from the reins of the 
 intellect. The informal expression carries this freedom 
 still further, while coupling together images, which 
 are entirely diverse as to their contents, but which as- 
 sociate themselves together under a higher idea. Now 
 since the fancy confines itself to the contents, the in- 
 tellect, on the contrary, to that higher idea, the former 
 makes a leap, where the intellect perceives the perfect 
 stability. The ideas unfold according to the law of 
 necessity, but pass over to the imagination according 
 to the law of freedom ; thought remains the same — 
 only the medium of its exhibition is changed. Thus 
 does the gifted author create the lordliest order out of 
 anarchy itself, and erects a solid fabric upon an ever 
 vacillating foundation — on the ever flowing stream of 
 imagination. 
 
 If we institute a parallel between the scientific, the 
 popular and the beautiful diction, it is apparent that all 
 three deliver the idea to be embodied, with equal fidel- 
 
LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 161 
 
 ity, materially, and thus all three assist us to a cogni- 
 tion, but in such a manner that the kind and degree of 
 this cognition are with each one sensibly different. 
 The aesthetic author presents us the data from which 
 he proceeds, rather as possible and desirable, than con- 
 vincing us of their reality or even necessity ; for his 
 thought announces itself only as an arbitrary creation 
 of the imagination, which, for itself alone, is never in a 
 condition to warrant the reality of its representations. 
 The popular author awakes in us the belief that a thing 
 is really so, but he succeeds no further ; for he makes 
 the truth of that statement sensible to us, but not abso- 
 lutely certain. Feeling indeed can teach what is, 
 but never what must be. The philosophical author 
 elevates that belief to conviction, for he proves upon 
 indubitable grounds, that a thing is necessarily so. 
 
 If we start from the previous principles, it will not 
 be difficult to assign its suitable place to each of the 
 three different forms of diction. Upon the whole it 
 may be regarded as a rule, that where not only the re- 
 sult is important, but the demonstration also, the sci- 
 entific style deserves the preference, and the popular 
 and aesthetic style, where generally there is reference 
 only to the result. But ivhen the popular mode of ex- 
 pression may pass over to the (Esthetic, is determined 
 by the greater or less degree of interest, which is to be 
 presupposed and created. 
 
 The pure scientific expression puts us (more or less, 
 according as it is more philosophical or more popular), 
 in possession of a cognition ; the aesthetic expression 
 11 
 
162 
 
 LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 lends us the same only for momentary enjoyment and 
 use. The first give us — if I may be allowed the com- 
 parison — the tree with its roots, but indeed we must 
 wait patiently, till it blossoms and bears fruit ; the aes- 
 thetic expression plucks for us only the blossoms and 
 fruit, but the tree which bore them is not ours ; and 
 when they are enjoyed and have withered, our posses- 
 sions vanish away. It would be just as absurd to pre- 
 sent him, who just now only desires a fruit, with the 
 tree itself and its fruits in prospect, as it would be to 
 pull off only the flowers and fruit for him who would 
 have the tree itself planted in his garden. The appli- 
 cation is self-evident, and I will only remark, that the 
 aesthetic expression is just as little suited to the chair 
 of instruction, as the precise and scientific to refined 
 conversation and the forum. 
 
 The disciple gathers for remote purposes and for a 
 future use ; hence the teacher must be careful to make 
 him a complete possessor of the knowledge, which he 
 transmits to him. But nothing is our own, except that 
 which is transmitted to the intellect. The orator, on 
 the contrary, designs a speedy use, and has an imme- 
 diate need of satisfying his public. It is his interest 
 then, to make the knowledge which he imparts prac- 
 tical, as quickly as possible, and he performs this in 
 the safest way, when he commits it to the sense and 
 qualifies it for the perception. The teacher, who ac- 
 cepts his public only upon conditions, and is author- 
 ized, in already presupposing that it has the mental 
 disposition which is requisite for the reception of truth, 
 
LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 163 
 
 only regards the object of his discourse ; as on the con- 
 trary the orator, who need enter upon no condition 
 with his public, and must first gain over their inclina- 
 tion to his purpose, has to address himself at once to 
 the subjects which he discusses. The former, whose 
 public is the same, and regularly returns, need only de- 
 liver fragments, which form a whole when united with 
 the preceding expositions ; the latter, whose public 
 changes constantly, and comes unprepared and perhaps 
 never returns, must complete his business in every 
 single delivery ; each of his discourses must be a whole 
 in itself, and contain its complete development. 
 
 Hence it is not strange, if a profoundly dogmatic 
 discourse meets with no success in conversation and 
 from the pulpit, and a spiritual, aesthetic discourse 
 bears no fruit in the chair of science — if the polite 
 world leaves unread writings which form an epoch in 
 the world of letters, and the scholar is ignorant of 
 works which are a school for the polished, and are 
 eagerly sought after by every admirer of Beauty. Each 
 kind can command admiration in its own definite circle 
 — nay, as to their internal capacity, both may be on a 
 perfect equality ; but it would smack of impossibility, 
 if we desired that a work which tasked the thinker, 
 should at the same time grace the leisure hour of the 
 mere bel-esprit. 
 
 Upon these grounds I consider it blameworthy, if 
 works are selected for the education of youth, in which 
 scientific matters are invested with an aesthetic form. 
 
1G4 
 
 LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 I speak here by no means of those works, where the 
 subject has been sacrificed to the form, but of really 
 excellent works, whose facts abide a most rigorous 
 proof, but do not include this proof in their form. It 
 is true, one accomplishes with such works the design of 
 being read, but always at the expense of the more im- 
 portant design, to what use are they read. By such 
 reading the intellect is always exercised only in its har- 
 mony with the imagination, and thus never learns to 
 distinguish the form from the subject-matter, and to act 
 as a pure faculty. And yet the mere exercise of the 
 intellect is an important crisis in the education of the 
 young, and in most cases, consists more in the think- 
 ing than in the thought. If we would have an em- 
 ployment well-conducted, we take care to announce it 
 as a sport. But the spirit should rather be already 
 braced to action by the form of treatment, and must be 
 thrust forward with a certain violence from passivity to 
 activity. The teacher should by no means conceal 
 from his scholar the rigorous conformity of method, 
 but rather present it to his attention, and where possi- 
 ble, make it an object of his desire. The student 
 should learn to prosecute a design, and be content too 
 with disagreeable means for the sake of the design. 
 He should early strive after that nobler pleasure which 
 is the reward of exertion. The senses are entirely re- 
 buffed by a scientific exposition, but an aesthetic one 
 excites their interest. What will be the result? We 
 devour with sympathy such a work, such a conversa- 
 tion — but we are hardly in a condition to render a 
 
LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 165 
 
 proper account, when asked for the results. And very 
 naturally — for the conceptions press into the soul by 
 whole masses, but the intellect can cognize only where 
 it divides ; the mind is rather passively than actively 
 disposed during the reading, but the spirit possesses 
 nothing but what results from its own action. 
 
 Finally, this holds good only of Beauty of a common 
 kind, and of the perception of such Beauty. The true 
 Beauty is based upon the most rigorous definiteness, 
 upon the strictest separation, upon the .highest internal 
 necessity ; only this definiteness must wait to be found, 
 rather than forcibly intrude itself. The highest con- 
 formity must exist there, but it must appear as nature. 
 Such a product will fully satisfy the intellect, as soon 
 as it is studied — but exactly because it is truly beau- 
 tiful, it does not intrude its conformity, nor address it- 
 self to the intellect in particular, but it speaks as pure 
 unity to the harmonizing whole of man — as nature to 
 nature. A common critic perhaps finds it vague, 
 meagre, far too little defined ; that very thing in which 
 the triumph of the exposition consists — the perfect 
 dissolution of parts into a simple whole, displeases him, 
 because he is only skilled in discriminating, and only 
 has an eye for the single. To be sure, the discrimi- 
 nating power of the intellect should be satisfied in phi- 
 losophical expositions, single results should obtain for 
 it throughout ; this is the design which can by no 
 means be overlooked. But if the author has so pro- 
 vided, by a rigorous internal definiteness, that the in- 
 tellect must necessarily find these results, as soon as it 
 
166 
 
 LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 applies itself in that direction, yet if not content with 
 that alone, and constrained by his nature, (which 
 always works as a harmonious unity, and quickly re- 
 stores again this unity, where it has been lost in the 
 operation of abstraction), he again combines the dis- 
 membered, and, through the united demands of the 
 spiritual and sensuous power, always claims the whole 
 man, — then indeed, far from writing according to an 
 indifferent standard, he has nearly approached the 
 highest. Certainly the common critic, who, without 
 an eye for this harmony, continually strives only for 
 the partial, who, in St. Peter's Church itself, would 
 only examine the pillars which support that artificial 
 firmament, will be little obliged to him for creating for 
 him a twofold labor ; for such a one must forsooth 
 first translate the author, if he would understand him ; 
 just as the mere naked intellect, deprived of all faculty 
 of exposition, must first transpose and lay apart in its 
 delivery the beautiful and harmonious in nature as 
 well as in art, — in short, like the school-boy, must 
 first learn to spell, in order to read. But the exhibit- 
 ory author is never restricted by the narrowness and 
 poverty of his reader. He moves towards the ideal 
 which he bears within, unconcerned, who follows him 
 or who loiters. Many will remain behind ; for, how- 
 ever rare it is only to find even thinking readers, it is 
 infinitely more rare, to meet with those who can set 
 forth their thought, (darstellend denhen Jcdnnen). 
 Then such an author will, in the nature of things, fall 
 out as well with those who only contemplate and per- 
 
LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 167 
 
 ceive — for he imposes upon them the distasteful toil 
 of thought — as with those, who only think, since he 
 demands what for them is absolutely impossible — the 
 exercise of a creative faculty. But as both are only 
 very incomplete representatives of common and genu- 
 ine humanity, which calls for an entire harmony of 
 both those occupations, their contradiction signifies 
 nothing; their judgments rather assure the author that 
 he has gained the object of his search. The abstract 
 thinker finds his subject well meditated, and the con- 
 templative reader finds his style lively ; both approve 
 then what they comprehend, and only miss what sur- 
 passes their ability. 
 
 But, on these very grounds, such an author is entirely 
 incompetent to acquaint the unlearned with the object, 
 of which he treats, — or, in the most peculiar sense of 
 the word, to teach. Luckily he is not compelled to 
 this, since there is no dearth of subjects for the instruc- 
 tion of the learned. The teacher, strictly so called, 
 must accommodate himself to the present exigency ; 
 he goes upon the supposition of incapacity ; as, on the 
 contrary, the author demands from his reader or hearer 
 a certain integrity and cultivation. Hence he does 
 not confine his action to the mere communication of 
 lifeless conceptions ; he embraces the animate with 
 lively energy and takes possession of the whole man, 
 his intellect, his feeling and his will. 
 
 If it is found injurious to the stability of knowledge, 
 to give room to the demands of taste in the process of 
 learning, it is therefore by no means affirmed, that the 
 
168 
 
 LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 cultivation of this faculty would be premature in the 
 scholar. Quite the reverse ; we should animate and 
 prompt him, to communicate, by means of lively repre- 
 sentation, those sciences which he has made his own 
 by means of study. If the latter has only been regard- 
 ed, the former can have none other than useful results. 
 One must certainly be master of a truth in a high de- 
 gree, to be able to forsake, without danger, the form 
 in which it had been found ; one must possess a great 
 intellect, in order not to lose his object in the free play 
 of the imagination. Whoever imparts to me his knowl- 
 edge in a scientific form, convinces me indeed, that he 
 properly comprehends, and knows how to maintain it ; 
 but he who is prepared at the same time to communi- 
 cate it in an aesthetic form, not only proves that he is 
 competent to dispense it, but also that he has taken it 
 up into his own nature, and is capable of representing 
 it in his actions. There is no other path for the re- 
 sults of thought to the will and into the life, but through 
 the self-active formative power. Nothing but what is 
 already a living fact within us, can become so without 
 us, and it is with creations of the spirit as with organic 
 formations — the blossom always precedes the fruit. 
 
 If we consider, how many truths are active as inter- 
 nal intuitions, a long time before philosophy demon- 
 strates them, and how often the best demonstrated 
 truths continue powerless for the feeling and will, we 
 shall perceive, how important it is for practical life, to 
 pursue this hint of nature, and to convert scientific 
 
» 
 
 LIMITS OF TASTE. 169 
 
 cognitions again into active intuitions. In this way 
 only is one prepared to participate in those treasures of 
 wisdom, which are forbidden by their constitution to 
 take the unnatural path of science. In respect to cog- 
 nition, Beauty here performs that, which in respect to 
 the mode of action, it performs in the moral world ; it 
 brings men together in the results and the material, 
 who would never have united in the form and the sub- 
 ject-matter. 
 
 The softer sex cannot and need not, in conformity to 
 its nature and aesthetic determinateness, participate 
 with the reader in science, but, through the medium of 
 representation, it can do so in truth. Man is still well 
 satisfied, that his taste should be offended, if the intel- 
 lect is only compensated by the internal capacity of a 
 subject. He is commonly only the more pleased, the 
 more severely the definiteness is brought out, and the 
 more completely the internal quality is separated from 
 the empirical mode. But woman does not resign the 
 most neglected form for the richest subject ; and the 
 whole interior structure of her being justifies the severe 
 demand. This sex, which, even if it did not govern by 
 Beauty, must at any rate be called the fair sex, because 
 Beauty governs it, carries everything that presents it- 
 self, before the tribunal of perception, and totally re- 
 jects whatever does not commend itself to that, or of- 
 fends it. Indeed, the truth itself which is inseparable 
 from its proof, cannot be transmitted to the sex through 
 this channel, but only the material of truth. But for- 
 tunately they only require the material of truth, in or- 
 
170 
 
 LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 der to attain their highest perfection, and the excep- 
 tions that have hitherto appeared, cannot excite the 
 wish that they might become the rule. 
 
 Then man must undertake the occupation as two- 
 fold, which nature not only remits, but also forbids to 
 the other sex, if he would meet woman on an equal 
 footing in this important point of existence. He will 
 then seek as much as possible, to move out of the 
 realm of abstraction where he reigns, into that of 
 imagination and perception, where woman is both the 
 model and arbitress. As he can establish no enduring 
 growth in the feminine spirit, he will seek to produce 
 as many flowers and fruits as possible, in his own field, 
 in order the oftener to renew the soon exhausted sup- 
 ply in the other, and to be able to sustain an artificial 
 harvest where no natural one comes to maturity. Taste 
 improves — or conceals — the native spiritual distinc- 
 tions of both sexes, it nourishes and adorns the femi- 
 nine with the products of the masculine spirit, and 
 allows the fair sex to perceive, where it has never 
 thought, and enjoy, where it has never labored. 
 
 Then it is true that form in communicating knowl- 
 edge is intrusted to taste, under the restrictions which 
 I have previously mentioned — but with the express 
 condition that it does not meddle with the subject. It 
 should never forget, that it executes a foreign commis- 
 sion, and is not employed with its own business. Its 
 entire instrumentality should be confined to giving the 
 mind an inclination favorable for cognition ; but it 
 should positively assume no authority in all that con- 
 cerns the subject-matter. 
 
LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 171 
 
 If it does the latter — if it makes supreme its own 
 law, which is no other than to please the imagination 
 and satisfy observation, — if it applies this law not only 
 to the method, but also to the matter, and not only ar- 
 ranges, but also selects the materials in conformity to 
 itself, it both exceeds as well as violates its commission, 
 and corrupts the object which it ought honestly to 
 transmit to us. It is now no longer asked, what the 
 things are , but how they may be best recommended to 
 the senses. The rigid consequence of thought, which 
 should only have been concealed, is cast aside as a 
 burdensome restraint ; perfection is sacrificed to grace 
 — the truth of parts to the Beauty of the whole — the 
 internal quality to the external impression. But where 
 the subject must accommodate itself to the form, there, 
 in fact, is no subject ; the exposition is vivid, and man, 
 instead of augmenting his science, has only pursued an 
 entertaining sport. 
 
 Writers, who possess more wit than intellect, and 
 more taste than science, subject themselves too often 
 to the imputation of this deception ; and readers who 
 are more accustomed to perceive than to reflect, show 
 themselves but too ready to pardon it. It is generally 
 a hazardous experiment, to form the taste completely, 
 before one has exercised the intellect as a pure reflect- 
 ive power, and enriched his head with ideas. For since 
 taste regards continually only the method and not the 
 matter, all actual distinction of things is lost just where 
 it is the sole judge. One becomes indifferent to reality, 
 and finally attributes all value to the form and the ap- 
 pearance. 
 
172 
 
 LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 Hence the shallow and frivolous spirit, which we 
 see very often to predominate in such ranks and cir- 
 cles, as in other respects boast not unjustly of the 
 highest refinement* It must unavoidably be pernicious 
 to a young man, to introduce him into this circle of the 
 graces, before the Muses have declared him compe- 
 tent ; and that which gives the exterior polish to the 
 mature youth, hardly fails to make a fool of the imma- 
 ture.' Substance without form is indeed only a half 
 possession, for the noblest sciences lie buried, like dead 
 treasures, in a head which is unable to give them any 
 shape. On the contrary, form without substance is 
 only the shadow of a possession, and all possible dex- 
 terity in expression can avail him nothing, who has no- 
 thing to express. 
 
 1 H. Garve, in his sagacious parallel of gentle and simple manners. 
 in the first part of his Essays, &c. (a book, concerning which I may 
 premise, that it should he in the hands of every oue) has enumerated, 
 among the prerogatives of a noble youth, his precocious qualification 
 for intercourse with the great world, from which the commoner is ex- 
 cluded by his birth. But H. Garve has not expressed an opinion on 
 the point whether this privilege, which undoubtedly is to be consid- 
 ered advantageous, as regards the exterior and aesthetic formation of 
 a young noble, can also be called a gain, in respect to his internal for- 
 mation, and thus to the whole of his culture ; and I doubt whether 
 he would be able to justify such an assertion. As much too as is 
 gained in this way for form, so much must consequently be lost in 
 matter ; and when we reflect, how much easier form adapts itself ;o 
 a subject, than subject to a form, the commoner need not be envious 
 of the noble's prerogative. If indeed the same arrangement must ob- 
 tain henceforward, that the commoner lalors, and the nobleman 
 represents, no belter means could be chosen for effecting it, than this 
 very difference in culture ; but I doubt, whether the nobleman will be 
 always content with such a division. 
 
LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 173 
 
 If then aesthetic culture would not conduct into this 
 by-path, taste must only define the external shape, but 
 reason and experience, the internal quality. If the 
 sensuous impression is made chief judge, and things 
 relate only to perception, man never emerges from the 
 bondage of matter, and it never becomes light within 
 his spirit, — in short, just as he concedes too much to 
 the imagination, just so much does he lose in the free- 
 dom of his reason. 
 
 The Beautiful operates through mere observation, 
 the True will have study. Whoever, then, merely 
 exercises his sense of Beauty, contents himself, where 
 study is absolutely necessary, with superficial observa- 
 tion, and will only sport cleverly, where grave exertion 
 is demanded. Nothing is ever gained by mere obser- 
 vation. Whoever will perform anything great, must 
 penetrate deeply, discriminate accurately, combine in 
 manifold ways and remain steadfast. Even the artist 
 and the poet, although both labor only for the satis- 
 faction arising from observation, can succeed in mak- 
 ing their works acceptable to us in the sense of play, 
 only by a strenuous and nothing less than attractive 
 study. 
 
 This appears to me to be the infallible test, by which 
 we may distinguish the mere dilettante from the gen- 
 uine artistic genius. The seductive charm of the 
 great and the beautiful, the fire with which it enkin- 
 dles the youthful imagination, and the appearance of 
 facility with which it deceives the senses, have already 
 persuaded many an inexperienced one to seize the 
 
174 
 
 LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 palette or the lyre, and to pour out whatever within 
 him would become living, in shapes or tones. Dark 
 ideas labor like a becoming world in his head, and 
 lead him to believe that he is inspired. He mistakes 
 the dark for the profound, the savage for the powerful, 
 the indefinite for the infinite, the senseless for the 
 supersensuous — and how does he not plume himself 
 at its birth ! But the judgment of the connoisseur 
 will not allow this testimony of ardent self-love. With 
 obdurate criticism he destroys the legerdemain of the 
 heated imagination, and sheds a light down the deep 
 shaft of science and experience, where, concealed from 
 the unconsecrated, bubbles up the fountain of all true 
 Beauty. If genuine genius slumbers in the interro- 
 gating youth, at first, indeed, his modesty will prove a 
 stumbling-block, but the courage of true talent will 
 soon animate him to endeavor. If nature has designed 
 him for a creative artist, he studies the human struc- 
 ture beneath the knife of the anatomist, enters the 
 profoundest depths, in order to be true upon the sur- 
 face, and investigates the whole genus in order to 
 prove his right to the individual. If he is born to be 
 a poet, he watches the humanity in his own breast, in 
 order to comprehend its infinitely changing play upon 
 the wide theatre of the world; he subjects luxuriant 
 fancy to the discipline of taste, and suffers the sober 
 intellect to survey the banks, between which the stream 
 of inspiration is to leap and sparkle. He is well 
 aware that the great increases only from unseemly tri- 
 fles, and he rears, grain for grain, the wondrous fabric 
 
LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 175 
 
 whose single impression now makes us giddy. But 
 if, on the contrary, nature has only stamped him for 
 a dilettante, difficulty cools his lifeless zeal, and he 
 either deserts, if he is modest, a path which self-de- 
 ception pointed out ; or, if he is not, he diminishes the 
 great ideal to the little diameter of his own capacity, 
 since he is not in a condition to enlarge his capacity 
 to the noble proportions of the ideal. The genuine 
 artistic genius, then, is ever to be recognized in this, 
 that in the most glowing feeling for totality, it pre- 
 serves coldness and enduring patience for the partial, 
 and rather sacrifices the delight of consummation, lest 
 it should mar perfection. The laboriousness of the 
 means disgusts the mere amateur with the end, and he 
 would fain remain at ease in production as in obser- 
 vation. 
 
 Hitherto we have spoken of the disadvantages which 
 arise from an overweening susceptibility to the beauti- 
 ful in form, and from too extensive aesthetic demands 
 for reflection and judgment. But the pretensions of 
 taste have a far greater meaning, if they have the Will 
 for their object ; for it is something entirely different, 
 whether the immoderate propensity for the beautiful 
 hinders the extension of our knowledge, or whether it 
 vitiates the character, and causes us to neglect our 
 duty. Literary capriciousness in reflection is cer- 
 tainly something injurious, and must obscure the intel- 
 lect ; but this same capriciousness, applied to the 
 maxims of the Will is something criminal, and must 
 
176 
 
 LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 inevitably deprave the heart. And aesthetic refine- 
 ment renders man prone to this dangerous extreme, as 
 he commits himself cxclusiccly to the feeling of Beauty, 
 and makes taste the unrestrained legislator for his 
 Will. 
 
 The moral determinateness of man demands a com- 
 plete independence of the Will from every influence 
 of sensuous impulses ; and taste, as we know, labors 
 unceasingly, to strengthen the alliance between reason 
 and sense. It is true, it thus succeeds in ennobling 
 the desires, and bringing them into greater harmony 
 with the demands of reason ; but from this very suc- 
 cess great danger may finally result for morality. 
 
 From the fact, that in man aesthetically improved, 
 the imagination in its freest play directs itself ac- 
 cording to laic, and that the sense is pleased not with- 
 out enjoying definiteness of the reason, it follows that 
 the reciprocal service is demanded of the reason, to 
 direct itself in the gravity of its legislation according 
 to the interest of the imagination, and not to govern 
 the Will without determinateness of the sensuous im- 
 pulse. The moral obligation of the Will, which is 
 valid entirely without condition, is imperceptibly re- 
 garded as a contract, which is binding upon one part 
 so long only as the other observes it. The accidental 
 agreement of duty with inclination is finally established 
 as a necessary condition, and thus the source of mo- 
 rality is poisoned. 
 
 How the character falls by degrees into this corrup- 
 tion, may be made intelligible in the following manner. 
 
LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 177 
 
 So long as man is a savage, and his impulses only 
 meet material objects, and an egoism of the lower kind 
 conducts his actions, sensuousness can only be dan- 
 gerous to morality through its blind strength, and can 
 oppose the prescriptions of reason merely as a force. 
 The voice of justice, moderation, humanity, is drowned 
 in the tumult of desires. He is terrible in his revenge, 
 since he is fearfully sensible to an injury. He robs 
 and murders, since his appetites are too powerful for 
 the weak restraints of reason. He is a furious beast 
 towards others, since the native impulse still bestially 
 sways himself. 
 
 But if he exchanges this savage state of nature for 
 the condition of refinement, if taste ennobles his im- 
 pulses, directs them to worthier objects in the moral 
 world, and tempers their rude sallies by the rule of 
 Beauty, it may happen that those impulses which be- 
 fore were only fearful through their blind violence, 
 become far more dangerous to morality of character, 
 through an appearance of dignity and an assumed au- 
 thority, and exercise a far worse tyranny over the 
 savage beneath the mask of innocence, nobleness and 
 purity. 
 
 The man of taste readily extricates himself from the 
 uncouth yoke of instinct. He subdues his impulse 
 according to the pleasure of the reason, and is sensi- 
 ble enough to leave the objects of his desires to be 
 defined by the reflective spirit. The oftener the case 
 occurs, that the moral and aesthetic judgment, the feel- 
 ing of morals and of Beauty, coincide in the same 
 12 
 
178 
 
 LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 object and meet in the same decision, the more will 
 the reason be inclined to consider an instinct so highly 
 spiritualized as one of its own, and finally resign to it 
 with unlimited authority the helm of the Will. 
 
 So long as a possibility exists that inclination and 
 duty may coincide in the same object of desire, this 
 representation of the moral feeling by the feeling of 
 Beauty can be productive of no positive harm, although 
 strictly considered, nothing is gained thereby for the 
 morality of single actions. But the case is materially 
 altered, if the interest of perception and of reason is 
 diverse — if duty demands conduct which is repugnant 
 to taste, or if the latter perceives itself attracted to an 
 object, which the reason, as moral arbitress, is forced 
 to reject. 
 
 At this point necessity at once interferes, to separate 
 the claims of the moral and aesthetic sense, which so 
 long a conjunction blended almost inextricably, to de- 
 fine their mutual privileges, and to discover the true 
 organ of power in the mind. But such an uninter- 
 rupted representation has induced a forgetfulness of it, 
 and the long custom of immediately obeying the sug- 
 gestions of taste, and of profiting thereby, must grad- 
 ually have acquired for it a show of right. From the 
 uprightness with which the taste has exercised its 
 control over the Will, one could not fail to concede a 
 certain respect for its claims, and it is this very respect 
 of which inclination now takes advantage, with cap- 
 tious logic, at the expense of conscientious duty. 
 
 Respect is a feeling which can only be entertained 
 
LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 179 
 
 for law, and what is in accordance with it. Whatever 
 can demand respect, lays claim to absolute homage. 
 The elevated inclination which has known how to ob- 
 tain a surreptitious respect, will then be no more sub- 
 ordinate to, but coordinate with, the reason. It will 
 pass for no treacherous subject, who rebels against his 
 sovereign ; it will be regarded as a majesty, and, like 
 peer with peer, act with the reason as moral lawgiver. 
 Then, as it pretends, the balance is equal according 
 to Right ; and how much is it not to be feared lest 
 Interest may turn the scale ! 
 
 Of all the inclinations which spring from the feeling 
 of Beauty and are the property of cultivated souls, 
 none recommends itself so highly to the moral feeling 
 as the elevated passion of Love, and none is more 
 fruitful in sentiments, which suit the true dignity of 
 man. To what heights does she not bear human na- 
 ture, and what divine sparks can she not often elicit 
 from common souls ! Each selfish inclination is con- 
 sumed by its holy fire, and principles themselves can 
 hardly preserve the purity of the mind more faithfully, 
 than love watches the nobleness of the heart. Often, 
 while those are still struggling, love has already con- 
 quered for them, and by its all-powerful energy accel- 
 erated resolutions, which mere duty would have in 
 vain demanded of weak humanity. Who could well 
 distrust a passion, which so powerfully protects all that 
 is excellent in human nature, and so triumphantly 
 withstands egoism, the sworn foe of all morality ? 
 
180 
 
 LIMITS OF TASTE, 
 
 But one would hardly trust the guidance of this 
 conductor, unless already secured from danger by a 
 better. The case might occur, when the beloved ob- 
 ject is unhappy — unhappy on our own account, when 
 it depends upon us to make him happy by the sacrifice 
 of some moral scruples. " Should we allow him to 
 suffer, for the sake of preserving a pure conscience ? 
 Does a disinterested, magnanimous passion allow 
 this — a passion forgetting itself in, and resigning 
 everything to, its object ? It is true, it runs counter 
 to our conscience, to make use of immortal means for 
 the purpose of aiding him — but do we call that loving, 
 when we still think of ourselves in the grief of a be- 
 loved one ? Are we not more anxious for ourselves 
 than for the object of our love, since we would rather 
 see him unhappy, than be so ourselves through the 
 reproaches of conscience ? " With such sophistry 
 can this passion undervalue the moral voice within us, 
 as a prompting of self-love, if it opposes its interests, 
 and represent our moral dignity as an element in our 
 happiness, which we are at liberty to alienate. If our 
 character is not safely established by good principles, 
 we shall act dishonorably with all the soaring of an 
 exalted imagination, and shall think to have acquired 
 a glorious victory over our self-love, when, exactly the 
 reverse, we are its miserable victim. In the well 
 known French romance, Liaisons dangereuses, we 
 find a very striking example of this deception, which 
 the love of an otherwise pure and beautiful spirit prac- 
 tises. An unguarded moment surprises the Presi- 
 
LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 181 
 
 dentess De Tourvel, and then she seeks to quiet her 
 afflicted heart, by the thought that she has sacrificed 
 her virtue to generosity. 
 
 The so-called imperfect duties are those especially 
 which the feeling of Beauty protects, and not seldom 
 maintains against the perfect. As they defer far more 
 to the caprice of the subject, and at the same time 
 reflect a glow of meritoriousness, they recommend 
 themselves to the taste more unduly than the perfect 
 duties, which govern absolutely with stern necessita- 
 tion. How many men allow themselves to be unjust, 
 for the sake of being generous ! How many are there 
 not, who violate the integrity of duty, in order to per- 
 form a single action well, and inversely ; who sooner 
 pardon an untruth than an indelicacy, sooner a viola- 
 tion of humanity than of honor — who destroy their 
 bodies in order to hasten the perfection of their spirits, 
 and debase their character to adorn their intellect ! 
 How many are there not, who are not appalled at de- 
 pravity, if a praiseworthy end is to be attained, who 
 pursue an ideal of political happiness through all the 
 horrors of anarchy, trample laws in the dust to make 
 way for better, and scruple not to devote the present 
 generation to misery, in order to secure thereby the 
 happiness of the next ! The apparent disinterested- 
 ness of certain virtues gives them an air of purity, 
 which sufficiently emboldens them to defiance in the 
 very face of duty ; 'and the fancy of many a one de- 
 ceives him with the singular desire to be superior to 
 morality and more rational than reason. 
 
182 
 
 LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 The man of refined taste is, in this particular, sus- 
 ceptible to a moral depravity, from which the rude 
 child of nature, by his very rudeness, is secured. 
 With the latter, the difference between that which the 
 sense requires and that which duty demands, is so 
 marked and apparent, and his desires partake so little 
 of the spiritual, that even if they still govern him, 
 however despotically, they cannot acquire any consid- 
 eration in his eyes. Then if overweening sensuous- 
 ness incites him to an unjust action, he may indeed 
 succumb to the temptation, but he cannot conceal 
 from himself that he errs, and so he does homage to 
 reason at the very moment when he acts in opposition 
 to its prescriptions. On the contrary, the refined dis- 
 ciple of art will not confess that he sins, and prefers 
 to denie it, in order to pacify his conscience. He 
 would fain yield to desire, it is true, but without 
 thereby sinking in his own esteem. Now how does 
 he effect this ? He first destroys the higher authority, 
 which withstands his inclination — and before he 
 transgresses the law, he brings into disrepute the com- 
 petency of the lawgiver. Would it be believed that a 
 depraved will could so pervert the intellect ? All dig- 
 nity to which an inclination can lay claim, is only 
 owing to its connexion with the reason, and it is now 
 both blinded and bold enough to arrogate this dignity 
 even in its contest with the reason — nay, to make use 
 of it even against the authority of «the reason. 
 
 So dangerous may it prove for morality of character, 
 if a too intimate communion reigns between the sensu- 
 
LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 183 
 
 ous and moral impulses, which can be completely 
 united only in the ideal, and never in reality. It is 
 true, sensuousness hazards nothing by this connexion, 
 as it possesses nothing which it must not resign when 
 duty calls, and the reason demands the sacrifice. But 
 so much more is hazarded with the reason, as moral 
 lawgiver, if it allows the' inclination to present it with 
 what it might demand from it; for then the feeling of 
 obligation is easily lost under the show of voluntari- 
 ness, and a gift is denied, if the sensuousness should 
 ever find its performance irksome. Then it is far 
 safer for morality of character, if the representation of 
 the moral feeling by the feeling of Beauty is, at least 
 for a moment, abolished — if the reason frequently 
 governs directly, and reveals to the Will its true sove- 
 reign. 
 
 It may here be justly said, that genuine morality is 
 preserved only in the school of adversity, and a state 
 of continuous prosperity may easily prove a quicksand 
 to virtue. I call him fortunate, who, in order to en- 
 joy, is not compelled to do unjustly, and in order to act 
 justly, is not compelled to abstain. The uninterrupt- 
 edly prosperous man never then sees duty face to face, 
 since his lawful and well-regulated inclinations always 
 anticipate the injunctions of reason, and no temptation 
 to an infraction of law brings the law to his remem- 
 brance. Only governed by the sense of Beauty, the 
 vicegerent of reason in the world of sense, he will de- 
 scend to his grave, without perceiving the dignity of 
 his destiny. The unfortunate man, on the contrary, 
 
184 
 
 LIMITS OF TASTE. 
 
 if he is at the same time a virtuous man, enjoys the 
 noble privilege of communing directly with the divine 
 majesty of law, and while yet a man, of evincing the 
 freedom of a spirit, as his own virtue is dependent 
 upon no inclination. 
 
UPON 
 
 THE MORAL USE 
 
 ESTHETIC MANNERS. 
 
AESTHETIC MANNERS. 
 
 The author of the treatise Upon the Danger of 
 Aesthetic Manners* has with justice suspected a mo- 
 rality, which is founded only upon the feeling of 
 Beauty, and has no other guarantee than Taste. But 
 still, a pure and lively feeling for Beauty evidently has 
 the most salutary influence upon the moral life : which 
 point I will now discuss. 
 
 If I ascribe to Taste the merit of contributing to 
 the advance of Morality, I do not mean that the sym- 
 pathy which a good Taste takes in an action, can 
 make that action a moral one. Morality need have 
 no other ground than itself. Taste can favor moral 
 conduct, as I hope to prove in the present essay, but 
 its influence can never create that which is moral. 
 
 The case is the same with an internal and moral 
 
 1 The Treatise here alluded to was inserted by the author among 
 his prose writings, under the title of the preceding essay, of which 
 it is a part. It was first published separately in the Horen: 1795. 
 
188 
 
 .ESTHETIC MANNERS. 
 
 Freedom, as with that which is external and physical : 
 I act freely in the latter sense, only when I obey my 
 Will alone, independent of every foreign influence. 
 But after all, I may be indebted for the possibility to 
 follow my Will unconstrained, to a cause distinct from 
 myself, as soon as it is understood that the latter can 
 restrict my will. Just so may I finally owe the possi- 
 bility to act well, to a cause distinct from my reason, 
 as soon as that cause is considered as a force which 
 may restrict my mental freedom. It may then be said 
 with equal propriety, that a man can receive freedom 
 from another, although freedom itself consists in his 
 being exempt from accommodating himself to others, 
 and that Taste may subserve virtue, although it is the 
 essence of virtue to exist independently of foreign aid. 
 
 An action by no means ceases to be free, because 
 that which might restrict it fortunately remains inac- 
 tive, if we only know that the actor followed his own 
 Will, without regard to a foreign one. In like man- 
 ner, morality may still be predicated of an internal 
 action, although the temptations which might have 
 vitiated it are fortunately wanting, if we only perceive 
 that the actor followed the prescriptions of his reason, 
 to the exclusion of foreign motives. \The freedom of 
 an external action depends only upon its immediate 
 origination from the Will of the person : the morality 
 of an internal action, only upon the immediate defini- 
 tion of the Will by the law of reason, j 
 
 It may be easier or harder for us to act as free men, 
 according as we impinge upon forces, which oppose 
 
AESTHETIC MANNERS. 
 
 189 
 
 our freedom and require to be subdued. So far there 
 are degrees of Freedom. Our freedom is greater, at 
 least more apparent, if we maintain it against the most 
 violent opposition of hostile forces ; but still it does 
 not cease, if our Will finds no opposition, or if a foreign 
 power interferes and annihilates this opposition with- 
 out our cooperation. 
 
 Just so is it with Morality. It may cost us more or 
 less of a struggle to obey the reason directly, accord- 
 ing as impulses stir within us which conflict with its 
 demands, and which we must abjure. So far there 
 are degrees of Morality. Our morality is greater, at 
 least more salient, if we directly obey the reason, not- 
 withstanding impulses however great ; but still it does 
 not cease, if we find no enticement to do the contrary, 
 or if something, which is not our power of will, weak- 
 ens this enticement. Enough, that we do well mo- 
 rally, when we do so only because it is moral, and 
 without first asking ourselves whether it is likewise 
 agreeable, — even if we suppose a probability to exist 
 that we might do otherwise, if it gave us pain or 
 abridged our enjoyment. 
 
 To the honor of human nature be it admitted, that 
 no man can sink so low as to prefer the bad, only be- 
 cause it is bad ; but that every one without distinction 
 would prefer the good, because it is good, if it did not 
 contingently exclude the agreeable, or include the dis- 
 agreeable. All immorality in actual life appears, 
 then, to result from the collision of the good with the 
 agreeable, or what is the same thing, of the desires 
 
190 ESTHETIC MANNERS. 
 
 with the reason — and to have its source, on the one 
 hand, in the strength of sensuous impulses, on the 
 other hand, in the weakness of the moral volition. 
 
 Then Morality can not only be hindered, but also 
 promoted, in a twofold manner. Either the party of 
 the reason and the power of moral volition must be 
 strengthened, so that no temptation can overmatch 
 it — or the force of temptation must be broken, that 
 the weaker reason and the weaker moral volition may 
 yet be superior to it. 
 
 It might indeed appear as if morality itself would 
 gain nothing by the latter operation, since no change 
 obtains thereby in the volition, upon the quality of 
 which alone depends the morality of an action. But 
 that change is by no means necessary in the admitted 
 case, where we do not suppose an evil will, which 
 must be changed, but only a good one, which is weak. 
 And this weak moral will attains, in the way men- 
 tioned, to activity, which perhaps would not take 
 place, if stronger impulses counterworked it. But 
 morality really exists where a good will is the ground 
 of an action. I do not hesitate, then, to lay down the 
 principle, that that truly advances morality, which 
 destroys the opposition between inclination and good- 
 ness. 
 
 The natural internal foe of Morality is the sensuous 
 impulse, which, as soon as an object is presented, 
 strives after satisfaction, and opposes the prescriptions 
 of the reason, as soon as it finds them inconvenient. 
 
ESTHETIC MANNERS. 191 
 
 This sensuous impulse is incessantly employed in 
 drawincr over to its interest the Will, which still re- 
 mains under moral laws, and has upon it the obliga- 
 tion, ever to be in contradiction to the demands of the 
 reason. 
 
 But the sensuous impulse requires no moral law, 
 and will have its object realized through the Will, 
 whatever the reason may say thereto. This- tendency 
 of our appetitive power, to rule the will directly and 
 regardless of a higher law, conflicts with our moral 
 determinateness, and is the strongest rival that man 
 must oppose in his moral action. Desire legislates 
 directly for rude dispositions, who are deficient both 
 in moral and aesthetic culture ; and they act only ac- 
 cording to the pleasure of the senses. The reason 
 legislates directly for moral dispositions, though defi- 
 cient in aesthetic culture ; and they overcome tempta- 
 tion only through a regard for duty. In spirits that 
 possess aesthetic refinement there is another court, 
 (resort — Instanz), which not seldom compensates for 
 virtue, where that is deficient, and assists it where it 
 exists. This court is Taste. 
 
 Taste demands moderation and decency : it abhors 
 everything that is hard, angular, violent, and inclines 
 to all that unites with ease and harmony. A correct 
 ton, which is nothing else than an eesthetic law, makes 
 a well recognized demand of every civilized man, that 
 he should listen to the voice of reason even in the 
 storm of emotion, and set bounds to the rude outbreaks 
 of nature. This constraint which the civilized man 
 
192 .ESTHETIC MANNERS • 
 
 imposes upon himself in the expression of his feelings, 
 secures to him a measure of dominion over those pas- 
 sions ; at least, it acquires for him a facility in inter- 
 rupting his condition of mere passivity by an exertion 
 of self-activity, and in restraining the rash transition 
 of feeling into action, by reflection. It is true, every- 
 thing which breaks the blind violence of passion, 
 evolves as. yet no virtue (for that must always be its 
 own work), but it affords space to the Will, to apply 
 itself to virtue. But this victory of taste over rude 
 passion is by no means a moral action, neither is the 
 freedom, which taste gains here for the Will, a moral 
 freedom. Taste liberates the mind from the yoke of 
 instinct only so far as it substitutes its own fetters ; 
 and while it disarms the first and the open foe of moral 
 freedom, it not seldom remains as the second foe, and 
 all the more dangerous under the guise of friendship. 
 That is to say, Taste governs the mind only by the 
 lure of satisfaction — a noble satisfaction, to be sure, 
 since the reason is its source — but no morality exists 
 where satisfaction determines the Will. 
 
 Still something of magnitude has been gained by 
 this interference of taste in the operations of the Will. 
 All those material inclinations and rude desires, which 
 so often oppose themselves obstinately and stormfully 
 to the practice of goodness, have been outlawed from 
 the mind by Taste, and in their stead nobler and 
 milder inclinations engrafted, which relate to order, 
 harmony and perfection : and although these are no 
 virtues, yet they share one object with virtue. If now 
 
r. \ m 
 
 ESTHETIC MANNERS. 193 
 
 desire speaks, it must endure a severe scrutiny from 
 the sense of Beauty : and if now the reason speaks and 
 enjoins actions of order, harmony and perfection, it 
 finds not only no opposition from the side of inclina- 
 tion, but rather the liveliest concurrence. If, then, 
 we survey the different forms in which morality may 
 be expressed, we can refer them all to these two. 
 Either sensuousness makes the move in the mind, that 
 something should or should not take place, and the 
 will takes action thereupon, according to the law of 
 reason — or the reason makes the move, and the Will 
 obeys it, without making inquiry of the senses. 
 
 The Grecian princess, Anna Comnena, tells us of a 
 captured rebel, whom her father, Alexius, while he 
 was one of his predecessor's generals, was commis- 
 sioned to escort to Constantinople. On the way, as 
 both are riding together alone, Alexius desires to make 
 a halt under the shadow of a tree, to recover from the 
 heat of the sun. Sleep soon overpowered him : but 
 the other, troubled by the fear of expected death, re- 
 mained awake. While Alexius is lying in a deep 
 slumber, the rebel perceives his sword which was 
 swung over a branch, and is tempted to gain his free- 
 dom by the murder of his keeper. Anna Comnena 
 gives us to understand that she does not know what 
 would have happened, if her father had not luckily 
 awaked. Now here was a moral case of the first kind, 
 where the sensuous impulse had the first voice, before 
 the reason pronounced sentence upon it as arbiter. 
 13 
 
194 
 
 ESTHETIC MANNERS. 
 
 Had the former overcome the temptation out of pure 
 regard for rectitude, there would be no doubt that it 
 had acted morally. 
 
 When the Duke Leopold von Braunschweig, of il- 
 lustrious memory, deliberated on the banks of the 
 swollen Oder, whether he should trust himself to the 
 impetuous stream at the peril of his life, in order to 
 rescue some unfortunates who were helpless without 
 him, — and when he, I suppose this case, entirely from 
 a consciousness of duty, sprang into the skiff which no 
 one else was willing to enter — none can deny that he 
 acted morally. The duke was here in a situation the 
 reverse of the former one. Here the representation of 
 duty preceded, and then the instinct of self-preserva- 
 tion excited an opposition to the prescription of the 
 reason. But in both cases, the will conducted in the 
 same manner, obeying the reason directly : conse- 
 quently both are moral. 
 
 But would both cases remain so still, if we allowed 
 Taste to exert an influence ? 
 
 Suppose, then, that the first, who is tempted to com- 
 mit a bad action, and forbears out of regard to recti- 
 tude, has a taste so cultivated, that everything infamous 
 and violent excites an abhorrence which nothing can 
 overcome : his pure aesthetic sense will reject anything 
 infamous, the moment that the instinct for preservation 
 urges it — then it will not come before the moral bar, 
 before the conscience, but be already decided in a pre- 
 vious court. But the aesthetic sense governs the Will 
 by feelings only, and not by laws. That man, then, 
 
ESTHETIC MANNERS. 
 
 195 
 
 renounces the agreeable feeling of life preserved, be- 
 cause he cannot bear the disagreeable one of having 
 perpetrated a crime. The whole matter is thus de- 
 cided in the court of feeling, and the man's conduct, 
 however legal it is, is morally indifferent and nothing 
 but a beautiful operation of nature. 
 
 Suppose now, that the other, whose reason prescribes 
 something to be done, against which a natural instinct 
 rebels, has an equally delicate sense of Beauty, charmed 
 by all that is great and perfect : the moment that the 
 reason makes its demand, the sensuousness will pass 
 over to it, and he will do that with inclination, which, 
 without this fine sensibility to Beauty, he would be 
 compelled to do against inclination. But shall we, on 
 this account, esteem him less perfect ? Certainly not, 
 for he acts originally out of pure regard for the pre- 
 scription of reason : and that he obeys this prescription 
 gladly, does not diminish the moral purity of his deed. 
 Then morally he is just as perfect, but physically he 
 is far more perfect : for he is a much more appropriate 
 subject for virtue. 
 
 Then Taste gives the mind a tendency appropriate 
 for virtue, as it removes all those inclinations which 
 hinder the latter, and excites those which are favorable. 
 Taste cannot be detrimental to true virtue, if, in all 
 the cases where native impulse makes the first move, 
 it tries at once and dismisses from its bar that upon 
 which the conscience must otherwise pronounce sen- 
 tence, — thus being the reason, that among the actions 
 of those who are governed by it, many more are found 
 to be indifferent, than truly moral. For human excel- 
 
196 
 
 .ESTHETIC MANNERS. 
 
 lence by no means depends upon the greater sum of 
 single, rigorously moral, actions, but upon the greater 
 congruence of the whole native disposition with the 
 moral law, and it is a small recommendation to an age 
 or a people, if we hear much among them concerning 
 morality and single moral deeds : rather may we hope 
 that in the climax of culture, if such a thing can be 
 imagined, there will be little talk about it. On the 
 other hand, Taste can avail true virtue, positively, in 
 all the cases where the reason makes the first move, 
 and is in danger of being outvoted by the stronger 
 force of the native impulses. For, in this case, it re- 
 conciles our sensuousness with the interest of duty, 
 and thus makes a meagre degree of moral volition ade- 
 quate to the practice of virtue. 
 
 Now if Taste, as such, injures true morality in no 
 case, but rather openly assists it in many, the circum- 
 stance that it promotes in the highest degree the legal- 
 ity of our conduct, must possess great weight. Sup- 
 pose that aesthetic culture could not in the least con- 
 tribute to make us better intentioned, it would, at any 
 rate, render us skilful so to act, even without a true 
 moral intention, as a moral intention would have 
 caused us to act. It is true, our actions concern by 
 no means the court of morality, excepting as they are 
 an expression of our intentions : but, reversely, our in- 
 tentions concern by no means the physical court, and 
 the plan of nature, excepting as they induce actions 
 which further the design of nature. But now both the 
 physical sphere of force, and the moral sphere of law, 
 coincide so strictly, and are so intimately blended, 
 
^ESTHETIC MANNERS. 
 
 197 
 
 that actions, which, according to their Form, coincide 
 with a moral design, at the same time include in their 
 contents, a coincidence with a physical design ; and as 
 the whole natural structure only seems to exist, in order 
 to make goodness, the highest of all designs, possible, 
 so goodness may in turn be used as a means to sustain 
 the natural structure. The order of nature, then, is 
 made dependent upon the morality of our intentions, 
 and we cannot offend against the moral world without 
 at the same time producing disorder in the physical. 
 
 Now if we can never expect human nature, so long 
 as it is human nature, to act as pure reason, uniformly 
 and steadfastly, without interruption or relapse, and 
 never to offend against moral order : if, with every 
 conviction of the necessity and of the possibility of 
 pure virtue, we must admit, how very contingent its 
 actual practice is, and how little we need rely upon the 
 invincibility of our better principles : if we are re- 
 minded, by this consciousness of our uncertainty, that 
 the structure of nature suffers by each of our moral 
 lapses : if we call to mind all this, it would be wickedly 
 bold to hazard the weal of the world upon the chance 
 of our virtue. An obligation results rather therefrom, 
 for us at least to satisfy the physical design by the con- 
 tents of our actions, even if we should not do as much 
 for the moral design by their form, — at least to dis- 
 charge to the design of nature, as perfect instruments, 
 the debt which we owe to reason, as perfect Persons, 
 in order not to be disgraced at the same time before 
 both tribunals. If, because the legality of our conduct 
 
198 
 
 ESTHETIC MANNERS. 
 
 has no moral worth, we would make no regulations for 
 it, the universal design might thereby be annulled ; and 
 before we were ready with our principles, all the ties 
 of society would be dissolved. But the more contin- 
 gent our morality is, the more necessary is it that we 
 should devise precautions for our legality, and. an in- 
 considerate or proud neglect of this can be morally im- 
 puted to us. Just as the insane man who divines his 
 approaching paroxysm, avoids all knives, and volunta- 
 rily surrenders himself to be bound, in order not to be 
 answerable, in a condition of sanity, for the crimes of 
 his disordered brain, — so are we obliged to bind our- 
 selves by Religion and by aesthetic laws, that our pas- 
 sion, in the periods of its ascendency, may not disturb 
 the physical order. 
 
 I have not undesignedly coupled Religion and Taste 
 together, since the merit is common to both, of serving 
 as a surrogate for true virtue, according to the effect, 
 if not equally according to the internal value, and of 
 insuring legality where morality cannot be expected. 
 Although a higher rank in the order of spirits would 
 undoubtedly invest him, who needed neither the al- 
 lurements of Beauty nor the prospects of immortality, 
 to act in every crisis conformably to the reason, still 
 the well-known limits of humanity compel the most 
 rigid moralist, to remit, in the application of his system, 
 somewhat of its severity, although he need abate no- 
 thing from it in theory, and to secure the welfare of the 
 human race, which would be but indifferently cared for 
 by our contingent virtue, by the two strong anchors, 
 Religion and Taste. 
 
UPON 
 
PATHOS. 
 
 Representation of Sorrow — merely as Sorrow — 
 is never the design of art, but it is extremely important 
 as an instrument for that design. The representation 
 of the supersensuous is the final design of art, and the 
 tragic art in particular effects this, by making objective 
 to us moral independence of nature's laws in the condi- 
 tion of emotion. The principle of freedom within us 
 is only cognoscible through the opposition it makes to 
 the violence of the feelings ; but the opposition can be 
 estimated only according to the force of the attack. If, 
 then, the Intelligence in man would reveal itself as a 
 power independent of nature, the latter must first dis- 
 play its whole strength before our eyes. The sensu- 
 ousness must suffer deeply and violently : there must 
 be Pathos, in order that the reason may announce its 
 independence and represent itself as acting. 
 
 One can never know, whether presence of mind is 
 an effect of his moral power, if he has not been con- 
 vinced that it is not an effect of insensibility. It is no 
 
202 
 
 PATHOS. 
 
 art, to be master over feelings which ruffle the 
 soul's surface only lightly and transiently; but to pre- 
 serve one's mental freedom in a storm, which stirs up 
 the whole sensuous nature, requires a capacity of re- 
 sistance, which is infinitely more sublime than any 
 force of nature. One attains, then, to a representa- 
 tion of moral freedom, only through the most lively 
 representation of suffering nature : and the tragic hero 
 must legitimate himself in our opinion as a susceptible 
 being, before we can do homage to him as a rational 
 being, and believe in his strength of spirit. 
 
 Then Pathos is the first and indispensable requisite 
 for a tragic artist, and he is allowed to carry the rep- 
 resentation of sorrow as far as it can be done, without en- 
 dangering his Jinal design, without suppression of the 
 moral freedom. He must, so to speak, give his hero 
 or his reader the complete freight of sorrow, because 
 otherwise it continues to be problematic, whether his 
 opposition thereto is a mental action, and something 
 positive, and not rather something purely negative, and 
 a deficiency. 
 
 The latter is the case with the old French tragedy, 
 in which we are very seldom or never shown a suffer- 
 ing nature, but generally see only cold, declamatory 
 poets, or comedians upon stilts. The frosty tone of 
 declamation extinguishes all true nature, and their 
 adorable decency makes it completely impossible for 
 French tragic poets to portray humanity in its truth. 
 Decency falsifies, even in its own proper place, the ex 
 pression of nature, and yet the art demands the latter 
 
PATHOS. 
 
 203 
 
 imperatively. We can hardly believe it in a French 
 tragic hero, that he suffers, for he delivers himself con- 
 cerning his state of mind, like the calmest of men ; and 
 his incessant regard to the impression which he makes 
 upon others, never allows him to leave to his own na- 
 ture its freedom. The kings, princesses and heroes of 
 a Corneille and Voltaire, never forget their rank in the 
 most vehement passion, and they put off their humanity 
 far sooner than their dignity. They are like the kings 
 and emperors in the old picture-books, who go to bed 
 with their crowns on. 
 
 How different with the Greeks, and those of the 
 moderns who have composed in their spirit ! The 
 Greek is never ashamed of nature ; he allows to the 
 sensuousness its full rights, and yet is always secure 
 from being overcome by it. His deeper and correcter 
 intellect permits him to distinguish the contingent, 
 which a bad taste magnifies, from the necessary. But 
 all in man, that is not humanity, is contingent. The 
 Grecian artist who has to represent a Laocoon, a Niobe, 
 a Philoctetes, knows of no princess, no king, and no 
 king's son : he busies himself only with men. For this 
 reason the wise sculptor throws aside the vestment, and 
 shows us only naked figures, although he knows very 
 well that this does not occur in actual life. He es- 
 teems clothing as something contingent, to which the 
 necessary need never be postponed ; and the laws of 
 propriety or of need are not the laws of art. The 
 sculptor should and will show us men, and garments 
 only conceal them ; he is right, then, in throwing them 
 aside. 
 
204 
 
 PATHOS. 
 
 Just as the Grecian sculptor rejects the useless and 
 troublesome burden of attire, in order to make room 
 for human nature, so the Grecian poet releases his men 
 from the equally useless and troublesome constraint of 
 convenience, and from all the frigid laws of propriety, 
 which only refine upon man and conceal his nature. 
 In the Homeric poetry and in the tragedians, a suffer- 
 ing nature speaks in true, sincere and impressive ac- 
 cents, to our hearts ; all the passions have a free play, 
 and no feeling is restrained by the rule of propriety. 
 The heroes are as susceptible as other men to all the 
 sorrows of humanity ; and this is the very thing that 
 makes them heroes, that they feel suffering strongly 
 and deeply, and yet are not vanquished by it. They 
 love life as ardently as the rest of us, but this sentiment 
 does not goveim them so much that they cannot resign 
 it, if the duties of honor or of manhood demand such a 
 surrender. Philoctetes fills the Grecian stage with his 
 lamentations ; even the maddened Hercules does not 
 repress his grief. Iphigenia, destined for sacrifice, 
 confesses with affecting openness, that she departs from 
 the light of the sun with sorrow. The Greek never 
 glories in sluggishness and indifference to suffering, 
 but in endurance of all its forms. Even the Gods of 
 the Greek must pay a tribute to nature, as soon as 
 the poet of humanity would bring them nearer to us. 
 The wounded Mars cries for pain as loud as ten thou- 
 sand men, and Venus, scratched by a lance, mounts 
 weeping to Olympus, and forswears all fights. 
 
 This tender sensibility for suffering, this warm, 
 
PATHOS. 
 
 205 
 
 hearty, genuine, unconcealed nature, which moves us 
 so deeply and quickly in the Grecian works of art, is 
 a model for all artists to imitate, and a law, which Gre- 
 cian genius has prescribed to art. It is nature which 
 eternally makes the first demand upon man, and which 
 never need be refused : for the man — before he is any- 
 thing else — is a susceptible being. Reason makes 
 the second demand upon him, for he is a rational-sus- 
 ceptive being, a moral person ; and it is the duty of 
 the reason to govern, not to be governed by, nature. 
 Then afterwards, if the right of nature has been first 
 admitted, and if, secondly, the reason has maintained 
 its own, it is allowable fox propriety to make the third 
 demand upon man, and to enjoin upon him regard for 
 society, in the expression of his feelings as well as his 
 intentions, that he may appear as a civilized being. 
 
 The first law of tragic art was, representation of suf- 
 fering nature. The second is, representation of moral 
 opposition to suffering. 
 
 Emotion, as emotion, is something indifferent, and 
 its representation considered for itself alone, would 
 have no aesthetic value ; for, once more to repeat it, 
 nothing that concerns the sensuous nature alone, is 
 worthy of representation. Hence, not only all merely 
 relaxing (melting) emotions, but generally all extreme 
 degrees, of whatever emotion, are beneath the dignity 
 of tragic art. 
 
 The melting emotions, the merely tender excite- 
 ments, belong to the province of the agreeable, with 
 
206 
 
 PATHOS. 
 
 which the fine arts have nothing to do. They gratify 
 the sense only by dissolution or relaxation, and relate 
 only to the external, not to the internal, condition of a 
 man. Many of our romances and tragedies, espe- 
 cially of the so-called Dramas (intermediates between 
 comedy and tragedy), and the popular domestic pic- 
 tures, belong to this class. They only produce ex- 
 haustion of the lachrymal sack, and a delightful allevi- 
 ation of the vessels : but the spirit goes away empty, 
 and the nobler power of man is thereby not in the least 
 strengthened. Just so, says Kant, does many an one 
 feel edified by a sermon, whereby absolutely nothing 
 has been builded up within him. 1 And the modern 
 
 1 (Tr.) — As illustrating what may be called dynamical preaching, 
 and the spurious devotion, which, like the cannon-fever, only seizes 
 raw recruits — the whole of Kant's passage is worth quoting. With 
 respect to spiritual edification, he says : — " When a fit signification 
 is sought for this term, scarce any other can be assigned than this : 
 Edification is the ethical effect wrought upon our inner man by Devo- 
 tion. This effect cannot be the mental movement or emotion, (for 
 this is already involved in the conception of devotion), although the 
 majority of the soi-disant devout (called upon this very account 
 Devotees), place all edification just in this sentimental movement. 
 Edification must therefore be understood to mean, the Ethical 
 Purchase that devotion takes upon the actual amendment and build- 
 ing up of the moral characters of mankind. A structure of this sort 
 can only then succeed when systematically gone about : firm princi- 
 ples, fashioned after well understood conceptions, are, first of all, to 
 be laid deep into the foundations of the heart ; from these, sentiments 
 corresponding to the weight and magnitude of oifr several duties 
 must rise, and be watched and protected against the snares and 
 wiles of appetite and passion, thus uprearing and building up a new 
 man — a Temple of God. Evidently this edifice can advance but 
 slowly, but slill some traces of superstructure ought to be perceptible. 
 
PATHOS. 
 
 207 
 
 music especially seems to address only the sensuous- 
 ness, thereby flattering the ruling taste, which only de- 
 sires to be tickled agreeably, not to be laid hold upon, 
 not to be powerfully moved, not to be elevated. Con- 
 sequently that which is melting is preferred, and no 
 matter how much confusion there may be in a concert 
 room, it is suddenly all ear, while a melting passage is 
 executed. An expression of sensuousness bordering 
 upon animality then usually appears upon every coun- 
 tenance, the drunken eyes swim, the open mouth is all 
 desire, a voluptuous trembling seizes the whole body, 
 the breath is fast and weak, in short, all the symptoms 
 of intoxication ensue : showing evidently, that the 
 senses riot, while the spirit, or the principle of freedom 
 in man, falls a prey to the violence of the sensuous im- 
 pression. All such emotions, I affirm, are excluded 
 from art by a noble and manly taste, because they 
 please nothing but the sense, with which art can have 
 no dealings. 
 
 But, on the other hand, those degrees of emotion are 
 likewise excluded, which only torture the sense, with- 
 out at the same time indemnifying the spirit. They 
 oppress the mental freedom by pain, no less than the 
 former do by pleasure, and therefore simply cause 
 
 Many there are, however, who deem themselves much edified 
 (by a discourse, psalmody or book) where absolutely nothing has 
 been builded up, ay ! where not even a finger has been stirred to 
 help on the work : possibly they think that the ethic dome will, like 
 the walls of Thebes, rise to the harmonious concert of sighs and 
 yearning wishes." — Religion within the bounds of Pure Reason. 
 SempWs Translation. 
 
208 PATHOS. 
 
 aversion, and no emotion worthy of art. Art must de- 
 iight the spirit and please the freedom. He who falls a 
 victim to pain, is no longer a suffering man, but only a 
 tormented animal ; for of man is absolutely demanded a 
 moral opposition to suffering, as the only means of 
 manifesting the principle of freedom, the intelligence, 
 within. 
 
 Upon such grounds, those artists and poets are but 
 wretchedly versed in their art, who think to secure 
 Pathos by the merely sensuous power of emotion, and 
 the most vivid delineations of suffering. They forget, 
 that suffering itself is never the Ji?ial design of a repre- 
 sentation, and can never be the direct source of the 
 satisfaction we feel at the tragic. The Pathetic is Ges- 
 thetic, only so far as it is sublime. But effects, which 
 result only from a sensuous source, and are founded 
 only in affection of the sensibility, are never sublime, 
 however much power they may betray : for the sublime 
 springs only from the reason. 
 
 A representation of mere passion (whether pleasure- 
 able or painful), without a representation of the super- 
 sensuous resistive power, is called common, the oppo- 
 site is called noble. Common and noble are the concep- 
 tions which always denote, where they are used, a rela- 
 tion to the sympathy or unsympathy (Nichtantheil) of 
 man's supersensuous nature with an action or a work. 
 Nothing is noble which does not flow out of the reason : 
 all that sensuousness produces for itself, is common. 
 We say of a man, that his action is common, if he fol- 
 lows only the suggestions of his sensuous impulse : his 
 
PATHOS. 
 
 209 
 
 action is respectable, if he follows his impulse with re- 
 gard only to laws ; his action is noble, if he follows only 
 the reason, without regarding his impulses. We call a 
 likeness common, if it has nothing to manifest the in- 
 telligence in man : we call it speaking, if the spirit de- 
 tines the features, and noble, if pure spirit defines them. 
 We call a work of architecture common, if it displays 
 to us nothing but a physical design : we call it noble, 
 if at the same time, independent of every physical de- 
 sign, it is a representation of ideas. 
 
 Then a good taste, I maintain, permits no represent- 
 ation of emotion, however forceful, which expresses 
 mere physical suffering and physical resistance, without 
 also manifesting the higher humanity, the presence of 
 a supersensuous faculty, — and this for the reason 
 already unfolded, that suffering in itself is never 
 pathetic and worth representing, but only the opposi- 
 tion to suffering. Therefore all the absolutely highest 
 degrees of emotion are forbidden both to the artist and 
 the poet, for they all suppress the internally resist- 
 ing power, or rather presuppose such a suppression, 
 since no emotion can attain its absolutely highest de- 
 gree, so long as man's intelligence affords any opposi- 
 tion. 
 
 Now the question arises : how does this supersensu- 
 ous resistive power make itself manifest in an emotion? 
 In no other way than by governing, or, more generally, 
 by resisting, the emotion. I say, the emotion ; for sen- 
 suousness also can resist, but that is not a resistance 
 to the emotion, only to its cause — not a moral, but a 
 14 
 
210 
 
 PATHOS. 
 
 physical resistance, which even the worm displays, 
 when we tread upon it, and the buffalo, when we wound 
 it, without consequently exciting Pathos. When a 
 suffering man gives expression to his feelings, when he 
 seeks to avoid his enemy, and to put the suffering 
 limb in safety, he acts in common with every animal, 
 and from a ready instinct which does not first consult 
 the will. Then that which does not make him cogni- 
 zable as an intelligence, is no act of his humanity. 
 It is true, sensuousness may each time resist its enemy, 
 but not once itself. 
 
 On the contrary, the contest with emotion is a con- 
 test with sensuousness, and thus presupposes something 
 distinct from the latter. A man, with the aid of his 
 intellect and his muscular power, can defend himself 
 against the object that causes him to suffer : but, 
 against the suffering itself, he has no other weapon than 
 the ideas of the reason. 
 
 Then where Pathos should obtain, these ideas must 
 appear in the representation, or be excited by it. But 
 ideas, positively and in a peculiar sense, are not to be 
 represented, because nothing in intuition can corre- 
 spond to them. But, negatively and indirectly, they 
 are by all means to be represented, if something is 
 given in the intuition, for which we should in vain 
 search the conditions of nature. Every appearance, 
 whose final cause cannot be deduced from the sensuous 
 world, is an indirect representation of the supersen- 
 suous. 
 
 Now how does art succeed in representing some- 
 
PATHOS. 
 
 211 
 
 thing that is above nature, without employing supra- 
 natural means ? What kind of an appearance must 
 that be, which is accomplished by natural powers, (for 
 otherwise it would not be an appearance), and yet can- 
 not without contradiction be deduced from physical 
 causes? This is the problem: now how does the 
 artist solve it ? 
 
 We must remember, that the phenomena which can 
 be observed in a man in a condition of emotion, are of 
 two species. They are such, firstly, as pertain to him 
 merely as an animal, and follow as such only the law of 
 nature, ungoverned by his will, or generally under no 
 direct influence exerted by his self-dependent power. 
 They are the immediate product of instinct, and 
 blindly obey its laws. To this species belong for ex- 
 ample, the organs of circulation, of respiration, and the 
 whole surface of the skin : but those organs too, which 
 are subjected to the will, do not always wait for its de- 
 cision, but are often set in motion immediately by the 
 instinct, there particularly, where pain or danger 
 threatens the physical condition. So indeed our arm 
 is under the authority of the will, but if we uncon- 
 sciously grasp something hot, the withdrawing the 
 hand is certainly not an action of the will, but only an 
 operation of instinct. Nay, still further : speech is 
 certainly something beneath the government of the will, 
 and yet the instinct can even dispose of this organ and 
 work of the intellect at pleasure, without first consult- 
 ing the will, as soon as a great pain or a strong emotion 
 surprises us. Let the most collected stoic see of a sud- 
 
212 
 
 PATHOS. 
 
 den something exceedingly wonderful or an unexpected 
 horror, let him be near when somebody slips and is on 
 the point of falling into a chasm, a loud exclamation, 
 and that too not a merely inarticulate tone, but a per- 
 fectly distinct word, will involuntarily escape him, and 
 his nature will have acted earlier than his will. This 
 then serves to illustrate, that there are appearances in 
 man, which cannot be ascribed to his Person, as intelli- 
 gence, but only to his instinct as a power of nature. 
 
 But, secondly, there are also appearances, which ex- 
 ist under the influence and under the dominion of the 
 will, or which at least we may consider such as the 
 will has power to hinder ; for which then, the Person 
 is responsible, and not the instinct. It belongs to in- 
 stinct, to watch with blind zeal the interest of sensu- 
 ousness ; but to the Person, to limit instinct by respect 
 for laws. Pure instinct has no regard for law ; but 
 the Person has to provide that no detriment befalls the 
 prescriptions of reason through any act of instinct. So 
 much then is certain, that not all the appearances of 
 man in a state of emotion are to be defined uncondi- 
 tionally by the instinct, but that limits can be put to it 
 by the will of man. If instinct alone defines all the ap- 
 pearances in man, nothing exists that can remind us of 
 the Person, and what we have before us is only nature, 
 that is, an animal : for every natural being under the 
 dominion of instinct is called animal. If, then, the 
 Person would be represented, some appearances must 
 obtain in man, which have either been defined in oppo- 
 sition to instinct, or yet not by instinct. The fact 
 
PATHOS. 
 
 213 
 
 that instinct has not denned them, suffices to lead us 
 to a higher source, as soon as we understand that in- 
 stinct would certainly have defined them differently, if 
 its power had not been broken. 
 
 We are now in a condition to state the way and 
 manner, in which the supersensuous, self-dependent 
 power of man, his moral self, can be represented during 
 emotion : namely, as follows. All the parts which 
 obey only nature, and which the will, either always or 
 under certain circumstances, cannot dispose of, must 
 betray the presence of suffering ; but those parts which 
 are removed from the blind force of instinct, and do 
 not necessarily obey the law of nature, must show few 
 or no traces of this suffering, must appear, then, in a 
 certain degree free. Now we recognize, at this dis- 
 harmony between those features which have been 
 stamped upon the animal nature by the law of neces- 
 sity, and between those, which the self-active spirit de- 
 termines, a supersensuous principle in man, which is 
 able to limit the operations of nature, and thus to man- 
 ifest itself as something distinct from them. The 
 purely animal part of man obeys the law of nature, and 
 can appear oppressed by the violence of an emotion. 
 Through this part, the whole strength of suffering dis- 
 plays itself, and serves, as it were, for a measure, by 
 which we may estimate the resistance ; for the strength 
 of the resistance, or man's moral force, can only be 
 judged according to the strength of the attack. The 
 more decisive and violent is the development of emo- 
 tion in the province of animality, without its being 
 
•214 
 
 PATHOS. 
 
 able to maintain the same force in the province of 
 humanity, the more recognizable does the latter be- 
 come, the more gloriously is man's moral independ- 
 ence revealed, the more pathetic is the representation, 
 and the more sublime is the Pathos. 1 
 
 This aesthetic principle is made into an intuition in 
 the statues of the ancients : but it is hard to bring 
 under conceptions, and to express in words, the im- 
 pression which the sensuous act of sight gives. The 
 group of Laocoon and his children is probably a 
 measure of what the plastic art of the ancients was 
 able to effect in Pathos. 
 
 " Laocoon," says Winckelmann, 3 " is a nature in the 
 deepest pain, made in the image of a man, who seeks 
 to collect against it a conscious strength of spirit : and 
 while his suffering swells the muscles and strains the 
 
 1 I comprehend within the province of animality, the whole sys- 
 tem of those appearances in man, which are subject to the blind vio- 
 lence of native instinct, and are fully explicable without supposing 
 a freedom of the will ; within the province of humanity, I compre- 
 hend those which receive their laws from the freedom. If a repre- 
 sentation of emotion in the province of animality is deficient, we re- 
 main cold ; if, on the contrary, it prevails in the province of humanity, 
 it disturbs and disgusts us. An emotion must always remain unre- 
 duced in the former province : its reduction may first occur in the 
 province of humanity. A suffering man, represented as weeping and 
 lamenting, will but feebly move us, because sighs and tears already 
 reduce the pain in the province of animality. A mute and stifled 
 pain seizes us much more powerfully, where we find no help in 
 nature, but are obliged to take refuge in something which lies out be- 
 yond nature: and in this very reference to the supersensuous lies 
 Pathos and the power of tragedy. 
 
 2 In his History of Art, p. 699. Vienna: quarto edition. 
 
PATHOS. 
 
 215 
 
 nerves, the soul armed with power appears in the chan- 
 neled forehead, and the breast heaves over the confined 
 breath and the stifled expression of feeling, as it strives 
 to comprehend and to lock the pain within. The 
 breath laden with anxious sighs, which he swallows 
 and represses, exhausts the abdomen, and makes the 
 sides hollow, by which we may judge of the agitation 
 of the viscera. But his own suffering seems to afflict 
 him less than that of his children, who turn their 
 faces to him and cry for help : for the paternal heart 
 shows itself in the saddened eyes, and sympathy seems 
 to float over them in a dim vapor. His countenance is 
 complaining, but not exclaiming ; his eyes are directed 
 after higher aid. The mouth is full of sadness, and the 
 fallen under lip is heavy with it : but it is mingled in the 
 arched upper lip with pain, which, with an expression 
 of chagrin, as if at unworthy and unmerited suffering, 
 ascends to the nose, causes it to swell, and appears in 
 the distended and up-drawn nostrils. The conflict be- 
 tween pain and opposition, united under the forehead, 
 as into a focus, is shaped with great truth : for while 
 the pain draws up the eyebrows, the struggle against 
 it presses down the cuticle above the eye against the 
 upper eye-lid, so that it is almost covered by the im- 
 pending flesh. The artist has sought to give the na- 
 ture, which he could not improve, more development, 
 more tension, more power : the greatest beauty ap- 
 pears where the greatest pain lies. The left side, 
 into which the snake sends its venom with furious bite, 
 is the one which appears to suffer most sharply, from 
 
216 
 
 PATHOS. 
 
 the closer susceptibility of the heart. His legs lift 
 themselves in order to escape from his calamity : no 
 part is in rest, the chisel-strokes themselves assist in 
 indicating a stiffened skin." 
 
 How truly and finely is the conflict of intelligence 
 with the suffering of sensuous nature developed in this 
 description, and how strikingly given are the appear- 
 ances in which animality and humanity, the constraint 
 of nature and the freedom of reason, reveal themselves. 
 Virgil has depicted the same scene in his yEneid : but 
 it did not lie in the plan of the epic poet, to linger over 
 the mental condition of Laocoon, as the sculptor was 
 obliged to do. With Virgil the whole relation is 
 merely accessory, and the purpose, whereto it should 
 serve him, is sufficiently attained by the simple physical 
 representation, without a necessity that he should give 
 us deep glances into the soul of the suffering one : 
 since he will not so much move us to compassion, as 
 penetrate us with horror. In this respect, then, the 
 duty of the poet was merely negative, namely, not to 
 carry the representation of suffering nature so far as to 
 lose thereby all expression of humanity or of moral re- 
 sistance, because otherwise aversion and indignation 
 must infallibly ensue. Consequently he preferred to 
 restrict himself to the representation of the cause of 
 suffering, and thought proper to enlarge more minutely 
 upon the dreadfulness of the two serpents, and upon 
 the fury with which they fall upon their victim, than 
 upon the sensations of the latter. Upon those he 
 dwelt but slightly, because it was important that he 
 
PATHOS. 
 
 217 
 
 should preserve unweakened the idea of a divine retri- 
 bution and the impression of horror. If, on the con- 
 trary, he had permitted us to know as much of Lao- 
 coon's Person, as the sculptor has, the suffering man, 
 and no longer the avenging divinity, would have been 
 the hero in the action, and the episode would have lost 
 its consistency with the whole. 
 
 We are well acquainted with Virgil's relation 
 through Lessing's excellent commentary. But the 
 purpose, for which Lessing used it, was only to make 
 perceptible the limits of poetic and picturesque repre- 
 sentation in this example, not to evolve therefrom the 
 conception of Pathos. But it seems to me to be no less 
 useful for the latter design, and I may be permitted to 
 run through it again with this view. 
 
 Ecce autem gemini Tenedo tranquilla per alta 
 (Horresco referens) immensis orbibus angues 
 Incumbunt pelago, pariterque ad littora tendunt. 
 Pcctora quorum inter fluctus arrecta, jubaeque 
 Sanguineae exsuperant undas, pars csetera pontum 
 Pone legit, sinuatque immensa volumine terga. 
 Fit sonitus spumante salo, jamque arva tenebant, 
 Ardentis oculos suffecti sanguine etigni, 
 Sibila lambebant linguis vibrantibus ora. 
 
 Here power, the first of the three above cited condi- 
 tions of the sublime, is given : that is to say, a mighty 
 power of nature, which is bent upon destruction and 
 derides all resistance. But that this power may be at 
 the same time fearful, and that fear sublime, depends 
 upon two different mental operations, that is, upon two 
 
218 
 
 PATHOS. 
 
 representations which we create spontaneously within. 
 First, when we compare this irresistible power of na- 
 ture with the weak resistive ability of the physical man, 
 we recognize it to be fearful ; and secondly, when we 
 refer it to our will, and call into consciousness the ab- 
 solute independence of the latter of every natural in- 
 fluence, it becomes for us a sublime object. But we 
 assume these two relations, for the poet gave us nothing 
 but an object armed with mighty force and striving to 
 display it. If we tremble before it, it happens only be- 
 cause we imagine ourselves, or a creature like us, in a 
 struggle with it. If, during our tremor, we feel ele- 
 vated, it is because we are conscious that we, even as 
 the victim of this power, should have nothing to fear 
 for our free self, for the autonomy of our determining 
 volition. In short, the representation so far is only 
 contemplatively sublime 
 
 Diffugimus visu exsangues, illi agmine certo 
 Laocoonta petunt. 
 
 The mightiness is now given as fearful also, and the 
 contemplative sublime passes over into Pathos. We 
 see it actually enter the lists with the weakness of man. 
 Laocoon or ourselves, the effect differs only in degree. 
 The sympathetic impulse terrifies the impulse for self- 
 preservation, the monsters break loose upon — us, and 
 all flight is vain. 
 
 It now depends no longer upon us, whether we will 
 measure this power with our own, relatively to our 
 own existence. This takes place in the object itself 
 
PATHOS. 
 
 219 
 
 without our cooperation. Then our fear has not, as 
 in the preceding moment, a subjective ground merely 
 in our minds, but an objective ground in the object. 
 For though we recognize the whole to be a pure fic- 
 tion of the imagination, yet we distinguish, even in 
 this fiction, a representation which is imparted from 
 without, from another, which we produce spontane- 
 ously within ourselves. 
 
 Then the mind loses a part of its freedom, because 
 it receives from without what it previously created 
 through its spontaneity. The representation of peril 
 acquires an appearance of objective reality, and the 
 emotion becomes serious. 
 
 If now, we were nothing but sensuous beings, and 
 obeyed only the instinct of self-preservation, we should 
 stand still here and remain in a condition of mere pas- 
 sivity. But there is something in us which takes no 
 part in the affections of the sensuous nature, and whose 
 activity conforms to no sensuous conditions. Now, 
 greater or less room will be left for suffering nature, 
 and a greater or less remainder of self-activity in the 
 emotion, according as this spontaneous principle (the 
 moral disposition), has developed itself in a mind. 
 
 In minds morally developed, the terrible (in imagi- 
 nation), has a swift and easy transition to the sublime. 
 As the imagination loses its freedom, the reason makes 
 valid its own : and the mind takes an inward extension 
 only so much the more, as it finds limits without. Re- 
 pulsed from all the intrenchments, which could afford 
 a physical protection to the sensuous being, we throw ' 
 
220 
 
 PATHOS. 
 
 ourselves into the impregnable fortress of our moral 
 freedom, and thus gain an absolute and infinite safety, 
 while we abandon a merely comparative and preca- 
 rious defence in the field of phenomena. But for the 
 very reason, that it must come to this physical stress, 
 before we can seek aid from our moral nature, we can 
 purchase this lofty feeling of freedom only through suf- 
 fering. The common soul continues fast in this suffer- 
 ing, and never feels, in the sublime of Pathos, anything 
 more than the terrible : on the contrary, a self-depend- 
 ent mind passes, from this very suffering, to the feeling 
 of his lordliest energy, and knows how to create sub- 
 limity from everything terrible. 
 
 Laocoonta petunt, ac primum parva duorum 
 Corpora gnatorum serpens amplexus uterque 
 Implicat, ac miseros morsu depascitur artus. 
 
 It produces a great effect, that the moral man (the 
 father), is attacked before the physical man. All emo- 
 tions are more aesthetic at second hand, and no sym- 
 pathy is stronger than that which we feel with sympathy. 
 
 Post ipsum auxilio subeuntem ac tela ferentem 
 Cornpiunt. 
 
 Now is the moment to establish the hero in our 
 esteem as a moral person, and the poet seizes this mo- 
 ment. We know from his description, the whole 
 force and fury of the hostile monsters, and know how 
 fruitless all opposition is. Now were Laocoon only a 
 common man, he would consult his own interest, and. 
 
PATHOS. 
 
 221 
 
 like the other Trojans, seek his safety in a hasty flight. 
 But he has a heart in his bosom, and the peril of his 
 children constrains him to his own destruction. This 
 single trait alone makes him worthy of all our com- 
 passion : and we should have been moved and shocked, 
 at whatever moment the serpents might have seized 
 him. But when it happens at the moment, when he is 
 worthy of our veneration as a father, when his death is 
 represented as the immediate result, as it were, of his 
 fulfilment of a paternal duty — this enflames our sym- 
 pathy to the highest. He is now as one, who surren- 
 ders himself to destruction from free choice, and his 
 death is an actionvof the will. 
 
 In all Pathos, then, the sense must become in- 
 terested through suffering, the spirit through freedom. 
 If a pathetic representation is wanting in an expression 
 of suffering nature, it is without (Esthetic power, and 
 our heart remains cold. If it fails in an expression of 
 ethical disposition, it can never, with all its sensuous 
 power, be pathetic, and will infallibly disturb our per- 
 ception. The suffering man must be apparent through 
 all the freedom of spirit, and the spirit, capable of 
 self-dependence, must appear through all the suffering 
 of humanity. 
 
 But the independence of spirit can be manifested in 
 a condition of suffering, in a twofold manner. Either 
 negatively — if the ethical man does not receive law 
 from the physical, and the condition is not allowed to 
 
222 
 
 PATHOS. 
 
 have a causality for the inclination : or positively — if 
 the ethical man gives law to the physical, and the in- 
 tention preserves causality for the condition. From 
 the first, results the sublime of resolution : from the 
 second, the sublime of action. 
 
 Every character that is independent of destiny is a 
 sublimity of resolution. " A brave spirit, in conflict 
 with adversity," says Seneca, " is an attractive specta- 
 cle, even for the gods." The Roman Senate after the 
 reverse at Cannae gives us such a sight. Even Milton's 
 Lucifer, when for the first time he casts his eyes around 
 Hell, his future abode, penetrates us, on account of 
 this strength of soul, with a feeling of admiration. He 
 exclaims : 
 
 " Hail horrors : hail 
 Infernal world ; and thou profoundest hell 
 Receive thy new possessor ; one who brings 
 A mind not to be changed by place or time. 
 The mind is its own place, and in itself 
 Can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven. 
 
 Here at least 
 
 We shall be free." 
 
 The answer of Medea in the tragedy belongs to the 
 same class. 
 
 Of sublimity of resolution we may have intuition, for 
 it depends upon coexistence ; on the contrary, sub- 
 limity of action may be only imagined, for it depends 
 upon succession, and the intellect is compelled, on ac- 
 count of the suffering, to make a deduction from a free 
 resolution. Consequently only the first is for the 
 sculptor, because he only can successfully represent 
 
PATHOS. 
 
 coexisting ideas ; but the poet can diffuse himself over 
 both. Even if the sculptor has to represent a sublime 
 action, he has to convert it first into a sublime resolu- 
 tion. 
 
 It is demanded for sublimity of action, that the suf- 
 fering of a man should not only have no influence upon 
 his moral quality, but, quite the reverse, should be the 
 work of his moral character. This can be in two 
 ways. Either mediately, and according to the law of 
 freedom, if he chooses suffering out of regard for some 
 duty. In this case the conception of duty determines 
 him as motive, and his suffering is an action of the will. 
 Or immediately, and according to the law of necessity, 
 if he atones morally for a duty transgressed. In this 
 case the conception of duty determines him as force, 
 and his suffering is only an effect. We have an exam- 
 ple of the first in Regulus, when, in order to keep his 
 word, he surrenders himself to the revengefulness of 
 the Carthagenians : he would have served for an exam- 
 ple of the second, had he broken his word, and had the 
 consciousness of this fault made him miserable. In 
 both cases the life has a moral ground, only with this 
 difference, that he shows us, in the first case, his moral 
 character, in the other, only his moral determinateness. 
 In the first case he appears as a person morally great, 
 in the second, only as an object aesthetically great. 
 
 This latter distinction is important for tragic art, 
 and therefore deserves a stricter examination. 
 
 That man is a sublime object, only in an aesthetic 
 estimation, who represents to us in his condition the 
 
224 
 
 PATHOS. 
 
 dignity of human determinateness, supposing that we 
 do not see this determinateness realized in his Person. 
 He becomes sublime, in a moral estimation, only when 
 he also conducts, as a Person, conformably to that de- 
 terminateness, — when our regard concerns not only 
 his ability, but the use of this ability, when not only 
 his disposition, but his actual demeanor acquires dig- 
 nity. It is something quite distinct, whether, in our 
 criticism, we regard the moral ability, and this possi- 
 bility of an absolute freedom of the will, or the use of 
 this ability, and the reality of this freedom of the will. 
 
 It is quite a different thing, I say, and this difference 
 lies not only in the objects criticised, but in the differ- 
 ent critical methods. The same object may displease 
 us, when regarded morally, and be very attractive, aes- 
 thetically. But if it gives us satisfaction in both the 
 critical courts, it is effected with both in a manner 
 entirely different. By being aesthetically useful, it be- 
 comes morally unsatisfying, and when morally satisfy- 
 ing, not aesthetically useful. 
 
 For example, I imagine the self-sacrifice of Leonidas 
 at Thermopylae. Morally considered, this action is a 
 representation of the moral law fulfilled against every 
 opposition of instinct : aesthetically considered, it is a 
 representation of the moral ability independent of every 
 constraint of instinct. This action satisfies my moral 
 sense (the reason) : it transports my aesthetic sense 
 (the imagination). 
 
 I offer the following reason for this difference in my 
 perceptions of the same object. 
 
PATHOS. 225 
 
 As our being separates into two principles or na- 
 tures, so also our feelings, in conformity with these, 
 separate into two species entirely distinct. As a ra- 
 tional being we feel approbation or disapprobation : as 
 a sensuous being, we feel pleasure or displeasure 
 Both feelings, approbation and pleasure, are founded 
 upon a satisfaction given : the former upon satisfaction 
 of a claim, for the reason demands only, but does not 
 need : the latter upon satisfaction of a solicitation, for 
 the sense needs only, and cannot demand. The de- 
 mands of reason and the needs of sense are both related 
 to each other, as necessity to exigency : both, then, 
 are comprehended under the conception of necessity, 
 only with this difference, that the necessity of reason 
 takes place unconditionally, but the necessity of sense 
 only under conditions. But with both the satisfaction 
 is contingent. Every feeling, of pleasure as well as of 
 approbation, has its final cause, then, in coincidence of 
 the contingent with the necessary. If the necessity is 
 an Imperative, the feeling will be approbation, if it is 
 an exigency, the feeling will be pleasure : and both of 
 them stronger in degree, according as the satisfaction 
 is more contingent. 
 
 Now a demand of the reason underlies every moral 
 decision, namely, that a thing be done morally, and an 
 unconditioned necessity exists, that we will what is 
 right. But since the will is free, it is (physically) 
 contingent whether we really do it. If we actually do 
 it, then this coincidence of chance in the use of free- 
 dom with the Imperative of the reason, acquires favor 
 15 
 
226 PATHOS. 
 
 or approbation, and in a higher degree, according as 
 the opposition of inclinations makes this use of freedom 
 more contingent and doubtful. 
 
 On the contrary, the object, aesthetically considered, 
 is related to the exigency of the imagination, which 
 cannot dictate, but can only desire, that the contingent 
 should coincide with its interests. But it is the in- 
 terest of imagination, to maintain itself in play, free 
 from laws. To this disposition for license, the moral 
 obligation of the will, which strictly defines for it its 
 object, is nothing less than favorable : and as the 
 moral obligation of the will is the object of moral 
 judgment, we easily see, that the imagination could not 
 find its account in judging after this fashion. But a 
 moral obligation of the will can be imagined only under 
 the supposition of its absolute independence of the 
 constraint of natural impulses : then the possibility of 
 the moral postulates freedom, and consequently coin- 
 cides herein most completely with the interest of the 
 fancy. But since the fancy with its exigency cannot 
 so prescribe to the will of an individual, as the reason 
 can with its Imperative, the ability of freedom, in its 
 relation to the fancy, is something contingent, and 
 hence must excite pleasure, as a coincidence of chance 
 with that which is (conditionally) necessary. If, then, 
 we criticise that deed of Leonidas morally, we regard 
 it from a point of view whence we apprehend its con- 
 tingency less than its necessity. If, on the contrary, 
 we criticise it aesthetically , we regard it from a stand- 
 point, where its necessity is displayed less than its con- 
 
PATHOS. 
 
 227 
 
 tingency. It is duty, for every will to act thus, as 
 soon as it is a moral will : but that there generally is a 
 freedom of will, which makes it possible to act thus, is 
 a. favor of nature with regard to that faculty for which 
 freedom is an exigency. Then if the moral sense — 
 the reason — criticises a virtuous action, the highest re- 
 sult is approbation, because the reason can never find 
 more than, and seldom only as much as, it demands. 
 If, on the contrary, the aesthetic sense — the imagina- 
 tion — criticises the same action, a positive pleasure 
 results, because the imagination can never demand an 
 unanimity with its exigency, and must therefore find 
 itself surprised at the actual satisfying of it, as at a 
 lucky chance. We approve Leonidas, because he 
 actually resolved the heroic act : we exult and are de- 
 lighted that he could resolve it. 
 
 The difference between both kinds of criticism be- 
 comes more visible, if we select an action, upon which 
 the moral and the aesthetic decisions diner. Take the 
 self-cremation of Peregrine Proteus at Olympia. 1 
 Judging morally, I cannot approve of this action so far 
 
 1 (Ta.) — Peregrine Proteus was a juggler who voluntarily burnt 
 himself at one of the Olympic games. He lived in the first half of 
 the second century. Being compelled to flee into Palestine, on ac- 
 count of some monstrous excesses, he there became a Christian, and 
 was distinguished for his zeal, which gained him a dungeon and the 
 prestige of persecution. After he was set at liberty, he recommenced 
 his wanderings, but fell unfortunately into the full tide of his old 
 excesses, and was finally as thoroughly detested as he had been 
 blindly adored. Wishing, however, to do one more thing for the 
 sake of glory, and to quit time and space with eclat, he gave out 
 that he would burn himself at Olympia: which he did, A. D. 168. 
 
228 
 
 PATHOS. 
 
 as I find impure motives active in it, on whose account 
 the duty of self-preservation is postponed. Judging, 
 aesthetically, this action pleases me, and for this reason, 
 that it testifies to an ability of the will, to resist even 
 the mightiest of all instincts, the impulse of self-preser- 
 vation. Whether it was a pure moral intention or only 
 a more powerful sensuous attraction, which suppressed 
 the impulse of self-preservation in the enthusiast Pro- 
 teus, I care not, in estimating it aesthetically ; in 
 which case I forsake the individual, abstract the rela- 
 tion of his will to the law of will, and imagine the hu- 
 man will generally, as a generic faculty, in relation to 
 the whole force of nature. Morally considered, we 
 have seen that self-preservation was conceived as a 
 duty, whose violation consequently offended ; on the 
 contrary, aesthetically considered, it was regarded as 
 an interest, whose postponement consequently pleased. 
 Then the operation which we perform in the former 
 
 Wieland has elevated Peregrine into the hero of one of his romances, 
 and has made a noble enthusiast out of the juggler ; his youthful 
 fancy is filled with marvellous conceptions and phantasms — he 
 strives to acquire a knowledge of himself and the world, which 
 shall elevate him to perfection and the bliss of spirits. He seeks 
 this, in order that he may live the life of a spirit, converse with divin- 
 ities and demonic influences, and rise from one degree of beauty to 
 another, till he has intuition and enjoyment of the archetypal Beauty, 
 the heavenly Venus, who is continent of all Beauty and perfection. 
 " One easily sees," says Gervinus " how this, a copy of a Lavater, a 
 christian mystic, and his yearning after a divine union, is the system 
 of devout Epicureanism." Wieland's Agalhodemon is very like this 
 romance of Peregrine Proteus, being a psychological apology for 
 Apollonius of Tyana. "It is a substitute for the inelegant biogra- 
 phy of Apollonius by Philostrates, as Proteus is for Lucian's jesting 
 Dialogue." 
 
PATHOS. 
 
 229 
 
 kind of criticism, is precisely reversed in the latter. 
 Here we place the sensuously limited individual and 
 the pathologically affective will, over against the abso- 
 lute law of will and the infinite duty of spirit ; there, 
 on the contrary, we place the absolute ability of will 
 and the infinite force of spirit, over against the con- 
 straint of nature and the limits of sensuousness. 
 Hence the aesthetic judgment leaves us free, and ele- 
 vates and inspires us, since we already gain a manifest 
 vantage against sensuousness, through the mere abili- 
 ty to will absolutely, through the mere disposition for 
 morality — since the mere possibility of extricating 
 ourselves from the constraint of nature, flatters our 
 need of freedom. Hence the moral judgment confines 
 and humiliates us, since we find ourselves more or less 
 at a disadvantage with every special act of the will 
 against the absolute law of will, and the fancy's im- 
 pulse of freedom, is contradicted by the limitation of 
 the will to a single mode of determinateness, which 
 duty positively demands. Here we soar from the ac- 
 tual to the possible, and from the individual to the 
 race ; there, on the contrary, we descend from the pos- 
 sible to the actual, and confine the race within the 
 limits of the individual : no wonder, then, that an 
 aesthetic judgment gives us a feeling of expansion, and 
 that, on the contrary, a moral judgment leaves us 
 cramped and bound. 1 
 
 1 This solution, I remark in passing, also explains to us the di- 
 versity of aesthetic impression, which the Kantian representation of 
 Duty is accustomed to make upon its different critics. Not a con- 
 
230 
 
 PATHOS. 
 
 It follows from all this, that the moral and the aes- 
 thetic criticism, far from supporting, rather impede, 
 each other, since they give the mind two entirely con- 
 tradictory directions : for the conformity, which the 
 reason demands as moral arbitress, does not consist 
 with the license which the imagination desires as aes- 
 thetic arbitress. Hence an object will the less serve 
 for aesthetic use, according as it is qualified for moral 
 use ; and if the poet must nevertheless select it, he 
 will do well, so to handle it, as not so much to refer 
 our reason to the rule of the will, as rather to refer our 
 fancy to the ability of the will. The poet must take 
 
 temptible portion of the public finds this representation of Duty very 
 humiliating: another portion finds it infinitely exalting for the 
 heart. Both are right, and the reason of the contradiction exists 
 only in the different stand-point, from which the two parties regard 
 this object. The mere performance of one's obligations, certainly 
 contains nothing great, and in so far as the best we are able to per- 
 form is nothing but the fulfilment, and a meagre fulfilment too, of 
 our Duty, the highest virtue contains nothing inspiring. But, to 
 perform one's obligations truly and steadfastly through all the limi- 
 tations of sensuous nature, and to obey undeviatingly the holy spirit- 
 law in the fetters of matter, this, certainly, is exalting and worthy of 
 admiration. Our virtue, reckoned against the spirit-world, has truly 
 nothing meritorious, and however much it may cost us, we shall 
 ever be unprofitable servants : on the other hand, reckoned against 
 the world of sense, it is an object all the more elevating. So far as 
 we judge all actions morally, and refer them to the ethic law, we 
 shall have little reason to be proud of our morality : but so far as we 
 regard these actions potentially, and refer our mental ability, which 
 underlies them, to the empirical world — that is, so far as we judge 
 aesthetically, a certain self- estimation is allowable, nay, it is even ne- 
 cessary; because we discover a principle within us, that is great ar.d 
 infinite beyond all comparison. 
 
PATHOS. 
 
 231 
 
 this course for his own sake, for where our freedom 
 begins his domination ends. We are his only so long 
 as we make external intuitions : he has lost us, as soon 
 as we commence an introversion. But the latter ine- 
 vitably ensues, as soon as an object no longer consider- 
 ed as a phenomenon by us, begins to rule us as a law. 
 
 Even of the utterances of the sublimest virtue, the 
 poet can use nothing for his purposes, save what be- 
 longs to those of power. He does not trouble himself 
 concerning the direction of power. The poet, even if 
 he places before our eyes the most perfect moral pat- 
 tern, has no other aim, and need have no other, than 
 to delight us by its contemplation. But nothing that 
 fails to improve our Subject, can delight us, and no- 
 thing that does not elevate our spiritual ability, can 
 spiritually delight us. But how can the dutifulness 
 of another improve our Subject and increase our spirit- 
 ual power 1 That he actually fulfils his duty, depends 
 upon a contingent use which he makes of his free- 
 dom, and which, therefore, can demonstrate nothing 
 for us. What we share with him is only the ability 
 for a like dutifulness; and when in perceiving his 
 ability, we perceive also our own, we feel an elevation 
 of our spiritual power. Then it is only through the 
 represented possibility of an absolutely free will, that 
 its actual exercise pleases our aesthetic sense. 
 
 One will become more convinced of this, by reflect- 
 ing how little the poetic power of the impression which 
 moral characters or actions make upon us, depends 
 upon their historic reality. The pleasure we take in 
 
232 
 
 PATHOS. 
 
 ideal characters loses nothing by the recollection that 
 they are poetic fictions : for all aesthetic effect is based 
 upon poetic, not upon historic truth. But poetic truth 
 does not consist in the fact that something has really 
 happened, but that it could happen, — in the internal 
 potentiality, then, of things. The aesthetic power 
 must then already lie in the represented possibility. 
 
 Even in the actual adventures of historical person- 
 ages, the Poetic does not consist in the fact of exist- 
 ence, but in the faculty announced through the exist- 
 ence. The circumstance, that these persons really 
 lived, and that these events really occurred, can, very 
 often, it is true, increase our satisfaction, but with a 
 foreign alloy that is far more detrimental than advan- 
 tageous to the poetic impression. The idea has been 
 long entertained, of rendering a service to the poetry 
 of our Father-land, by recommending to poets national 
 objects for elaboration. The Grecian poetry, it is said, 
 had such a mastery over the heart, because it depicted 
 native scenes and immortalized native deeds. It is 
 not to be denied that, by virtue of this circumstance, 
 the poetry of the ancients produced effects of which 
 the modern poetry cannot boast ; but did these effects 
 belong to the art and to the poet ? Alas for Grecian 
 art, if it had nothing but this fortuitous advantage over 
 modern genius — alas for Grecian taste, if it was 
 forced to depend for its triumph upon these historic 
 associations in the works of its poets ! Only a barba- 
 rous taste needs the spur of private interest to win it 
 to beauty, and only the bungler borrows from the ma- 
 
PATHOS. 
 
 terial a power which he despairs of imparting to the 
 form. Poetry should not take her way through the 
 cold region of memory, and should never make learn- 
 ing her interpreter, or self-interest her advocate. She 
 must find the heart, since from that she flows ; she 
 must not single out the citizen in the man, but the 
 man in the citizen. 
 
 It is fortunate that true genius does not care much 
 for the hints which are peevishly thrown out for its 
 benefit, with a capacity not so good as the intention : 
 else Sulzer 1 and his followers would have given a very 
 
 i (Tr.) — J. G. Sulzer: 1719-79. He was the last critical de- 
 fender of what Gervinus calls musical poetry. His book (a sort of 
 aesthetic dictionary), is full of radotcrie about the inspiration of the 
 poet and his methodical madness, something which Sulzer never ex- 
 perienced. He is desirous of teaching artists how they are to con- 
 duct during this inspiration, and has many things to whisper into the 
 ear of philosophers. " Batleux and Baumgarten are his aesthetic 
 authorities; Lessing is hardly mentioned in his bulky volume ; Bod- 
 mer and Klopstock are his poetic ideals, and he rates the Noachid, in 
 commendation of which he wrote a special book, higher than the 
 Messias ; he admires Rousseau and Dante on the ground of a musical 
 or seraphic relationship, though he does not profess to understand the 
 latter, — &c." " He comprehends the Ethical and the ^Esthetic un- 
 der the moral feeling, which is the source of poetry. It is the final 
 design of Art to awaken moral feelings : he strives in particular to 
 excite a more refined feeling in the most respectable part of the na- 
 tion, since he hopes by this means to advance the arts, and by the arts 
 to fashion the whole public life. He seeks to make a permanent 
 union of poetry with religion and politics, to give festivals and every- 
 thing national as a point d'appui for the arts — that the people may 
 be inflamed with zeal for the rights of humanity ; and he considers 
 those men specially commissioned to be poets, whose ruling passion 
 is love for the common weal. This disposition made Herder favor- 
 ably disposed towards him ; but all who longed for the development 
 
234 
 
 PATHOS. 
 
 ambiguous shape to German poetry. To impart to 
 men a moral culture, and to kindle national feelings 
 in the citizen, is truly an honorable mission for the 
 poet, and the Muses know best, how closely therewith 
 the arts of the Sublime and Beautiful may assimilate. 
 But that which would eminently prosper in a mediate 
 connection with poetry, would have, in an immediate 
 connection, but an ill success. Poetry never carries 
 on with man a special occupation ; and no instrument 
 more awkward could be chosen, for the proper execu- 
 tion of any isolated commission, of any detail. Its 
 sphere of action is the totality of human nature, and 
 only so far as it has an influence upon the character, 
 can it influence its single operations. Poetry can be 
 to man what love is to the hero. It can neither coun- 
 sel him, nor smite with him, nor perform any labor 
 for him : but it can bring him up to be a hero, can 
 summon him to deeds, and arm him with strength for 
 all that he ought to be. 
 
 Then the aesthetic power, with which sublimity of 
 intention and action seizes us, depends by no means 
 upon the interest of the reason, that something should 
 become well done, but upon the interest of the imagina- 
 tion, that well-doing should be possible — that is, that 
 
 of a pure poetic spirit, opposed him, and his theory remained a canon 
 only for a Hackert." Goethe declared against his theory, and was 
 especially severe upon the glorifications of the Noackid : " After the 
 waters of epic poetry have subsided, few pilgrims will be left to visit 
 the ruins of Bodmer's ark on the hill of Devotion." — See Gervinus, 
 iv. 241. 
 
PATHOS. 
 
 235 
 
 no sentiment, however mighty, may be oppressive to 
 freedom of mind. But this possibility lies in every 
 strong expression of freedom and volitive power ; and 
 wherever a poet meets with such, he has found an ap- 
 propriate object for his representation. As regards 
 his interest, it is a matter of indifference, from what 
 class of characters, bad or good, he selects his heroes, 
 as the same measure of power which is necessary for 
 the good, may in consequence be very often demanded 
 in the bad. How much more we regard, in our aes- 
 thetic judgments, the power than the direction of the 
 power, freedom than conformity, is sufficiently evident 
 from the fact that we prefer to see power and freedom 
 expressed at the expense of conformity, rather than 
 conformity preserved at the expense of power and 
 freedom. As soon, then, as cases occur, in which the 
 moral law unites itself with motives that threaten to 
 carry away the will by their violence, the character 
 gains sesthetically, if it is able to resist these motives. 
 A vicious person begins to interest us, as soon as he 
 must venture life and happiness, in order to carry out 
 his evil will ; on the contrary, a virtuous person fails 
 to attract our attention in the same proportion as his 
 happiness itself compels him to act with propriety. 
 Revenge, for example, is unquestionably an ignoble 
 and a base emotion. Yet not the less does it become 
 aesthetic, as soon as it costs the one who exercises it, a 
 grievous sacrifice. When Medea murders her child- 
 ren, she aims through the deed at Jason's heart, but 
 at the same time she inflicts a grievous wound upon 
 
236 
 
 PATHOS. 
 
 her own ; and her revenge becomes aesthetically sub- 
 lime, as soon as she displays the tenderness of the 
 mother. 1 
 
 1 (Tr.) — The union of mental power, of woman's revenge and of 
 maternal tenderness, into one effect of pathetic sublimity, is finely 
 represented by Seneca, in his tragedy of Medea : Act v. Sc. i. The 
 following are parts of her long soliloquy, in the midst of the flames 
 of Corinth, set on fire by her magical rites : 
 
 Seek some new revenge 
 Till now unheard of: rally all thy powers — 
 Break through the barriers of shame and right : 
 A hand that's pure can wreak but mean revenge. 
 Bend to the task and rouse thy sluggish ire, 
 And from thy deepest nature summon forth 
 Long-smothered power. What I have done till now, 
 Shall be called virtue. Let the nations know 
 How harmless and of note how common were 
 My former crimes. I simply tried my power — 
 What could rude art or girlish rage effect ? 
 I am Medea now — ills sharpen wit. 
 
 Ye Gods ! I see the goal ! 
 My soul collect thyself. My children, come, 
 Make expiation for a father's guilt. 
 Horror invades my heart — my limbs are cold, 
 And my whole bosom trembles. Rage departs, 
 And all the mother banishes the wife. 
 
 Wherefore does anger and then love impel me ? 
 Contending passions make their sport of me, 
 As when the arrowy winds wage furious war, 
 And swell the ocean with opposing waves, 
 And currents fret the deep. 
 
 But exile presses : even now, 
 Snatched from my bosom they are borne away 
 Weeping and grieving. They are lost to me — 
 
PATHOS. 
 
 237 
 
 Herein the aesthetic judgment contains more that is 
 true, than we commonly believe. Vices, which testify 
 to a strength of will, openly announce a greater dispo- 
 sition for true moral freedom, than virtues, which 
 steady themselves upon an inclination ; since it costs 
 the consequent wickedness only a single victory over 
 itself, a single reversal of maxims, in order to apply to 
 goodness the whole consequence and ability of will, 
 which was expended upon crime. Otherwise how 
 comes it, that we repel with aversion a semi-virtuous 
 character, and often follow with shuddering admiration 
 one of unmitigated depravity ? Unquestionably be- 
 cause we surrender with the former, even the possibility 
 of an absolutely free will, while, with every expression 
 of the latter, we perceive that he might raise himself to 
 the whole dignity of humanity by a single act of his 
 will. 
 
 Then in aesthetic criticisms we are not interested 
 for morality in itself, but only for freedom, and the 
 former can please our imagination, only so far as it 
 makes the latter apparent. Hence one evidently in- 
 volves together proper limits, if, in aesthetic things, he 
 demands moral conformity, and would force the imagi- 
 nation out of her legitimate province, in order to ex- 
 Then never let them feel a father's kiss. 
 O rage ! I follow thee. Marshal the way. 
 
 Ye Furies ! Sear my eyeballs 
 With all your torches : I am ripe for crime. 
 Now act, my soul. Oblivion shall not hide 
 This last sad summoning of fortitude. 
 
238 
 
 PATHOS. 
 
 tend the realm of reason. Some would either entirely 
 subjugate her, thus gaining no aesthetic effect at all, 
 or divide her authority with the reason, thus gaining 
 little for morality. By attempting to pursue two differ- 
 ent designs, there is danger that both will fail. One 
 would fetter freedom of fancy by moral conformity, and 
 destroy the necessity of reason by the caprice of the 
 imagination. 
 
UPON 
 
 THE SUBLIME. 
 
THE SUBLIME. 
 
 " No man must must," said the Jew Nathan to the 
 Dervis, and the expression is true far more extensively, 
 than one might at first allow. The Will is the dis- 
 tinctive feature of man, and reason itself is only its 
 eternal rule. All nature acts rationally ; man's pre- 
 rogative is only, that he acts rationally with conscious- 
 ness and will. All other things must ; man is the 
 being who wills. 
 
 For this reason nothing is so unworthy of a man, as 
 to suffer violence, for violence disannuls him. Who- 
 ever inflicts it upon us, calls into question nothing 
 less than humanity ; whoever cowardly submits to it, 
 forfeits his humanity. But this pretension to absolute 
 freedom from all that is violence, seems to presuppose 
 a condition possessing sufficient power, to repel every 
 other power. If he finds himself in a condition, which 
 does not maintain the highest rank in the empire of 
 powers, there results thence an unhappy contradiction 
 between impulse and ability. 
 16 
 
242 
 
 THE SUBLIME. 
 
 Man is found in this situation. Encircled by count- 
 less powers, all of which are superior and play the 
 master over him, he makes pretensions by his nature, 
 that he will endure no violence. It is true, he ingen- 
 iously enhances his natural powers by means of his in- 
 tellect, and, up to a certain point, actually succeeds in 
 physically becoming lord over all that is physical. 
 There are expedients, says the proverb, against every- 
 thing, except Death. But this single exception, if it 
 really is one in the strictest sense, would remove the 
 whole conception of man. He can never be that being 
 who wills, if there is even a single case, where he ab- 
 solutely must, what he does not will. This single hor- 
 ror, what he only must and does not will, will haunt 
 him like a spectre, and, as is actually the case with 
 most men, leave him a prey to the blind terrors of 
 fancy ; his boasted freedom is absolutely nothing, if he 
 is bound even in a single point alone. Culture should 
 place man in freedom, and be serviceable to him in 
 developing his whole conception. It should thus make 
 him capable of maintaining his will — for man is the 
 being who wills. 
 
 This is possible in a twofold manner. Either really, 
 if man opposes force to force, if, as nature, he governs 
 nature ; or ideally, if he steps forth from nature, and 
 thus abolishes, in respect to himself, the conception of 
 force. That which is auxiliary to the first, is called 
 physical culture. Man develops his intellect and his 
 sensuous powers, either to convert the powers of nature 
 according to their own laws, into instruments of his 
 
THE SUBLIME. 
 
 243 
 
 will, or to place himself in safety from those operations 
 which he cannot control. But the powers of nature 
 can be governed or repulsed only up to a certain point ; 
 she withdraws from the might of man beyond this 
 point, and subjects him to her own. 
 
 Now then his freedom would be lost, if he was capa- 
 ble of no other than physical culture. But he ought to 
 be a man without exception, and consequently in no 
 case suffer anything against his will. If then he can 
 no longer oppose a proportional physical power to other 
 physical powers, nothing remains, in order to be freed 
 from force, but entirely to annihilate a relation which 
 is so detrimental to him, and to abolish in idea a force 
 which he must suffer in fact. But abolishing a force 
 in idea, is nothing else than voluntarily submitting to 
 it. That which qualifies him for this, is called moral 
 culture. 
 
 The man of moral cultivation, and he alone, is en- 
 tirely free. He is either superior to nature, as a force, 
 or he harmonizes with her. Nothing is force which 
 she practises with regard to him, for before it comes to 
 him, it has already become his own action, and dynam- 
 ical nature never reaches him, since he spontaneously 
 withdraws himself from all that she can reach. But 
 that this character, which morality teaches under the 
 conception of resignation in necessity, and religion 
 under the idea of submission to the divine ordinances, 
 may become a work of free choice and reflection 
 there is requisite a greater clearness of thought and a 
 higher energy of volition, than is wont to belong to 
 
244 
 
 THE SUBLIME. 
 
 man in active life. But fortunately, there is not only 
 in his rational nature, a moral disposition which can be 
 unfolded by the intellect, but an (esthetic tendency to 
 it already exists in his sensuo-rational, that is, his hu- 
 man nature, which can be stimulated by certain sensi- 
 ble objects, and cultivated by the purification of his 
 feelings, for this ideal excursion of the mind. At 
 present, I shall proceed from this disposition, which is 
 indeed according to its conception and essence, ideal, 
 but which the realist himself sufficiently manifests in 
 his life, although he does not concede it in his system. 1 
 It is true, the developed feeling for Beauty already 
 succeeds in making us to a certain extent independent 
 of nature as a force. A mind which has so far ennobled 
 itself, as to be more affected by the form than the sub- 
 ject-matter of things, and, without regard to possession, 
 to create a free satisfaction from mere reflection upon 
 the mode of representation — such a mind bears with- 
 in itself an internal, indefeasible fullness of life ; and 
 since it is not compelled to appropriate the objects, 
 among which it lives, it is not in danger of being de- 
 prived of them. But after all, the appearance will 
 still have a corporeity, in which it manifests itself, and 
 so long then, as a need only of beauty in appearance 
 exists, a need remains for the existence of objects ; and 
 consequently our satisfaction is still independent of na- 
 ture as a force, which rules over the whole province of 
 
 1 As generally nothing can be truly idealistic, except what the 
 complete realist practises unconsciously, and denies at the expense of 
 consistency. 
 
THE SUBLIME. 
 
 245 
 
 being. That is — it is something entirely different, 
 whether we feel a desire for fair and good objects, or 
 whether we only desire that the objects already extant 
 should be fair and good. The latter may consist with 
 the highest mental freedom, but not the former ; we 
 may demand that what exists should be fair and good, 
 but only wish that the Fair and the Good would exist. 
 This mental inclination, which is indifferent whether 
 the Fair and Good and Perfect exists, but desires with 
 rigorous severity, that the Existing should be fair and 
 good and perfect, is called preeminently, great and 
 sublime, since it contains all the realities of a beautiful 
 character, without partaking of its limits. 
 
 It is a mark of a good and beautiful, but always of 
 a weak spirit, ever to strive impatiently to realize its 
 moral ideal, and to be sorely tried by the obstacles to 
 this design. Such men throw themselves into a gloomy 
 dependence upon chance, and it may always be pre- 
 dicted with safety, that they concede too much to the 
 material in moral and aesthetic things, and cannot 
 abide the highest test of character and taste. That 
 which is morally faulty should not induce passivity 
 and grief, which always evinces an unappeased want 
 rather than an unaccomplished demand. The latter 
 should be accompanied by an active emotion, and ra- 
 ther strengthen and confirm the mind in its power, than 
 make it desponding and unhappy. 
 
 Nature gave us two guardian spirits for our com- 
 panions through life. One, familiar and agreeable, 
 
246 
 
 THE SUBLIME, 
 
 wiles away the tedium of the journey by his lively sport ? 
 lightens the fetters of necessity, and conducts us with 
 joy and pleasantry to the perilous position where we 
 must act as pure spirits and lay aside everything cor- 
 poreal, — to the cognition of truth and the practice of 
 duty. Here he deserts us, for his province is only the 
 world of sense, and his earth-born pinions cannot bear 
 him out beyond it. But now the other approaches, 
 grave and silent ; and bears us with vigorous arm over 
 the dizzy abyss. 
 
 We recognize in the first of these spirits, the feeling 
 of Beauty — in the second, the feeling of Sublimity. 
 It is true, Beauty is an expression of freedom, but not 
 of that, which elevates us above the force of nature and 
 releases us from all corporeal influence — only of that, 
 which we enjoy in the midst of nature as men. We 
 feel ourselves free through Beauty, since the sensuous 
 impulses harmonize with the law of reason ; we feel 
 ourselves free through Sublimity, since the sensuous 
 impulses have no influence upon the legislation of the 
 reason, since the spirit acts here, as if it existed under 
 no other laws than its own. 
 
 The feeling of sublimity is a mingled feeling. It is 
 a composition of wofulness, which in its highest degree 
 appears as horror, and ofjoyfulness, which can amount 
 to transport, and although it is not strictly pleasure, is 
 still far preferred to all pleasure by spirits of refine- 
 ment. This union of two diverse perceptions in a 
 single feeling, proves incontestably our moral independ- 
 ence. For as it is absolutely impossible, that the 
 
THE SUBLIME. 
 
 247 
 
 same object should stand in two opposite relations to 
 us, it follows hence, that we ourselves stand in two dif- 
 ferent relations to the object — that therefore two op- 
 posite natures must be combined in us, which are in- 
 terested in a manner totally opposite in the representa- 
 tion of this object. We perceive, then, by the feeling 
 of Sublimity, that our spiritual condition is not neces- 
 sarily moulded according to our sensuous condition, 
 that the laws of nature are not necessarily also our 
 own, and that we possess an independent principle, 
 independent of every sensuous emotion. 
 
 The sublimity of an object is of a twofold nature. 
 We either refer it to our comprehensive power, and fail 
 in the attempt to form for ourselves an image or con- 
 ception of it; or we refer it to our vital power, and 
 consider it as a force, against which our own sinks 
 into nothing. But although in both cases we sustain 
 the painful feeling, suggested by it, of our own limita- 
 tions, yet we do not avoid it, but rather are attracted 
 by it with irresistible power. Would this indeed be 
 possible, if the limits of our fancy were at the same 
 time the limits of our comprehension ? Would we 
 indeed fain be reminded of nature's omnipotence, if 
 we had not in reserve something besides what might 
 become her prey ? We are delighted at the sensuo- 
 infinite, since we can imagine what the senses no 
 longer embrace and the intellect no longer apprehends. 
 We are inspired by the fearful, since we can will what 
 the impulses abhor, and reject what they desire. We 
 readily leave the imagination to find its master in the 
 
248 
 
 THE SUBLIME. 
 
 realm of phenomena, for, after all, it is only one sensu- 
 ous power triumphing over another sensuous power ; 
 but nature in her whole boundlessness cannot attain to 
 the absolute greatness within ourselves. We readily 
 subject our welfare and existence to physical necessity, 
 for that reminds us, that it has no control over princi- 
 ples. The man is in its power, but the will of man is 
 his own. 
 
 And thus nature has employed even a sensuous 
 means, to teach us that we are more than merely sen- 
 suous ; she thus knew how to take advantage of percep- 
 tions, to lead us to the discovery that we are nothing 
 less than slavishly subject to the force of perceptions. 
 And this is an effect entirely different from that which 
 can be accomplished by Beauty ; that is, by the Beauty 
 of reality, for even the sublime must lose itself in ideal 
 Beauty. Reason and Sense harmonize under the sway 
 of Beauty, and it possesses attraction for us only on 
 account of this agreement. Then through Beauty 
 alone we should never perceive, that we are able and 
 designed to demonstrate ourselves as pure intelli- 
 gences. On the contrary, reason and sense do not 
 harmonize in the Sublime, and in this very opposition 
 between both lies the magic, whereby it invades our 
 mind. The physical and the moral man are here most 
 rigorously distinguished from each other ; for exactly 
 in those objects, where the first only feels his limita- 
 tion, the other experiences his power, and is infinitely 
 exalted by the same thing which humbles the other to 
 the dust. 
 
THE SUBLIME. 
 
 249 
 
 I will assume that a man should possess all the vir- 
 tues, whose union constitutes the beautiful character. 
 He should find his delight in the exercise of justice, 
 benevolence, temperance, independence and fidelity ; 
 all duties, whose performance is imposed by circum- 
 stances, should be his pastime, and prosperity should 
 make no action difficult to him, ever invited to action 
 by his philanthropic heart alone. Who is not trans- 
 ported at this beautiful unison of the native impulses 
 with the prescriptions of reason, and who can refrain 
 from loving such a man ? But indeed can we, with 
 all our leaning towards him, be assured that he is ac- 
 tually a virtuous man, and that generally there is vir- 
 tue ? If this man aimed at nothing but agreeable 
 perceptions, he could positively act no otherwise, with- 
 out being a fool ; and to be vicious, he would have to 
 despise his own advantage. It may be that the source 
 of his actions is pure, but he must settle that with his 
 own heart ; it is beyond our ken. We see him do 
 nothing more than the merely judicious man must do, 
 who makes pleasure his God. Then the world of sense 
 is adequate to account for the whole phenomenon of 
 his virtue, and we are not compelled to look beyond it 
 for a motive. 
 
 But suppose this same man is suddenly plunged into 
 the greatest misfortune. Let one spoil him of his 
 goods, and ruin his fair name ; let disease stretch him 
 upon a couch of anguish, and death snatch from him all 
 whom he loves — let all in whom he confided, desert 
 him in his need. Seek him again in this condition, 
 
250 
 
 THE SUBLIME. 
 
 and demand of the unhappy man the exercise of the 
 same virtues in which the happy man had been once 
 so prompt. If we find him at such a crisis exactly the 
 same, if poverty has not diminished his benevolence, 
 ingratitude his obligingness, sorrow his equanimity, or 
 his own adversity his sympathy with the prosperity of 
 others, — if we note the change of his circumstances 
 in his appearance, but not in his conduct, in the ma- 
 terial, but not in the form of his actions — then in- 
 deed we are no longer contented with an explanation 
 from the conception of nature, (according to which, it 
 is absolutely necessary, that the present must be refer- 
 rible as an effect to something past as its cause), since 
 nothing can be more contradictory than that the same 
 effect should remain, if the cause has changed into its 
 opposite. We must then renounce every natural ex- 
 planation, must cease entirely to derive the conduct 
 from the condition, and must transfer the former from 
 the immutability of physical laws to a motive entirely 
 different, which, it is true, the reason can attain with 
 its ideas, but the intellect with its conceptions cannot 
 embrace. This discovery of the absolutely moral abil- 
 ity, which depends upon no natural condition, gives to 
 the feeling of wofulness with which we are seized at 
 the sight of such a man, that utterly inexpressible 
 charm, which no pleasure of the senses, however en- 
 nobled they may be, can dispute with the Sublime. 
 
 Then the Sublime constructs for us a passage from 
 the sensuous world, in which the Beautiful would fain 
 hold us always captive. Not gradually, (for there 
 
THE SUBLIME. 
 
 251 
 
 is no transition from dependence to freedom), but sud- 
 denly and by a convulsive movement, it tears the self- 
 dependent spirit from the meshes which a refined 
 sensuousness had thrown around it, and which bind 
 the stronger, the more transparently they are spun. If 
 it has triumphed ever so much over a man by the im- 
 perceptible influence of an effeminate taste ; if it has 
 succeeded, arrayed in the seductive disguise of spirit- 
 ual Beauty, in forcing itself into the very penetralia 
 of moral legislation, and there poisoning sacred prin- 
 ciples at their source, — a single sublime emotion is 
 often sufficient to rend asunder this tissue of deceit, 
 to restore at once to the fettered spirit its whole elas- 
 ticity, to impart a revelation of its true destiny, and to 
 force upon it, at least for a moment, a feeling of its 
 dignity. Beauty, under the shape of the goddess 
 Calypso, has fascinated the brave son of Ulysses, and 
 by the might of her attractions, has held him a long 
 time captive in her island. He long imagines that he 
 adores an immortal divinity, while he lies only in the 
 arms of voluptuousness ; but a sublime influence in- 
 vades him suddenly under the shape of Mentor, he 
 calls to mind his better destiny, throws himself into 
 the waves, and is free. 
 
 The Sublime, like the Beautiful, is lavishly diffused 
 through all nature, and the susceptibility for both is 
 implanted in all men ; but their germ develops un- 
 equally, and must be assisted by Art. It is already a 
 feature in the design of nature, that at first we eagerly 
 
252 
 
 THE SUBLIME. 
 
 hasten after the Beautiful, while we still shun the Sub- 
 lime ; for Beauty is the nurse of our infancy, and 
 should conduct us from our rude state of nature to 
 refinement. But although she is our first love, and 
 our susceptibility for her first unfolds itself, nature has 
 still provided that it should ripen slowly, and await the 
 formation of the intellect and heart. If taste attained 
 its full maturity, before truth and morality had been 
 planted in our hearts, in a way better than taste could 
 give, the sensuous world would forever remain the 
 limit of our endeavors. We should transcend it neither 
 in our conceptions nor sentiments, and that would 
 have no reality for us which the imagination could not 
 represent. But fortunately it already exists in the ten- 
 dency of nature, that although the taste blossoms first, 
 it after all attains its maturity only subsequent to all 
 the mental capabilities. Sufficient respite is gained 
 in this interim, to furnish the head copiously with con- 
 ceptions, and the breast with priceless principles, and 
 then specially to develop from the reason the suscepti- 
 bility for the great and Sublime. 
 
 So long as man was only the slave of physical ne- 
 cessity, and had not yet found an outlet from the nar- 
 row circle of exigency, nor divined the lofty angelic 
 freedom in his breast, incomprehensible nature could 
 only remind him of his limited imagination, and de- 
 structive nature of his physical weakness. He must 
 then despondingly slight the former, and turn from the 
 other with abhorrence. But free contemplation has 
 hardly given him a foot-hold against the blind en- 
 
THE SUBLIME. 
 
 253 
 
 croachment of natural powers, and he has hardly dis- 
 covered, amid this tide of the apparent, something 
 Permanent in his own being, when the savage masses 
 of nature around him begin to speak far different lan- 
 guage to his heart, and external, relative greatness is 
 the mirror, where he sees reflected his internal, abso- 
 lute greatness. Calmly, and with a pleasing fear, he 
 now approaches these bugbears of his imagination, 
 and purposely summons the whole strength of this fac- 
 ulty, to set forth the sensuo-infinite, in order that, even 
 if it succumbs in the attempt, he may feel more vividly 
 the superiority of his ideas over the highest that sensu- 
 ous can afford. The aspect of boundless distance and 
 immeasurable height, the wide ocean at his feet, and 
 the greater ocean above him, rescue his spirit from the 
 narrow sphere of the actual and the oppressive con- 
 finement of physical life. He is presented with a 
 larger unit of measure by the simple majesty of nature, 
 and, surrounded by her noble shapes, his mind no 
 longer brooks the mean and narrow. Who knows 
 how many luminous thoughts or heroic resolves, which 
 no saloon or student's cell would have given to the 
 world, have not sprung from this valorous conflict of 
 the mind with the great spirit of nature, in a single 
 walk ? Who knows whether it is not to be ascribed 
 in part to a rarer intercourse with this great genius, 
 that the character of the dweller in cities applies itself 
 so readily to trifles — is stunted and withered, — if the 
 sense of the nomad remains open and free as the firm- 
 ament, beneath which he pitches his tent ? 
 
254 
 
 THE SUBLIME. 
 
 But not only that which is unattainable for the im- 
 agination, the Sublime of quantity, but also that which 
 is incomprehensible for the intellect, disorder, can 
 serve to set forth the supersensuous, and give an im- 
 pulse to the mind, as soon as it acquires the property 
 of greatness, and announces itself as a work of nature, 
 (for otherwise it is contemptible). Who does not 
 rather linger amid the spirited disorder of a natural 
 landscape, than in the insipid regularity of a French 
 garden ? Who does not rather admire the wonderful 
 contest between fertility and desolation on the plains 
 of Sicily, and more willingly feast his eyes with the 
 wild cataracts and cloud-peaks of Scotland, than won- 
 der at the meagre triumph of patience over a froward 
 element in starched and formal Holland 1 No one 
 will deny, that the physical man is better provided for 
 in the meadows of Batavia, than beneath the treacher- 
 ous crater of Vesuvius, and that a comprehensive and 
 methodical intellect finds its account in a regular 
 kitchen garden, far more than in a wild, natural land- 
 scape. But man has a want beyond his life and wel- 
 fare, and a better destiny than to comprehend the 
 phenomena that surround him. 
 
 That which makes the wild singularity of the physi- 
 cal creation so attractive to the susceptible traveller, 
 opens for an enthusiastic mind, even in the dangerous 
 anarchy of the moral world, the source of a pleasure 
 entirely unique. He, forsooth, who illuminates the 
 great economy of nature with the meagre torch of in- 
 tellect, and forever plots only to harmonize her bold 
 
THE SUBLIME. 
 
 255 
 
 disorder, can never be satisfied in a world, where insane 
 chance seems to govern rather than a wise plan, and 
 merit and fortune stand in opposition to each other, in 
 by far the majority of cases. He will have everything 
 in the great world-system regulated as in a good hotel, 
 and if he misses, as it cannot otherwise be, this want 
 of conformity, nothing remains for him but to expect, 
 from a future existence and another nature, that satis- 
 faction which is owed to him by the present and past. 
 If, on the contrary, he readily resigns the wish to bring 
 this lawless chaos of phenomena under a unity of 
 cognition, his loss on one side is amply restored on 
 the other. Thus universal deficiency of a designed 
 connection among this throng of phenomena, whereby 
 they exceed, and become useless to, the intellect, which 
 must adhere to this connective form, is the very thing 
 that makes them a symbol, so much the more striking for 
 the pure reason, which finds its own independence or 
 natural conditions represented in this wild license of 
 nature. For if we destroy all connection in a series of 
 things, we have the conception of independence, which 
 coincides surprisingly with the pure rational concep- 
 tion of freedom. Then under this idea of freedom, 
 which the reason obtains out of itself, it embraces in 
 one unity of thought, what the intellect can unite in 
 no unity of cognition, — subjects, by this idea, the in- 
 finite play of phenomena, and maintains then at the 
 same time, its power over the understanding, as a sen- 
 suously conditioned faculty. If we now recollect how 
 a rational being must esteem the consciousness of no 
 
256 
 
 THE SUBLIME. 
 
 independence of the law of nature, we can comprehend 
 how it happens, that men of elevated dispositions can 
 regard themselves indemnified by this idea of freedom 
 imparted to them, for all the disappointments of cog- 
 nition. Freedom in all their moral contradictions and 
 physical evils, is a spectacle for noble minds, infinitely 
 more interesting than welfare and regularity without 
 freedom, where the sheep patiently follow the shep- 
 herd, and the self-ruling will is degraded into the sub- 
 servient fragment of a machine. The latter makes 
 man only an animated product and prosperous citizen 
 of nature ; freedom makes him a citizen and co-ruler 
 of a higher system, where it is infinitely more noble to 
 occupy the lowest place, than to lead the series in the 
 physical plan. 
 
 Considered from this point of view, and only from 
 this, universal history is a sublime spectacle to me. 
 The world, as a historical object, is in fact only the 
 conflict of the powers of nature among themselves and 
 with man's freedom, and history acquaints us with the 
 results of this contest. So far as history has hitherto 
 attained, it has far greater deeds to relate of nature 
 (which includes every human emotion), than of the 
 abstract reason ; and the latter has been able to assert 
 its power only by isolated exceptions to nature's law, 
 in a Cato, Aristides, Phocion, and men of like stamp. 
 If we only approach history with a great expectation 
 of light and knowledge, how signally are we deceived ! 
 Every well-meant effort of philosophy, to harmonize 
 that which the moral world demands, with that which 
 
THE SUBLIME. 
 
 257 
 
 the actual affords, is falsified by the testimony of ex- 
 perience ; and nature equals the courtesy with which 
 she directs or seems to direct herself, in her organic 
 realm, according to the regulative principles of criti- 
 cism, by the lawlessness with which, in the realm of 
 freedom, she casts off the restraint that the speculative 
 spirit would fain impose upon her. 
 
 How entirely different, if we desist from explaining 
 her, and receive her incomprehensibility as the stand- 
 point for criticism. The very circumstance that na- 
 ture, considered in the mass, derides all the rules that 
 our understanding prescribes to her — that, in her 
 free, capricious gait, she tramples in the dust with like 
 indifference the creations of wisdom and of chance — 
 that she hurries along to one ruin, the important as 
 well as the insignificant, the noble as well as the com- 
 mon — that, here, she sustains an ant-hill, there, em- 
 braces and crushes in her giant arms, man, her lordliest 
 creation — that, in a wanton hour, she often dissipates 
 her most hardly-won acquisitions, and often expends 
 centuries upon a work of folly ; — in a word — this de- 
 fection of nature, as a totality, from the cognitive rules 
 to which she is subject in her single modes, evinces 
 the absolute impossibility of explaining nature herself 
 by the laws of nature, and of applying to her realm, 
 the laws that are valid within it ; the mind, then, is ir- 
 resistibly impelled from the actual into the ideal world, 
 from the conditional into the absolute. 
 
 A terrific and destructive nature controls us much 
 further than one that wears a sensuo-infinite aspect, 
 17 
 
258 
 
 THE SUBLIME. 
 
 that is, so long as we remain only her free observers. 
 Indeed, the sensuous man and the sensuousness in the 
 rational man, fear nothing so much as to fall out with 
 this force, whose sway extends over welfare and exist- 
 ence. 
 
 The highest ideal to which we aspire is, to preserve 
 a good understanding with the physical world, as the 
 guardian of our prosperity, without being thereby com- 
 pelled to break with the moral world, which determines 
 our dignity. But, as all our knowledge teaches, it is 
 ever impossible to serve both masters ; and even if duty 
 (a case almost impossible) should never clash with ex- 
 igency, still natural necessity enters into no compact 
 with man, and neither his power nor his dexterity can 
 secure him against the tricks of fortune. Well for 
 him, then, if he has learned to endure what he cannot 
 alter, and to resign with dignity what he cannot pre- 
 serve ! Cases may occur, when fate storms all the 
 outworks on which he relied for security, and when 
 nothing remains for him but to take refuge in the in- 
 violability of spiritual freedom ; when there are no 
 other means to pacify the native impulse, than to will 
 so — and no other method of withstanding the force of 
 nature, than by anticipating it, and, by a free surrender 
 of all sensuous interests, dying by his own moral force 
 before he falls a victim to physical force. 
 
 He is strengthened for this purpose by sublime emo- 
 tions, and a more frequent communion with destruc- 
 tive nature, as well there, where she only shows to him 
 from afar her ruinous might, as where she actually 
 
THE SUBLIME. 
 
 259 
 
 displays it against his fellow-man. Pathos is an artistic 
 misfortune, which, like genuine misfortune, places 
 us in immediate contact with the spiritual law that 
 reio-ns in our breast. But genuine misfortune does not 
 always choose well its man and its time ; it often sur- 
 prises us defenceless, and, what is still worse, it often 
 makes us defenceless. On the contrary, the artistic 
 misfortune of Pathos finds us completely armed, and 
 since it is only feigned, the self-dependent principle 
 within us wins space to maintain its absolute indepen- 
 dence. Now the oftener that the spirit renews this 
 act of spontaneity, the more facility will it acquire, 
 and a greater advantage over the sensuous impulse, so 
 that finally, even if a feigned and artistic misfortune 
 becomes a serious one, it is prepared to treat it as art- 
 istic, and to dissolve genuine sorrow in a sublime emo- 
 tion — which is the highest effort of human nature. 
 Then we may say that Pathos is an inoculation of in- 
 exorable fate, whereby it is robbed of its malignity, and 
 its attack is shifted to the stronger side of man. 
 
 Away then with the mistaken forbearance and the 
 weakly pampered taste, which casts a veil over the 
 grave countenance of necessity, and in order to find 
 favor with the senses, counterfeits a harmony between 
 well-being and well-doing, of which no traces are man- 
 ifest in the actual world. Let the evil relation con- 
 front us face to face. There is salvation for us, not in 
 an ignorance of the perils which beleaguer us, — for 
 this cannot always be maintained — but in an acquaint- 
 ance with them. We are aided in forming this ac- 
 
260 
 
 THE SUBLIME. 
 
 quaintance by the fearfully magnificent spectacle of 
 all-destroying, re-producing, and again destroying mu- 
 tation — of ruin, now slowly undermining, now sud- 
 denly invading — by the pathetic pictures of humanity 
 yielding in the struggle with destiny, of the incessant 
 flight of prosperity, of betrayed security, of triumphant 
 injustice and of prostrate innocence, which history 
 furnishes abundantly, and which tragic art brings with 
 imitative skill before our eyes. For where is the man 
 with a moral disposition not utterly neglected, who can 
 linger amid such scenes as the stubborn yet fruitless 
 struggle of Mithridates, the downfall of Syracuse and 
 Carthage, without doing shuddering homage to the 
 stern law of necessity, without instantly curbing his 
 desires, and, invaded by this eternal falsity of all the 
 Sensuous, grasping at the Permanent within his breast 1 
 Then the capacity for perceiving the Sublime is 
 one of the noblest tendencies of human nature, which 
 as well merits our respect for its origin from the self- 
 acting faculty of thought and will, as it deserves the 
 fullest development, on account of its influence upon 
 the moral man. Beauty only recommends itself to 
 man, the Sublime to the pure dcuf/wv within him ; and 
 since after all we are destined to govern ourselves in 
 every sensuous limitation according to the code of pure 
 spirit, the Sublime must be added to the Beautiful, in 
 order to complete the totality of aesthetic culture, and 
 to extend the susceptibility of the human heart to the 
 whole circumference of our destiny — consequently be- 
 yond the world of sense. 
 
THE SUBLIME. 
 
 261 
 
 Without Beauty there would be lasting strife be- 
 tween our natural and our purely rational destiny. 
 We should neglect our humanity in the endeavor to 
 satisfy our spirituality, and, every moment prepared 
 for a disruption from the world of sense, should con- 
 stantly remain aliens in the sphere of action once for 
 all assigned to us. Beauty without Sublimity would 
 lead us to forget our dignity. We should mar the 
 vigor of character in the enervation of an uninterrupted 
 enjoyment, and should lose sight of our unalterable 
 destiny and our true father-land, while indissolubly 
 bound to this contingent form of being. Only if Sub- 
 limity is wedded to Beauty, and our susceptibility for 
 both is equally developed, are we finished citizens of 
 nature, without consequently being her slaves, and 
 without forfeiting our citizenship in the world of in- 
 telligence. 
 
 It is true, nature already exhibits for herself alone a 
 crowd of objects, which might exercise the susceptibil- 
 ity for the Sublime and Beautiful : but man here, as 
 in other cases, is better served at second than at first 
 hand, and prefers to receive a subject selected and 
 prepared by art, rather than to draw scantily and pain- 
 fully from the impure sources of nature. The imita- 
 tive plastic impulse, which can permit no impression, 
 without immediately striving after a lively expression, 
 and which sees in every great or beautiful form of na- 
 ture a challenge to wrestle with her, has the great ad- 
 vantage over the latter, of being permitted to treat as 
 the chief design and a proper whole, that which nature 
 
262 
 
 THE SUBLIME. 
 
 — if she does not quite aimlessly reject — yet only un- 
 dertakes by the way, during the prosecution of a more 
 contiguous design. If nature suffers violence in her 
 fair organic creations, either by the imperfect individ- 
 uality of substance or by the operation of heterogen- 
 eous powers, or if she exercises violence in her great 
 and pathetic scenes, and acts as a force upon man, 
 although she can become aesthetic only when an object 
 of free contemplation, yet her imitator, creative art, is 
 completely free, because she abstracts all contingent lim- 
 itations from her object, and leaves the mind of the be- 
 holder free, because she imitates only the show and 
 not the reality. But as the whole enchantment of the 
 Sublime and Beautiful consists only in the show and 
 not in the contents, art has every advantage over na- 
 ture, without sharing her fetters. 1 
 
 1 (Tr.) — Jean Paul, in his Vorschule der JEsthetik, seems to dis- 
 sent from Schiller as to the question, in what does Sublimity consist ? 
 Though Jean Paul has upon this subject as upon every other, no 
 severely defined system, and sometimes imagines instead of deter- 
 mines, yet his remarks are notable, and also appropriate here. After 
 stating that Kant, and after him, Schiller, make the Sublime to con- 
 sist in an Infinite, which sense and imagination fail to give and com- 
 prehend, but which the Reason creates and retains — he says : " but 
 the Sublime, for example, a sea, a high mountain, cannot be beyond 
 the limits of the senses, because they embrace that in which the Sub- 
 lime first dwells (conceptions of Time and Space) : the same is true 
 of the imagination which previously constructs, in its infinite wastes 
 and aether-heights, the infinite Space for the sublime pyramids. Fur- 
 ther, it is true that the Sublime is always joined with a sensuous symbol 
 (in or out of us), but this often lays no claim at all to the powers of 
 fancy and of sense. So, for example, in that oriental poem where the 
 
THE SUBLIME. 
 
 263 
 
 prophet awaits a token that the Divinity is passing by, who was 
 not in the fire, nor in the thunder, nor in the whirlwind, but who 
 comes at last in a soft, low voice, the tranquil symbol is evidently 
 more sublime than one which is majestic. So aesthetic sublimity of 
 action stands in an inverse relation to the importance of the sensuous 
 symbol — and only the smallest is the sublimest ; in this case Jupi- 
 ter's eye-brows move more sublimely than his arm or than himself. 
 
 " Further, Kant divides the Sublime into mathematical and dynam- 
 ical, or as Schiller expresses it, into that which exceeds our compre- 
 hensive ability, and that which threatens our life. Briefly, it might be 
 called the Quantitative and the Qualitative, or the external and the 
 internal. But the eye can never make intuition of any other than a 
 quantitative sublimity ; no intuition, but only a conclusion from ex- 
 perience, can give to an abyss, a stormy sea, a sliding cliff, dynami- 
 cal sublimity. How then is intuition made of such ? By the ear^ 
 which is the direct ambassador of power and of horror — as in the 
 thunder of clouds, of the ocean, of cataracts, the roaring of lions, &c. 
 A man without any empirical knowledge will tremble at audible 
 greatness ; but every example of visible greatness would only raise 
 and expand him. 
 
 " If I define the Sublime as related infinity, there is a fivefold, or also 
 a threefold division to be made ; that related to the eye (the mathe- 
 matical or optical Sublime) — to the ear (the dynamical or audible) 
 — then the imagination must refer the infinity again to its own quan- 
 titative and qualitative sensuousness, as boundlessness,* and as divin- 
 ity — and then there is still the third or fifth Sublimity, which manifests 
 itself exactly in an inverse relation to the external or internal sensu- 
 ous symbol — namely the moral or active Sublime. 
 
 "Now how does the Infinite become related precisely to a sensuous 
 object, if the latter, as I have shown, is less than the capacity of 
 sense and imagination? The enormous leap from the sensuous as 
 symbol into the supersensuous as the symbolized — which Pathogno- 
 my and Physiognomy must make every moment — is made possible 
 only by Nature, and by no mediate idea; for example, between the 
 mimic expression of hatred and hatred itself — nay, between word 
 and idea, there is no equation. But the conditions must be found, 
 
 * Eternity is a mathematical or optical Sublimity for the imacination ; or 
 thus — Time is the infinite line, Eternity the infinite surface, Divinity the 
 dynamical fulness. 
 
264 
 
 THE SUBLIME. 
 
 under which one sensuous object is preferable to another as a spirit- 
 ual symbol. The ear requires both extension and intension : the 
 tone of thunder must be prolonged as well as loud. As we can make 
 intuition of no power but our own, and as voice is, so to speak, the 
 parole of life, it is evident why the ear designates the Sublime of 
 power. And a rapid comparison of our own tones with foreign ones 
 is not thereby to be entirely excluded. Even silence may be Sublime ; 
 as that of a bird of prey floating silently — the calm before a tempest 
 — and that between the lightning and the thunder. 
 
 " Many cases present themselves for investigation : for example, 
 those in which the different kinds of the Sublime are combined — as 
 the waterfall, which is both mathematically and dynamically great — 
 so also a tempestuous sea. Another point is, what relation does this re- 
 lated infinity of Nature bear to the infinity of Art — since the imagina- 
 tion refers to the reason in both ? Then there are many objections to the 
 Kantian principle of ' pain at every Sublimity ;' especially this, that 
 according to Kant the greatest Sublime, that is, God, must give the 
 greatest pain ; and so to the other Kantian proposition, that after the 
 Sublime everything is little, it may be objected, that there are de- 
 grees even of Sublimity, not as infinite, but as related ; for example, 
 a clear starlight over a sleeping sea does not so mightily elevate the 
 soul, as a storm-heaven with its storm-sea, — and God is more Sub- 
 lime than a mountain." 
 
 For a further exposition of Schiller's theory of the Sublime, see 
 the second part of the Essay upon Various ^Esthetic Subjects — en- 
 titled, " ^Esthetic Estimation of Size." 
 
THOUGHTS 
 
 UPON THE USE OF 
 
 THE COMMON AND LOW 
 
 IN ART. 
 
THE COMMON AND LOW. 
 
 Everything is Common which does not address the 
 spirit, and which excites only a sensuous interest. It 
 is true, there are a thousand things which are previously 
 common in the matter or content : but since the com- 
 mon in matter can be ennobled by the treatment it re- 
 ceives, we speak in Art only of the Common in form. 
 An ordinary man will disgrace the noblest material by 
 an ordinary treatment : on the contrary, a great head 
 and a refined spirit knows how to ennoble the Com- 
 mon itself, because he connects it with something spir- 
 itual, and exposes its most favorable side. Thus a 
 historian of the common stamp, will inform us as so- 
 licitously of his hero's most insignificant affairs as of 
 his noblest deeds, and dwell as long upon his pedigree, 
 dress and domestic economy, as upon his schemes and 
 undertakings. He will so relate his greatest deeds, 
 that no man will take them for what they are. On 
 the other hand, a historian of genius and enlarged ca- 
 pacity will infuse even into the private life and the in- 
 
268 
 
 THE COMMON AND LOW. 
 
 different actions of his hero an interest and a capacity 
 which makes them notable. In creative art the Flem- 
 ish painters have an ordinary taste : the Italians, but 
 still more, the Greeks, a great and noble taste. The 
 latter continually sought the ideal, rejected every com- 
 mon trait, and selected too no common material. 
 
 A portrait painter can treat his subject in a style 
 both Common and Great ; Common, if he sets forth the 
 contingent as carefully as the necessary, if he neglects 
 the great, and solicitously brings out the little ; Great, 
 if he knows how to discover the most interesting traits, 
 separating the accidental from the necessary, bringing 
 out the great and only indicating the little. But no- 
 thing is Great, except the expression of soul in actions, 
 features and positions. 
 
 A poet treats his subject in a common way, if he 
 brings out unimportant actions and passes hastily over 
 the important. He treats it in a great way, if he unites 
 it with the Great. Homer knew how to give a spirited 
 treatment to the shield of Achilles, although the ma- 
 terial fabrication of a shield is something very com- 
 mon. 
 
 The Low stands yet one degree below the Common, 
 and is distinguished from it by the fact, that it indicates 
 not only something negative, not only a want of the 
 spiritual and noble, but something positive, namely 
 rudeness of feeling, bad manners and degraded senti- 
 ments. The Common only springs from an absent 
 superiority which is desirable, the Low from the de- 
 ficiency of a quality, which may be required of both. 
 
THE COMMON AND LOW. 
 
 269 
 
 For example, revenge, wherever it is to be found, and 
 however it may be displayed, is in itself something 
 common, since it manifests a want of magnanimity. 
 
 But we make a particular distinction of a low re- 
 venge, if the man who exercises it, uses disgraceful 
 means to satisfy it. The low always indicates some- 
 thing coarse and clownish, but even a man of birth 
 and better manners, may think and act in a common 
 way, if he possesses moderate gifts. A man acts in a 
 common way who only thinks of his own interest, and 
 so far he is the opposite of the noble man, who can for- 
 get himself, in order to create enjoyment for another. 
 But the former would act in a low way, if he pros- 
 ecuted his interest at the expense of his honor, without 
 ever respecting the laws of propriety. The common, 
 then, is opposed to the noble ; the low, at the same 
 time to the noble and the proper. To yield to every 
 passion unresistingly, to satisfy every impulse, without 
 even acknowledging the restraint of decorum, much 
 Jess of morality, is low, and betrays an abject soul. 
 
 In works of art also, the low may be apparent, not 
 only by selecting low objects, which a sense of fitness 
 and propriety forbids, but also by treating them in a 
 low way. We so treat an object, either if we render 
 that side conspicuous which propriety demands should 
 be concealed, or if we give it an expression which 
 suggests low, accessory representations. Low inci- 
 dents occur in the life of the greatest man, but only 
 a low taste would select and portray them. 
 
 We find scriptural paintings, where the apostle, the 
 
270 
 
 THE COMMON AND LOW. 
 
 Virgin and Christ himself have an expression, as if they 
 had been selected from the commonest rabble. All 
 such productions evince a low taste, which justifies us 
 in inferring a rude and vulgar mind in the artist him- 
 self. 
 
 There are cases, it is true, where even in art the low 
 may be allowed ; there, namely, where its object is to ex- 
 cite laughter. Even a man of refinement may sometimes 
 divert himself with the rude but true expressions of na- 
 ture, and with the contrast between the manners of the 
 polite and vulgar, without betraying a depraved taste. 
 The intoxication of a man of rank, wherever it occurred, 
 would excite disgust; but we laugh at drunken postil- 
 ions, sailors, and barrow-men. Jests, which would be 
 insupportable in an educated man, divert us in the 
 mouth of the rabble. Many scenes of Aristophanes 
 are of this kind, which however sometimes transgress 
 these limits, and become utterly despicable. For this 
 reason we are amused with Parodies, in which senti- 
 ments, expressions and exploits of the common people 
 are palmed off upon people of quality, and treated by 
 the poet with all possible propriety and dignity. As 
 soon as the poet only aims at creating a laughing-stock, 
 and only wishes to divert us, we may overlook all that 
 is low, but he must not excite aversion or disgust. 
 
 He excites aversion, if he introduces the low where 
 we cannot possibly tolerate it — in men namely, from 
 whom we are justified in expecting better manners. 
 If he treats his subject not in accordance with this, 
 he offends either the truth, since we should prefer to 
 
THE COMMON AND LOW. 
 
 271 
 
 esteem him a deceiver, than believe that men of culture 
 could really act in so low a way • or his men offend 
 our moral feeling, and what is still worse, excite our 
 indignation. It is quite another thing in Farce, as 
 there is an implied agreement between the author and 
 the audience, so that no one has any expectation of 
 truth. In a Farce we absolve the author from all 
 fidelity in delineation, and he gets, as it were, a privi- 
 lege to deceive us. For the Comic is founded upon its 
 very contrast with truth \ but it could not possibly ex- 
 ist at the same time as truth and as contrast. 
 
 But there are a few cases even in the serious and 
 tragic, where the low may be introduced. Yet then 
 it must pass over into the fearful, and the momentary 
 offence of taste must be counteracted by a powerful 
 employment of emotion, and become as it were, swal- 
 lowed up by a deeply tragical effect. Theft, for ex- 
 ample, is something absolutely low, and whatever 
 apology for the thief our heart may suggest, however 
 much he may have been impelled by the force of cir- 
 cumstances, still an indelible mark is stamped upon 
 him, and aesthetically considered, he always remains a 
 low object. Here taste pardons still less than moral- 
 ity, and its tribunal is more severe, since an aesthetic 
 object is answerable also for all the accessory ideas 
 which it suggests to us ; as on the other hand, every- 
 thing contingent is abstracted by a moral criticism. 
 Therefore a man who steals, will be a most despicable 
 object for any poetical representation with a serious 
 content. But if the man is a murderer at the same 
 
272 
 
 4H ^ ^il.. 
 
 THE COMMON AND LOW. 
 
 time, he is to be sure, still more despicable morally, 
 but he is a degree more tolerable cesthetically. He 
 who debases himself by a deed of infamy (I only speak 
 now of things aesthetically considered) may be some- 
 what reelevated and reestablished in our (Esthetic re- 
 gard, by a crime. This divergence of the moral from 
 the aesthetic judgment is remarkable, and merits atten- 
 tion. We might adduce many causes for it. In the 
 first place, I have already said, that since the aesthetic 
 judgment depends upon the fancy, all accessory repre- 
 sentations also, which are excited by an object, and 
 stand in natural connexion with it, influence this judg- 
 ment. If now these accessory representations are of a 
 low kind, they inevitably degrade the principal object 
 whence they result. 
 
 Secondly, in an aesthetic criticism we regard power, 
 in a moral criticism, conformity to law. Want of 
 power is something contemptible, and equally so is 
 every action, which leaves us to infer it. Every base 
 and cowardly deed is repugnant to us by the want of 
 power which it betrays ; and inversely a diabolical act 
 may please us cesthetically, as soon as it only evinces 
 power. But a theft shows a base and cowardly dispo- 
 sition, — a murder has at least the show of power ; and 
 that degree of interest which, aesthetically, we take in 
 the act, corresponds to the degree of power developed 
 by it. 
 
 Thirdly, a heinous and terrible crime diverts our at- 
 tention from its quality, and directs it to its fearful re- 
 sult. The stronger mental emotion suppresses then 
 
THE COMMON AND LOW. 273 
 
 the weaker. We do not look back into the soul of the 
 criminal, but forward to his fate, and to the effects of 
 his act. As soon as we begin to tremble, all delicacy 
 of taste is hushed. The main impression entirely oc- 
 cupies our soul, and abolishes the accessory ideas, to 
 which the low particularly belongs. Hence the theft 
 of young Ruhberg, in the Crime of Ambition, is not 
 repulsive upon the stage, but truly tragical. The au- 
 thor has managed the circumstances so dexterously, 
 that we are hurried along without a breathing space. 
 The fearful misery of his family, and particularly the 
 sorrow of his father, are objects which draw our whole 
 attention from the criminal to the results of his deed. 
 We are far too much affected, to admit the representa- 
 tion of the infamy with which the theft is branded. In 
 short — the low is concealed by the fearful. It is 
 curious, that this theft of young Ruhberg, actually per- 
 petrated, is not so repulsive, as the mere groundless 
 suspicion of a theft in another play, where a young offi- 
 cer is undeservedly accused of having stolen a silver 
 spoon, which is afterwards found. Here then the low 
 is only imagined, a mere suspicion, and yet it does an 
 irretrievable injury, in our aesthetic representation, to 
 the innocent hero of the piece. The reason is, be- 
 cause the supposition that a man could act in a low 
 way, evinces no very stable opinion of his morals, as 
 conventional laws require that one should be consider- 
 ed an honest man so long as he does not manifest the 
 contrary. If then we couple anything contemptible 
 with him, it seems as if he had sometime or other given 
 18 
 
274 
 
 THE COMMON AND LOW. 
 
 a pretext for the possibility of such suspicion ; although 
 what is low in an unmerited suspicion pertains pro- 
 perly to the accuser. In the play alluded to, the injury 
 done to the hero is increased, since he is an officer, 
 and in love with a lady of rank and culture. With 
 both these predicates, the predicate of theft makes a 
 woful contrast, and it is impossible, if he is with his 
 fair lady, not to recollect for a moment that he might 
 have the silver spoon in his pocket. The greatest mis- 
 fortune is that he never guesses the suspicion resting 
 upon him ; for were this the case, he would, as an offi- 
 cer, demand a bloody satisfaction. Then the results 
 would pass over into the fearful, and the low would 
 disappear. 
 
 Still we must accurately distinguish the low in dis- 
 position from the low in action. The first is beneath 
 aesthetic dignity, the last may often very well agree 
 with it. Slavery is low, but a slavish disposition in 
 freedom is contemptible ; on the contrary, a slavish oc- 
 cupation without such a disposition is not so; rather 
 may lowness of condition, united with grandeur of dis- 
 position, pass into Sublimity. The master of Epicte- 
 tus, who chastised him, acted in a low way, and the 
 beaten slave evinced an elevated soul. True greatness 
 beams from a lowly lot all the more nobly, and the 
 artist need not fear to represent his hero with a mean 
 outside, if he is only assured, that the expression of in- 
 ternal worth is at his bidding. 
 
 But that which may be permitted to the poet, is not 
 always allowable for the painter. The former brings 
 
THE COMMON AND LOW. 
 
 275 
 
 his object only before the fancy, the latter, on the other 
 hand, immediately before the senses. Thus the im- 
 pression of a painting is not only more lively than that 
 of a poem, but the painter also cannot make the in- 
 ternal so apparent by his natural signs, as the poet can 
 by his arbitrary signs, and yet the internal alone can 
 reconcile us with its external development. If Homer 
 represents his Ulysses in beggar's rags, it depends upon 
 us how far we carry out this image, and how long we 
 dwell upon it. But in no case has it sufficient liveli- 
 ness of coloring, to become unpleasant or disgusting to 
 us. But if the painter or even the dramatist should 
 imitate faithfully Homer's Ulysses, we should turn from 
 it with repugnance. In this case we do not have the 
 force of the impression in our own power ; we must 
 see what the painter shows us, and we cannot so easily 
 ignore the disagreeable accessory ideas, which are 
 thus brought to our remembrance, 
 
DISCONNECTED 
 
 OBSERVATIONS 
 
 UPON VARIOUS 
 
 ESTHETIC SUBJECTS. 
 
VARIOUS ESTHETIC SUBJECTS. 
 
 All qualities of things, which make them aesthetic, 
 are comprehended under four classes, which, according 
 to their objective difference, as well as according to 
 their different subjective relation, produce for our pas- 
 sivity or activity, a satisfaction different not only in 
 strength, but also in value, and are also unequally 
 adapted for the purpose of the fine' arts. These classes 
 are, the Agreeable, the Good, the Sublime and the 
 Beautiful. Of these the sublime and beautiful alone 
 are proper for art. The agreeable is not worthy of it, 
 and the good is at least not its design ; for the design 
 of art is to please, and the good, whether theoretical or 
 practical, can and need not be subservient to sensuous- 
 ness. 
 
 The agreeable satisfies only the senses, and is to be 
 distinguished from the good, which pleases the pure 
 reason. It pleases by its content, for the sense can 
 only be affected by matter, and all that is form, can only 
 please the reason. 
 
280 
 
 VARIOUS ^ESTHETIC SUBJECTS. 
 
 It is true, the beautiful pleases through the medium 
 of the senses, in which it differs from the good, but it 
 pleases the reason by its form, in which it differs from 
 the agreeable. The good, we may say, pleases by a 
 pure form that is according to reason, the beautiful by 
 a form that is similar to reason, the agreeable by no 
 form at all. The good is thought, the beautiful re- 
 garded, the agreeable only felt. The first pleases in 
 idea, the second in contemplation, the third in ma- 
 terial perception. 
 
 We are particularly struck by the difference between 
 the good and the agreeable. The good enlarges our 
 cognition, since it creates and supposes a conception 
 of its object ; the ground of our satisfaction lies in the 
 object, although the satisfaction is itself a condition, in 
 which we find ourselves. On the contrary, the agree- 
 able produces no cognition of its object, and is founded 
 upon none. It is only agreeable because it is perceiv- 
 ed, and its conception entirely vanishes, as soon as we 
 lose by reflection the susceptibility of the senses, or 
 only divert it to another object. A warm breeze is 
 agreeable to a man, who feels the cold ; but the same 
 man will seek a cooling shade in the heat of summer. 
 But we allow that he has rightly judged in both cases. 
 The objective is completely independent of us, and 
 what to-day appears to us true, proper and rational, 
 will (supposing that we have judged rightly to-day) 
 appear the same after twenty years. Our judgment 
 concerning the agreeable varies, according as our po- 
 sition alters with reference to its object. It is then, no 
 
VARIOUS .ESTHETIC SUBJECTS. 
 
 281 
 
 property of the object, but first results from the rela- 
 tion of an object to our senses, — for its necessary 
 condition is the nature of our sense. 
 
 The good, on the contrary, is already good before it 
 is represented and perceived. The property by which 
 it pleases, exists completely for itself, without any ne- 
 cessity for our subject, although our satisfaction at it 
 rests upon a susceptibility of our being. The agreeable, 
 we may say, is only, because it is perceived ; the good, 
 on the contrary, is perceived, because it is. 
 
 We are less struck by the difference between the 
 beautiful and the agreeable, however great it may be. 
 The former resembles the agreeable in this, that it 
 must always be presented to the senses, that it pleases 
 only empirically. It further resembles it in neither 
 creating nor supposing any cognition drawn from its 
 object. But again, it is very distinct from the agreea- 
 ble, since it pleases by the form of its actual mode, 
 not by the material perception. It is true, it pleases 
 the rational Subject, only so far as that is at the same 
 time sensuous ; but it also only pleases the sensuous, 
 so far as that is at the same time rational. It not only 
 pleases the individual but the genus, and although it 
 maintains an existence only by its relation to sensuo- 
 rational nature, it is still independent of all empirical 
 determinations of sensuousness, and remains the same, 
 even if the private constitution of the Subject has al- 
 tered. Then the beautiful has in common with the 
 good, that in which it differs from the agreeable, and 
 departs from the good, just where it approaches the 
 agreeable. 
 
282 
 
 VARIOUS ESTHETIC SUBJECTS. 
 
 Under the good is to be comprehended that, in 
 which the reason recognizes a conformity to its laws, 
 whether theoretical or practical. But the same object 
 may fully harmonize with the theoretical reason, and 
 yet be entirely repugnant to the practical. We may 
 dislike the purpose of an undertaking, and yet admire 
 its aptness for that purpose. We may despise the en- 
 joyments which the voluptuary makes the aim of life, 
 and yet praise the strict consequences of his principles 
 and his wisdom in the choice of means. What pleases 
 us only by its form, is good, and it is absolutely and 
 unconditionally good, if its form is at the same time its 
 content. The good is also an object of perception, 
 but of no direct perception, like the agreeable, and of 
 no mixed perception, like the beautiful. It does not 
 stimulate desire like the former, or inclination like the 
 latter. The pure representation of the good can only 
 inspire regard. 
 
 It is obvious from the fixed distinction between the 
 agreeable, the good and the beautiful, that an object 
 may be ugly, imperfect, and even morally exception- 
 able, and still be agreeable — still please the senses ; 
 that an object can be revolting to the sense, and yet be 
 good — yet please the reason ; that an object may be 
 revolting, in its internal quality, to the moral feeling, 
 and still please in contemplation — still be beautiful. 
 The reason is, that in all these various exhibitions an- 
 other faculty of the mind is interested, and in a differ- 
 ent manner. 
 
 But the classification of aesthetic predicates is not 
 
VARIOUS ESTHETIC SUBJECTS. 
 
 283 
 
 exhausted with the above, for there are objects, which 
 are at the same time ugly, repugnant and dreadful to 
 the sense, dissatisfactory to the intellect, and indiffer- 
 ent in a moral estimation, and which still please — 
 nay, please to such a high degree, that we readily sac- 
 rifice the gratification of sense and of reason, in order 
 to procure its enjoyment. 
 
 Nothing in nature is more enchanting than a beauti- 
 ful landscape in the red of evening. The rich mani- 
 foldness and mild outline of shapes, the infinitely vary- 
 ing play of light, the delicate veil which envelops dis- 
 tant objects, — all combine, to charm our senses. Per- 
 haps the soft murmur of a waterfall, the melody of 
 nightingales, and pleasant music are added to increase 
 our pleasure. We are dissolved in sweet perception of 
 tranquillity, and while our senses are affected most 
 agreeably by the harmony of colors, shapes and tones, 
 the mind revels in an easy and spirited flow of ideas, 
 and the heart" in the current of its feelings. 
 
 Suddenly a storm arises, which darkens the sky and the 
 whole landscape, which surpasses and drowns all other 
 sounds, and suddenly deprives us of all our pleasures. 
 Clouds, black as pitch, encircle the horizon, deafening 
 thunder-claps descend, flash follows flash, and our sight 
 as well as hearing is most disagreeably affected. The 
 lightning only shines to render the frightful night more 
 apparent; we see it as it strikes — nay, we begin to 
 tremble lest it may strike us also. Yet not the less do 
 we believe, that we have rather gained than lost by the 
 change, those persons excepted, whom fear deprives of 
 
284 
 
 VARIOUS ESTHETIC SUBJECTS. 
 
 all freedom of judgment. We are powerfully attracted 
 in one direction by this fearful spectacle, which repels 
 our senses, and linger in it with a feeling, which in- 
 deed we cannot properly call pleasure, but which is 
 often far superior to pleasure. But now this spectacle 
 of nature is rather destructive than good (at least we 
 are not obliged to regard the utility of a tempest, in or- 
 der to find pleasure in such a phenomenon), it is ugly 
 rather than beautiful, for darkness, as a deprivation of 
 all the appearances which light creates, can never be 
 pleasing ; and the sudden shattering of the air by the 
 thunder, and its sudden illumination by the lightning, 
 contradict a necessary condition of all Beauty, which 
 admits nothing abrupt, nothing violent. Further, this 
 phenomenon is rather painful than agreeable to mere 
 sense, since the nerves of sight and of hearing are 
 painfully strained, and then just as violently relaxed, 
 by the sudden alternations of darkness and light — from 
 the roar of the thunder to silence. And notwithstand- 
 ing all these causes of displeasure, a tempest is an at- 
 tractive appearance for one who does not fear it. 
 
 Still further. In the midst of a green and smiling 
 plain, a rude and naked hillock is prominent, which 
 shuts out from the eye a part of the prospect. Every 
 one will wish this excrescence removed, as something 
 which disfigures the beauty of the whole landscape. 
 Now let one imagine this hillock to become higher and 
 higher, without in the least altering its form in other 
 respects, so that the same relation is preserved between 
 its breadth and height. At first our dissatisfaction at 
 
VARIOUS ./ESTHETIC SUBJECTS. 
 
 285 
 
 it will increase, since its increasing bulk only makes it 
 more obtrusive, more troublesome. But proceed to 
 magnify it to double the height of a tower, and our dis- 
 satisfaction at it insensibly disappears, and gives place 
 to a feeling entirely different. Finally when it has 
 risen so high, that it is almost impossible for the eye to 
 embrace it in a single image, it is more esteemed by us 
 than all the beautiful plain around it, and we should 
 unwillingly exchange the impression which it produces, 
 for another however fair. Now let one give in idea 
 such an inclination to this mountain, that it appears 
 every moment as if it would fall over, then our previous 
 feeling is mingled with that of terror, but the object 
 itself will be all the more attractive. But suppose, 
 that we could prop up this inclined mountain by an- 
 other, then the terror, and with it a great part of our 
 pleasure, would be lost. Suppose further, that we 
 placed near this mountain four or five others, each of 
 which should be a fourth or fifth part lower than its 
 neighbor, then the first feeling which was inspired by 
 its magnitude, w^ould be evidently diminished ; some- 
 thing similar would occur, if we should divide the moun- 
 tain itself into ten or twelve equal fragments, or if we 
 adorned it by ingenious additions. In the first instance, 
 our only process was, to increase the mountain, exactly as 
 it was, without altering its form — and by this single 
 circumstance it was changed from an indifferent, even 
 a repulsive, object, to one of pleasure. In our second 
 process, we changed this great object at the same time 
 into an object of terror, and thereby increased our 
 
286 
 
 VARIOUS ESTHETIC SUBJECTS. 
 
 pleasure at its aspect. In the last process undertaken, 
 we diminished the terrific quality of its appearance, 
 and thereby weakened the pleasure. We have lessen- 
 ed subjectively the representation of its greatness, partly 
 by dividing the attention of the eye, partly by creating 
 for it a measure of comparison in the smaller moun- 
 tains placed near by, whereby it could more easily 
 command the greatness of the largest. Then greatness 
 and fear fulness can in certain cases suffice, in them- 
 selves alone, as a source of pleasure. 
 
 There is no image in the Grecian Mythology more 
 fearful and at the same time more revolting than the 
 Furies or Erinnyes, when they ascend from Orcus to 
 punish a criminal. A ghastly, withered visage, hag- 
 gard figures, heads wreathed with serpents instead of 
 hair, disgust our senses as much as they offend our 
 taste. But when these monsters are represented as 
 they haunt Orestes the matricide, shaking torches in 
 their hands, and hunting him restlessly from place to 
 place, till finally, when indignant justice is appeased, 
 vanishing in the abyss of hell, we linger amid this rep- 
 resentation with an agreeable horror. But it is not 
 only the remorse of a criminal, which is personified by 
 the Furies, that can please us when represented, but 
 his unlawful deeds themselves, his real actus. Cly- 
 temnestra, the Medea of the Greek tragedy, who mur- 
 dered her husband — Orestes, who killed his mother, 
 fill our mind with a shuddering delight. Even in com- 
 mon life, we discover that indifferent, and even re- 
 
VARIOUS ^ESTHETIC SUBJECTS. 
 
 287 
 
 volting and horrible objects, begin to interest us, as 
 soon as they approach either the monstrous or the ter- 
 rible. A very common and insignificant man begins 
 to please us, when a violent passion, which does not in 
 the least elevate him in our estimation, converts him 
 into an object of fear and terror ; just as a common 
 and paltry object is a source of pleasure to us, as soon 
 as we magnify it till it threatens to transgress our 
 powers of comprehension. A disagreeable man be- 
 comes still more disagreeable through anger, and yet 
 he may have the greatest attraction for us during an 
 outbreak of that passion, when it does not run into the 
 ridiculous but into the fearful. This remark is appli- 
 cable even in the case of animals. A bull in the 
 plough, a horse in the cart, a dog, are common objects ; 
 but if we goad the bull into fight, throw the peaceful 
 horse into a rage, or if we see a mad dog, we elevate 
 these animals into aesthetic objects, and begin to regard 
 them with a feeling which partakes of satisfaction and 
 regard* The universal bias of all men towards emo- 
 tion, the power of sympathetic feeling, which impels us 
 in nature to the spectacle of sorrow, fear and horror, 
 which attracts us in art so strongly, which charms us 
 in the theatre, and exercises our taste so extensively in 
 the delineations of great misfortunes, — all this is in- 
 dicative of a fourth source of pleasure, which neither 
 the Agreeable, the Good nor the Beautiful are compe- 
 tent to create. 
 
 All the examples hitherto adduced have in common 
 something objective in the perception they excite in 
 
288 
 
 VARIOUS ESTHETIC SUBJECTS, 
 
 us. We perceive in all an exhibition of something, 
 " which either transgresses, or threatens to do so, our 
 sensuous comprehension or our sensuous resistance," 
 yet without pushing this superiority so far as to oppress 
 both those powers, or to diminish our exertions for cog- 
 nition or for resistance. On the one hand a manifold- 
 ness is bestowed upon us, to comprehend which in a 
 unity, forces our intuitive faculty to its limits. On 
 the other, a power is exhibited, ? against which our own 
 disappears, but which we are still compelled to ac- 
 commodate to the latter. It is either an object, which 
 at the same time offers itself to, and withdraios itself 
 from, our intuitive faculty, and rouses the effort for 
 representation without letting it hope for satisfaction ; 
 or it is an object, which seems to take a hostile attitude 
 against our being itself, challenges us, as it were, to 
 conflict, and excites solicitude for the result. The 
 same operation upon the perceptive faculty is also evi- 
 dent in all the cases adduced. All throw the mind into 
 a state of restless emotion and intensity. A 'certain 
 gravity, which may amount to solemnity, occupies our 
 souls, and while evident traces of anxiety are manifest 
 in the sensuous organs, the reflecting spirit sinks back 
 into itself, and seems to rely upon an elevated con- 
 sciousness of its independent power and dignity. This 
 consciousness must actually predominate, if the great 
 or the terrible would have for us an aesthetic value. 
 Since the mind is inspired by such exhibitions, and 
 feels itself raised above itself, we distinguish them by 
 the epithet Sublime, although nothing sublime per- 
 
VARIOUS AESTHETIC SUBJECTS. 
 
 289 
 
 tains objectively to the objects themselves, on which 
 account it would be more appropriate to style them 
 elevating, 
 
 An object, to be called sublime, must be opposed to 
 our sensuous faculties. Two different relations may 
 be imagined in which things can stand to our sensuous- 
 ness, and corresponding to these there must also be two 
 different modes of opposition. They are either re- 
 garded as objects, from which we would create a cog- 
 nition, or as a force, with which we measure our own. 
 According to this distribution there are also two spe- 
 cies of the sublime, the sublime of cognition and the 
 sublime of power. 
 
 But the sensuous faculties contribute nothing further 
 towards cognition, except as they comprehend the given 
 substance, and arrange together its manifoldness in 
 time and space. To distinguish and assort this mani- 
 foidness is the business of the intellect, not of the 
 imagination. Diversity is only for the intellect — 
 homogeneousness only for the imagination (as sense), 
 and then it is only the mass of the homogeneous (the 
 quantity not the quality) that can make a distinction in 
 the sensuous appropriation of phenomena. Should 
 then the sensuous representative faculty succumb to an 
 object, this object must exceed the imagination through 
 its quantity. Therefore the sublime of cognition de- 
 pends upon number or bulk, and for this reason it can 
 also be called the mathematical sublime. 
 
 19 
 
290 
 
 ESTHETIC ESTIMATION OF SIZE. 
 
 ^ESTHETIC ESTIMATION OF SIZE. 
 
 I can make four, entirely different, representations 
 of the quantity of an object. 
 
 The tower, which I see before me, is a great object. 
 It is four hundred feet high. 
 It is high. 
 
 It is a lofty (sublime) object. 
 
 It is evident, that something entirely distinct is de- 
 clared by each of these four predicates, which still 
 collectively relate to the quantity of the tower. In the 
 two first, the tower is regarded only as a Quantum (a 
 greatness), in the two remaining, as a Magnum (as 
 something great). 
 
 Everything made up of parts is a Quantum. Each 
 intuition, each intellectual conception has a magnitude, 
 as certainly as the latter has a sphere and the former a 
 content. Then quantity cannot generally be meant, 
 if, in speaking of objects we regard a difference of 
 magnitude. The reference here is to such a quantity, 
 as especially pertains to an object — that is, one that 
 is not only a Quantum, but at the same time a Mag- 
 num. 
 
 In every magnitude we suppose an unity, to which 
 many homogeneous parts are allied. If then a distinc- 
 tion would obtain between magnitude and magnitude, 
 it can only consist in this, that in the one more parts, 
 in the other less parts are united to an unity, or that 
 
ESTHETIC ESTIMATION OF SIZE. 
 
 291 
 
 the one composes only one part in the other. That 
 Quantum, which contains in itself another Quantum 
 as part, is a Magnum in comparison with this Quan- 
 tum. 
 
 To examine how often a definite Quantum is con- 
 tained in another, is called measuring this Quantum 
 (if it is continuous — stetig,) or counting it (if it is not 
 continuous.) It always depends then upon the unity 
 which is taken as a measure of comparison, whether 
 we regard an object as a Magnum : that is to say, all 
 conception of magnitude is relative. 
 
 Considered with reference to its measure, every mag. 
 nitude is a Magnum, and still more so with reference 
 to the measure of its measure, compared with which 
 the latter is itself a Magnum. But as it descends, it 
 also ascends. Every Magnum is small, as soon as we 
 propose to contain it in another ; and what limit is 
 there to this, since we can multiply again with itself 
 every amount, however great? 
 
 Then in the process of measurement we can hit upon 
 the comparative, to be sure, but never upon the abso- 
 lute magnitude, namely, upon that which can be con- 
 tained in no other Quantum, but which embraces in 
 itself all other magnitudes. Certainly nothing would 
 hinder the same intellectual operation, which renders 
 to us such a magnitude, from also giving it to us in 
 duplo, since the intellect proceeds successively, and, 
 guided by conceptions of number, can push forward its 
 synthesis to infinity. So long as it continues to define 
 how great an object is, the object is not yet (absolutely) 
 
292 ^ESTHETIC ESTIMATION OF SIZE. 
 
 great, and may by the same method of comparison be 
 degraded to a very small one. According to this, 
 there could be in nature only a single magnitude per 
 excellentiam, namely, the infinite entirety of nature 
 itself, but to which no intuition can correspond, and 
 whose synthesis can never be completed in time. As 
 the empire of numbers is inexhaustible, the intellect 
 must be that which terminates its synthesis ; and it 
 must everywhere set up a unity as the extreme and 
 highest measure, and declare to be absolutely great, 
 whatever exceeds it. 
 
 This actually takes place, if I say of the tower 
 which I see before me, it is high, without defining its 
 height. I here give no measure of comparison, and 
 yet I cannot ascribe absolute greatness to the tower, as 
 nothing hinders me from assuming it to be still greater. 
 Then at the mere aspect of the tower an extreme 
 measure must already be given to me, and I must be 
 able to conceive by my expression, this tower is high, 
 that I have also prescribed this maximum measure to 
 every other. This measure, then, already lies in the 
 conception of a tower, and it is nothing else than the 
 conception of its generic magnitude. 
 
 There is a certain maximum of magnitude to every- 
 thing, either in its genus (if it is a work of nature), or 
 (if it is a work of freedom) in its design and in the 
 limits which ultimate causes prescribe to it. We ap- 
 ply this measure of magnitude, with more or less con- 
 sciousness, in every apperception of objects ; but our 
 perceptions are very different, according as the meas- 
 
ESTHETIC ESTIMATION OF SIZE. 
 
 293 
 
 ure, which we consider ultimate, is more or less con- 
 tingent or necessary. If an object surpasses the con- 
 ception of its generic magnitude, it induces astonish- 
 ment to a certain degree. We are surprised, and our 
 experience is enlarged, but so far as we take no in- 
 terest in the object itself, the only result is this feeling 
 of surpassed expectation. We deduced that measure 
 only from a series of experiences, and there is no ne- 
 cessity that it should always be adequate. If on the 
 contrary, a production of freedom surpasses the con- 
 ception, which we formed from the limitations of its 
 causes, we shall already experience a certain admira- 
 tion. Here it is not only surpassed expectation which 
 surprises us in such an experience, it is at the same time 
 a divestiture of limits. In the former case our atten- 
 tion was only confined to the product, which in itself 
 was indifferent ; in the latter, we are attracted by the 
 productive power, which has a moral relation, or rather, 
 a relation to a moral being, and must then necessarily 
 interest us. This interest will increase in the same 
 degree, as the power which constitutes the active prin- 
 ciple, is nobler and more important, and as the limit 
 which we find surpassed is more difficult to overcome. 
 A horse of unusual magnitude will agreeably surprise 
 us, but still more so the strong and dexterous rider, 
 who manages him. Now if we see him leap with this 
 horse over a wide and deep ditch, we are astonished ; 
 and if there are hostile ranks into which we see him 
 spring, respect is united with this astonishment, and it 
 passes over into admiration. In the latter case we 
 
294 .ESTHETIC ESTIMATION OF SIZE. 
 
 consider his action as a dynamical magnitude, and ap- 
 ply our conception of human bravery as an unit of 
 measure, where it depends upon our own feeling, and 
 upon what we regard as the extreme limit of valor. 
 
 On the contrary, the case is entirely different, when 
 the conception of magnitude in a design is surpassed. 
 Here our ultimate measure is not empirical and con- 
 tingent, but rational and thus necessary, and it cannot 
 be transgressed without annulling the design of the 
 object. The magnitude of a dwelling-house is orly de- 
 termined by its design ; the magnitude of a tower can 
 only be determined by the limits of architecture. 
 Hence if I find the dwelling house too large for its 
 purpose, it must necessarily displease me. On the 
 contrary, if I find the tower exceeding my idea of its 
 generic height, it will only please me the more. And 
 why ? The former is a contradiction, the latter only 
 an unexpected coincidence with that which I seek. I 
 may be very properly pleased when a limit is extended, 
 but not when an intention is frustrated. 
 
 If I only say of an object that it is great, without 
 stating how great it is, I do not thereby affirm it as 
 something absolutely great, for which no scale is suffi- 
 cient ; I only conceal the scale to which I subject it, 
 in the supposition that it is already contained in its 
 simple conception. It is true, I do not entirely define 
 its magnitude, in comparison with all supposable things, 
 but still partly, and with reference to a certain class of 
 things, — then always objectively and logically, be- 
 cause I declare a proportion, and proceed according to 
 a conception. 
 
AESTHETIC ESTIMATION OF SIZE. 295 
 
 But this may be an empirical, consequently a con- 
 tingent conception, and in this case my judgment will 
 only have subjective validity. Perhaps I mistake for 
 generic magnitude, what is only the magnitude of cer- 
 tain species — perhaps I distinguish as an objective 
 limit, what is only the limit of my Subject — perhaps 
 my private conception of the use and design of a thing 
 underlies my examination. Then, according to the 
 matter, my estimation of magnitude can be entirely 
 subjective, although, according to the Form, it is ob- 
 jective — that is, an actual definition of proportion. 
 The European regards the Patagonian as a giant, and 
 his judgment has full validity with that nation, from 
 which he has borrowed his conception of human mag- 
 nitude ; in Patagonia, on the contrary, he would meet 
 with contradiction. Nowhere do we better descry the 
 influence of subjective causes upon human judgment, 
 than in our estimation of magnitude, as well in ma- 
 terial as in immaterial things. Every man, we may 
 affirm, has a certain scale of power and virtue within 
 himself, to which he conforms in his estimation of the 
 magnitude of moral actions. The miser will consider 
 the gift of a florin as a very great exertion of his liber- 
 ality, while the generous man will not be satisfied in 
 giving thrice the sum. A man of common stamp re- 
 gards non-deception as a very great proof of his hon- 
 esty ; another man of delicate feelings frequently hesi- 
 tates to appropriate a lawful gain. 1 
 
 1 (Tr.) — Then, making the lowest statement possible, we need an 
 ethical maximum, of which we may have intuition, — an absolute 
 
296 /ESTHETIC ESTIMATION OF SIZE. 
 
 Although in all these cases the scale is subjective, 
 yet the measurement itself is always objective ; for we 
 need only make the scale universal, and the definition of 
 
 magnitude, which humanity cannot surpass, since it represents the 
 limit of humanity : and this, in order that we may satisfy the de- 
 mands of virtue, and fulfil the limits of our humanity. Without such 
 an ethical maximum, all our virtue would be contingent, because our 
 unit of virtue would be so : consequently society would never emerge 
 from its state of nature. Then " a providential man " is needed, if 
 on no other grounds than that we must do the right. To this Kantian 
 principle add another, that " not he who does right, but he who loves 
 it, is the righteous man," and we have the conception of Christianity ; 
 since the power to do the right is already involved in the presentation 
 of the ethical maximum, which convicts, enlightens and inspires. 
 The following passage from Kant's " Religion within the bounds of 
 Pure Reason," will not be out of place : " The ideal of humanity as 
 acceptable to God (that is, the idea of an ethical perfection, so far 
 forth as this last may be possible for finite Agent-Intelligents shack- 
 led by wants and appetites), ean only be cogitated by the represen- 
 tation of a Person ready and willing to discharge all the offices of hu- 
 manity, who, not only by doctrine and example, spreads abroad the 
 utmost amount of good, but does further, although assaulted by the 
 highest temptations, undergo for the sake of the whole world, his 
 enemies not excepted, the greatest miseries, even an ignominious 
 death. Thus would the matter seem to be figured : for we can frame 
 to ourselves no notion of the degree and momentum of a force, such 
 as is the vis insita of a moral sentiment, except by observing it war- 
 ring against antagonists, and standing, amidst the greatest possible 
 invasions and extremities, unvanquished and victorious." Semple. — 
 Thus the same law obtains in the ethical, as in the aesthetical sphere: 
 without possessing a maximum as our unit of measure, we may mis- 
 take for generic magnitude what is only the magnitude of certain spe- 
 cies, and distinguish as an absolute limit what is only the limit of 
 our Subject. Therefore that which is only a deduction from the pure 
 reason, is neither absolute religion nor absolute morality; both, like 
 their forms, become transient and contingent. This aesthetic rule of 
 Schiller may thus enjoy an universal validity. 
 
ESTHETIC ESTIMATION OF SIZE. 
 
 297 
 
 magnitude will have an universal character. This is 
 actually the case with the objective scales, which are 
 in universal use, although they all have a subjective 
 origin, and are obtained from the human corporeity. 
 
 But all comparative estimation of magnitude, whether 
 ideal or corporeal, whether it be entirely or only partly 
 defined, results only in relative, and never in absolute 
 magnitude ; for if an object actually surpasses what we 
 assume as the extreme and highest scale, still the 
 question may continually recur, how often it surpasses 
 it. It is indeed something great compared with its 
 genus, but yet not the greatest possible magnitude ; 
 and if the limit is once exceeded, it may be exceeded 
 to infinity. But we now seek the absolute magnitude, 
 since that alone can contain within itself the ground of 
 a superiority — for all comparative magnitudes, con- 
 sidered as such, are equivalent. Since nothing can 
 compel the intellect to become stationary in its opera- 
 tions, limits must be placed to it by the imagination ; 
 in other words, the estimation of magnitude must cease 
 to be logical, — it must be aesthetically conducted. 
 
 If I estimate a magnitude logically, I always refer it 
 to my cognitive faculty ; if aesthetically, I refer it to 
 my perceptive faculty. On the one hand, I experience 
 something from the object, but on the other hand, only 
 something in myself, induced by the represented mag- 
 nitude of the object. On the one hand, I perceive 
 something without myself, on the other hand, some- 
 thing within myself. Then I no longer make a par- 
 ticular estimate of magnitude, but I myself for the mo- 
 
298 ESTHETIC ESTIMATION OF SIZE. 
 
 ment become a magnitude, and truly an infinite one. 
 That object, which converts me into an infinite mag- 
 nitude, is called sublime. 
 
 Then the sublime of magnitude is no objective qual- 
 ity of the object to which it is ascribed ; it is only our 
 subjective action, incited by that object. On the one 
 part, it arises from the represented inability of the 
 imagination to attain that totality in the exposition of 
 magnitude, which is insisted upon by the reason ; on 
 the other part, from the evident ability of the reason to 
 set up such a demand. The repulsive power of the 
 great and of the sensuo-infinite is based upon the first, 
 their attractive power upon the second. 
 
 But although the sublime is an appearance which is 
 first subjectively created, still the objects themselves 
 must contain the ground why exactly these and no 
 other objects induce us to make this application. And 
 since further, by our judgment we assume in the object 
 the predicate of the sublime (thus signifying, that we 
 undertake this combination not merely arbitrarily, but 
 intending thereby to establish a law for every one), 
 we must contain subjectively a necessary ground, why 
 we make exactly this application and no other, of a 
 certain class of objects. 
 
 Therefore there are necessary internal and external 
 conditions of mathematical sublimity. A certain defi- 
 nite relation between reason and imagination pertains to 
 the former, and a definite relation of the contemplated 
 object to our aesthetic scale of magnitude, to the latter. 
 
 Both the imagination and the reason must develop 
 
AESTHETIC ESTIMATION OF SIZE. 
 
 299 
 
 themselves with a certain degree of energy, if great- 
 ness would affect us. The imagination desires to ap- 
 ply its whole comprehensive faculty to the exposition 
 of the idea of the Absolute, which effort the reason 
 sedulously presses. If the fancy is dull and inactive, 
 or if the tendency of the mind is more for conceptions 
 than for intuitions, the most sublime object remains 
 only objectively logical, and is not a subject for aes- 
 thetic judgment. This is the reason why men of pre- 
 ponderating powers of analysis, seldom manifest much 
 susceptibility for aesthetic greatness. Either their 
 imagination is not sufficiently lively, even to induce 
 them to set forth the Absolute of the reason, or their 
 intellect is too busily employed, in appropriating the ob- 
 ject to itself, and in attracting it from the field of in- 
 tuition into its own discursive domain. 
 
 A great object is not at all aesthetical without a cer- 
 tain energy of the fancy ; on the other hand, the aes- 
 thetical is not sublime without a certain energy of the 
 reason. The idea of the Absolute demands an unu- 
 sual development of the lofty rational faculty, a certain 
 fertility in ideas, and a more accurate acquaintance of 
 man with his noblest self. He will never be capable 
 of making a supersensuous use of sensuous greatness, 
 whose reason has yet received no culture. The reason 
 will never employ itself in the business, and it will 
 be committed to the imagination, or to the intellect 
 alone. But the imagination singly is far from engag- 
 ing in a process of comprehension, which is painful to 
 it. It is, then, satisfied with mere apprehension, and 
 
300 
 
 ^ESTHETIC estimation of size. 
 
 it never feels the desire to give an universality to 
 its expositions. Hence the stupid insensibility, with 
 which the savage can dwell in the bosom of the sub- 
 limest nature, among the symbols of the Infinite, with- 
 out being roused from his brutish slumber, without 
 even divining from afar the great spirit of Nature, 
 which speaks to a feeling soul out of the sensuous im- 
 mensity. 
 
 What the rude savage gazes at with senseless apathy, 
 the enervated voluptuary flees from as an object of ab- 
 horrence, which reveals to him only his weakness, not 
 his power. His narrow heart feels painfully rent asun- 
 der by representations of greatness. It is true, his 
 fancy is sufficiently susceptible to attempt the exposi- 
 tion of the sensuo-infinite, but his reason is not suffi- 
 ciently substantial, to terminate this undertaking with 
 success. He would climb towards it, but, while half 
 way, sinks back exhausted. He contends with the fear- 
 ful Genius, but it is only with terrestrial, not immortal 
 weapons. Conscious of this weakness, he rather shuns 
 a presence which oppresses him, and seeks aid from 
 Rule, the comforter of all the weak. If he cannot el- 
 evate himself to natural greatness, nature must con- 
 form to his little capacity. She must exchange her 
 bold forms for artificial ones, which are foreign to her, 
 but which are made an exigency by his pampered 
 senses. She must subject her will to its iron yoke, and 
 crouch in the fetters of mathematical conformity. This 
 was the origin of the old French taste in gardens, 
 which finally gave way almost universally to the Eng- 
 
^ESTHETIC ESTIMATION OF SIZE. 
 
 301 
 
 lish, but without thereby coming perceptibly nearer to 
 the true taste. For Nature's character is no more a 
 mere manifoldness than it is an uniformity : and her 
 grave and tranquil sedateness is just as little compatible 
 with these hasty and frivolous transitions, with which 
 in the modern style they hurriedly shift her decora- 
 tions. In all her mutations she never lays aside her 
 harmonious unity ; she conceals her fulness in modest 
 simplicity, and we see, even in her most luxuriant free- 
 dom, that she respects the law of stability. 1 
 
 Among the objective conditions of mathematical 
 sublimity, the first is, that the object in which we would 
 recognize it, should form a whole and so manifest uni- 
 ty ; the second, that it should make the highest sensu- 
 ous measure, to which we* are wont to refer all magni- 
 tudes, entirely useless. Without the first, the imagina- 
 tion would not be summoned to attempt an exposition 
 of its totality ; without the second, it would not be able 
 to fail in this attempt. 
 
 The horizon exceeds every magnitude, which can 
 anywhere come under our observation, for all objects 
 in space must be included within it. We observe not 
 
 1 Horticulture and dramatic poetry have lately met with nearly the 
 same fate, and in fact among the same nations. The same tyranny 
 of rule in the French gardens and the French tragedies ; the same 
 wild and manifold irregularity in the parks of the English and in their 
 Shakspeare ; and as the German taste has hitherto received its tone 
 from the foreign, it must in this respect also vacillate between both 
 of those extremes. 
 
302 
 
 AESTHETIC ESTIMATION OP SIZE. 
 
 the less, that a single mountain which rises itself there- 
 in, is often capable of giving us a far stronger impres- 
 sion of sublimity, than the whole circle of vision, which 
 embraces not only this mountain, but a thousand other 
 objects of magnitude. This happens because the hori- 
 zon does not appear to us as a single object, and thus 
 we are not invited to comprehend it as an entirety. 
 But if we abstract from the horizon all objects which 
 attract the sight particularly, and imagine a wide and 
 unbroken plain or the open sea, the horizon itself will 
 become an object, and truly the most sublime that the 
 eye can ever contemplate. Its sphericity in particular 
 contributes much to this impression, since it is so 
 easily embraced, so that the imagination can the less 
 abstain from attempting its full conception. 
 
 But the aesthetic impression of magnitude depends 
 upon the fact, that the imagination attempts the t< tal 
 representation of the given object in vain, and this 
 can only occur, when the highest measure of magni- 
 tude which it can actually embrace at once, added to 
 itself as many times as the intellect can actually com- 
 prehend in a conception, is too small for the object. 
 But the result seems to be, that objects of equal mag- 
 nitude must also make an equally sublime impression, 
 and that an object of less magnitude has the power to 
 lessen this impression — which is contrary to experi- 
 ence. For according to this, the part frequently ap- 
 pears sublimer than the whole, the mountain or the 
 tower sublimer than the sky in which it rears itself — 
 the cliff sublimer than the ocean whose waves foam 
 
^ESTHETIC ESTIMATION OF SIZE. 
 
 303 
 
 around it. But we must here recollect the above men- 
 tioned conditions, by virtue of which the aesthetic im- 
 pression only ensues when the totality of the object 
 employs the imagination. But if the latter omits this 
 with respect to the far greater object, and, on the con- 
 trary, observes it with the smaller, it may be sestheti- 
 cally affected by the latter, and yet be insensible to the 
 former. But if it conceives of the larger as a mao-ni- 
 tude, it at the same time conceives of it as an unity, 
 and then it must necessarily make an impression 
 stronger in proportion as it exceeds the other in mag- 
 nitude. 
 
 AW sensuous magnitudes are either in Space (ex- 
 tended magnitudes), or in time (numeral magnitudes). 
 Although every extended magnitude is at the same 
 time a numeral magnitude (since that which is given 
 in Space we must also comprehend in Time), the nu- 
 meral magnitude itself is only so far sublime as I trans- 
 form it into an extended magnitude. It is true, the 
 remoteness of the earth from Sirius is a prodigious 
 Quantum in Time, and outrunning my fancy when I 
 would conceive its totality ; but I cease to employ my- 
 self in contemplating this Time-magnitude, and assist 
 myself by figures ; and then I only obtain the impres- 
 sion of sublimity by recollecting that the highest extend- 
 ed magnitude, which I can comprehend in an unity — 
 a range of mountains, for example, is still a measure 
 much too small and entirely inadequate for this re- 
 moteness. Then I take the measure to be applied to 
 it from extended magnitudes ; so it depends upon the 
 measure, whether an object shall appear to us great. 
 
30-4 
 
 .ESTHETIC ESTIMATION OF SIZE , 
 
 Extended greatness either appears in Lengths or in 
 Heights; Depths are also included, for depth is only 
 a height below us. just as height may be called a depth 
 above us. Hence the Latin poets do not hesitate to 
 use the expression profundus even with respect to 
 heights : 
 
 " Xi faciat, maria ac terras ecelumque profundum 
 Quippe ferant rapidi secuin ." 
 
 Heights appear altogether more sublime than equallv 
 great lengths, the reason of which lies partly in the 
 fact, that dynamical sublimity is associated with the 
 aspect of the first. A simple length, however immeas- 
 urable it may be. has nothing fearful in itself, but a 
 height certainly has, since we might be precipitated 
 from it. For the same reason depth is still more sub- 
 lime than height, since the idea of the fearful is closely 
 united with it. If a great height would be appalling 
 for us. we must first imagine ourselves at tlie top, and 
 then change it into a depth. We can easily make such 
 an experiment, if we look at a cloudy sky chequered 
 with blue in a well, or else in a dark piece of water, 
 where its infinite depth gives an appearance far more 
 awful than its height The same occurs in a higher 
 degree, if we regard it while stretched upon our backs, 
 in which position it is also changed into a depth ; and 
 since it is the only object that meets the eye, our 
 imagination is irresistibly impelled to set forth its to- 
 tality. Height and depth operate more powerfully 
 upon us for this reason also, that the estimation oftheir 
 
ESTHETIC ESTIMATION OF SIZE. 305 
 
 magnitude is weakened by no comparison. A length 
 always has a scale in the horizon, beneath which it is 
 lost — for the sky extends as far as any length. It is 
 true, the highest range of mountains is small in com- 
 parison with the height of the sky, but it is only the 
 intellect, and not the eye, which teaches that, and it 
 is not the heaven which makes the mountains diminu- 
 tive by its height, but the mountains show by their 
 magnitude the height of the heaven. 
 
 Hence it is not only a representation optically just, 
 but also symbolically true, when it is said that Atlas 
 supports the heavens. For as the sky itself appears to 
 rest upon Atlas, so does our representation of the 
 height of the sky rest upon the height of Atlas. Then 
 the mountain in a figurative sense actually sustains 
 the sky, as it supports it for our sensuous representa- 
 tion of its height. Without the mountain the sky would 
 fall — that is, it would optically sink from its height 
 and become depressed. 
 
 20 
 
UPON 
 
 THE TRAGIC ART. 
 
THE TRAGIC ART. 
 
 We take delight in the simple condition of emotion, 
 independent of every relation of its object to our im- 
 provement or depravation ; and we strive to transport 
 ourselves into that condition, even if it involves some 
 sacrifice. This impulse underlies our most customary 
 pleasures ; little regard being had as to whether the 
 emotion creates desire or aversion, whether it is natu- 
 rally pleasant or painful. Indeed, experience teaches 
 that an unpleasant emotion has the greater attraction 
 for us, and that consequently pleasure at emotion 
 stands in an inverse ratio to its content. It is an uni- 
 versal phenomenon of our nature, that the mournful, 
 the fearful, even the horrible, allures with irresistible 
 enchantment — that we feel ourselves alternately re- 
 pelled and attracted with equal power, at the approach 
 of grief and of horror. We press on the tiptoe of ex- 
 pectation around the narrator of a tale of murder ; we 
 devour with appetite the wildest goblin stories, and all 
 the more eagerly, as they make our hair to stand on end. 
 
310 
 
 THE TRAGIC ART. 
 
 This feeling is more vividly expressed at actual in- 
 tuition of objects. If we view from the shore a tem- 
 pest, in which a whole fleet founders, our imagination 
 will be delighted as strongly as our feelings are moved ; 
 it would be hard to believe, with Lucretius, that this 
 natural pleasure results from a comparison of our own 
 safety with the peril that is perceived. How dense is 
 the crowd that accompanies a criminal to the scene of 
 his punishment ! Neither the satisfaction of a love of 
 jusuice, nor the ignoble pleasure of gratified revenge, 
 can explain this phenomenon. For the unhappy one 
 may even find absolution in the hearts of the spectators, 
 and the most lively sympathy for his preservation may 
 be active ; and yet a greedy desire, stronger or weaker, 
 impels the spectator to direct both eye and ear to the 
 expression of his suffering. If the man of culture and 
 refinement of feelings is an exception, it is not because 
 this impulse has no existence within him, but because 
 he is overcome by the painful strength of his sympathy, 
 or is withheld by the laws of propriety. The rude son 
 of nature, who is restrained by no tender feeling of hu- 
 manity, surrenders himself to this powerful incitement 
 without aversion. It must, then, be founded in the 
 original dispositions of the human mind, and its expla- 
 nation must lie in some general psychological law. 
 
 But if we also find these rude natural feelings in- 
 compatible with the dignity of human nature, and 
 therefore hesitate to found thereon a law for the whole 
 race, there are empirical facts sufficient to place be- 
 yond doubt the reality and the universality of pleasure at 
 
THE TRAGIC ART. 
 
 311 
 
 painful emotions. The severe conflict of opposing in- 
 clinations or duties, which is a source of misery for 
 those who suffer it, is delightful for us who contemplate 
 it : we follow with ever increasing pleasure the pro- 
 gress of a passion to the very abyss into which it hurls 
 its unhappy victim. The same tender feeling which 
 makes us recoil from the sight of physical suffering, or 
 even from the physical expression of a moral suffering, 
 causes us to find a pleasure all the sweeter in sympathy 
 with pure moral pain. The interest is universal with 
 which we linger over the delineations of such objects. 
 
 This naturally regards only an emotion which is 
 communicated or reproduced ; for the near relation in 
 which an original emotion stands to our impulse for 
 happiness, usually occupies and busies us too much, to 
 allow room for the pleasure which it grants when free 
 from every personal relation. So the feeling of pain 
 predominates in him who is actually governed by a 
 distressing passion, however much the delineation of 
 his mental state may please the hearer or spectator. 
 Nevertheless, even the original painful emotion is not 
 entirely destitute of pleasure for him who suffers it : 
 only the degrees of this pleasure differ according to 
 the varieties of mental constitution. If no enjoyment 
 existed even in unrest, in doubt, in fear, games of 
 chance would have far less attraction for us, we should 
 not plunge into peril with a bold temerity, and sympa- 
 thy with foreign suffering would not give us the 
 liveliest delight at the very moment of the greatest il- 
 lusion and self-substitution. But it is not therefore 
 
312 
 
 THE TRAGIC ART. 
 
 affirmed, that unpleasant emotions confer pleasure in 
 and for themselves — an assertion which no one would 
 think of maintaining : enough, if these mental states 
 only secure the conditions, under which alone we find 
 certain kinds of satisfaction possible. Then the minds 
 which are particularly susceptible to these kinds of 
 satisfaction, and which especially covet them, will be 
 more easily reconciled with those unpleasant condi- 
 tions, and will not entirely lose their freedom even in 
 the most violent storms of passion. 
 
 The displeasure which we experience at disagreea- 
 ble emotions, originates in the relation of its object to 
 our sensuous or moral faculty ; and our pleasure at 
 agreeable emotions springs from the same source. Al- 
 so the degree of freedom which a man can maintain in 
 the midst of emotions, depends upon the proportion 
 which exists between his sensuous and his moral na- 
 ture ; and as it is understood that no choice exists for 
 us in the moral sphere, while, on the contrary, the 
 sensuous impulse is subject to the legislation of the 
 reason, and is thus in our power, at least ought to be, 
 — it is obvious that it is possible to maintain a perfect 
 freedom in all those emotions which have to do with 
 the selfish impulse, and to be master of the degree to 
 which they ought to rise. This will be weaker, just 
 in proportion to the superiority which the moral sense 
 maintains over a man's impulse for happiness, and to 
 the diminution, by obedience to universal laws of 
 reason, of the selfish attachment to his individual Me. 
 Then such a man will have, in the condition of emo 
 
THE TRAGIC ART. 
 
 313 
 
 tion, a less vivid perception of the relation of an ob- 
 ject to his impulse for happiness, and will consequently 
 experience far less of the displeasure which only re- 
 sults from this relation. On the contrary, he will so 
 much the more heed the proportion which this object 
 holds to his morality, and be therefore so much the 
 more susceptible to the pleasure which the relation to 
 the moral sense often mingles with the most painful 
 sufferings of sensuousness. Such a mental disposition 
 is the best fitted to enjoy the satisfaction of compassion, 
 and to preserve the original emotion itself within the 
 limits of compassion. Hence the great value of a phi- 
 losophy of life, which weakens the feeling of our indi- 
 viduality by continual reference to universal laws, which 
 teaches us to lose our little Self in the coherence 
 of the great whole, and thereby puts us in a state to 
 treat with ourselves as with strangers. This sublime 
 temper of the soul is the lot of strong and philosophic 
 minds, who have learned, by continuous labor upon 
 themselves, to subdue the selfish impulse. Even the 
 bitterest misfortune never carries them beyond a sad- 
 ness, which too may always be united with a percepti- 
 ble degree of pleasure. Only those who are able to 
 separate themselves from themselves, enjoy the privi- 
 lege of compassionating themselves, and of feeling a 
 personal suffering in the mild reflection of sympathy. 
 
 The preceding remarks intimate with sufficient clear- 
 ness, the sources of the enjoyment which emotion, and 
 especially that which is mournful, guaranties to us. 
 
314 
 
 THE TRAGIC ART. 
 
 It is greater, as we have seen, in moral dispositions, 
 and it operates freely in proportion to the mind's inde- 
 pendence of the selfish impulse. And farther, it is 
 more lively and vigorous in mournful emotions, where 
 the self-love is disturbed, than in joyful emotions, 
 which suppose a satisfaction of the latter : then it in- 
 creases where the selfish impulse is offended, and de- 
 creases where this impulse is flattered. But we know 
 only two sources of enjoyment, the satisfaction of the 
 impulse for happiness, and the fulfilment of moral laws : 
 a pleasure, then, which is proved not to result from the 
 former source, must necessarily originate from the lat- 
 ter. Thus the pleasure with which painful emotions 
 affect us at second hand, results from our moral na- 
 ture; and in certain cases they may affect us agreea- 
 bly, even when felt at first hand. 
 
 Attempts have been made in many ways, to explain 
 the enjoyment of compassion : but none of the solutions 
 could be satisfactory, because the ground of the phe- 
 nomenon was sought in accompanying circumstances 
 rather than in the nature itself of emotion. With 
 many, the enjoyment of compassion is nothing but the 
 enjoyment of the soul in its own sensibility : with oth- 
 ers, pleasure in a highly excited state of mental activi- 
 ty : some make it result from the discovery of morally 
 beautiful traits of character, on occasion of a conflict 
 with misfortune and passion. But the point still re- 
 mains unsolved, why exactly the pain itself, the special 
 suffering, should attract us the most powerfully in ob- 
 jects of compassion, since, according to the above ex- 
 
THE TRAGIC ART. 
 
 315 
 
 planations, a weaker degree of suffering must evidently 
 be more favorable to the alleged causes of our pleas- 
 ure at emotion. The liveliness and vigor of the repre- 
 sentations excited in our fancy, the moral excellence 
 of the suffering person, the introversion of the sympa- 
 thizing Subject upon himself, may indeed heighten the 
 pleasure at emotion, but they are not the causes which 
 produce it. The suffering of a feeble soul, the grief 
 of a villain, certainly do not secure to us this enjoy- 
 ment, but not because they do not excite our compas- 
 sion in the same degree as would the suffering hero or 
 the struggling saint. Then the prior question continu- 
 ally recurs, why precisely the degree of suffering should 
 define the degree of sympathetic pleasure at emotion : 
 and it can only be answered by supposing the attack 
 upon our sensuousness to be the condition for the ex- 
 citement of that mental power, whose activity creates 
 that sympathetic enjoyment at suffering. 
 
 Now this power is none other than the Reason ; and 
 in so far as its free efficiency, as absolute spontaneity, 
 specially deserves the name of activity, in so far as the 
 mind feels perfectly free and independent only in its 
 moral action, — in so far, certainly, is the satisfied im- 
 pulse for activity the source of our enjoyment at mourn- 
 ful emotions. But then that which underlies this en- 
 joyment is not the number, not the vivacity of repre- 
 sentations, not the activity of the mental powers, but it 
 is a definite species of the former, and a definite, ra- 
 tionally created activity of the latter. 
 
 We find, then, a communicated emotion delightful, 
 
316 
 
 THE TRAGIC ART. 
 
 because it satisfies the impulse for activity : a mourn- 
 ful emotion secures that effect in a higher degree, be- 
 cause it satisfies this impulse in a higher degree. The 
 mind expresses its highest activity only in its condition 
 of perfect freedom, only in the consciousness of its ra- 
 tional nature, since only there does it make application 
 of a power which is superior to every resistance. 
 
 Then that mental condition which is specially favor- 
 able for the annunciation of this power, and which 
 awakens this lofty activity, is most appropriate for a 
 rational being, and most satisfactory to the impulse for 
 activity ; it must, then, be united with an especial de- 
 gree of pleasure. A mournful emotion places us in 
 such a condition, and the pleasure it causes must sur- 
 pass the pleasure at joyful emotion, according as our 
 moral ability is elevated above our sensuousness. 
 
 That which is only a subordinate member in the 
 whole system of design, Art may separate from its con- 
 nection and pursue as a main design. Enjoyment may 
 be only a mediate design for Nature : for Art it is the 
 highest. Then it pertains particularly to the design of 
 the latter, not to neglect the lofty enjoyment which is 
 contained in mournful emotions. But that art in par- 
 ticular, whose design is the enjoyment of compassion, 
 is, by universal acceptance, called the Tragic Art. 
 
 Art fulfils its design by an imitation of nature, w r hen 
 it fulfils the conditions under which enjoyment becomes 
 possible in reality, and unites, according to an intelli- 
 gent plan, the scattered institutes of nature, in order to 
 attain as its final aim, that which nature only made her 
 
THE TRAGIC ART. 
 
 317 
 
 accessory design. Then the Tragic Art will imitate 
 nature in those actions which have a special power to 
 awake compassionate emotion. 
 
 In order, then, to prescribe to Tragic Art some uni- 
 versal method of procedure, it is above all necessary to 
 know the conditions under which, according to daily 
 experience, the enjoyment of emotion is wont to be 
 most certainly and strongly created : but, at the same 
 time, those circumstances must be regarded, which 
 confine or entirely destroy it. 
 
 Experience gives two opposite causes, which hinder 
 enjoyment at emotion : either if compassion is too 
 feebly excited, or so strongly, that the communicated 
 emotion passes over into the vivacity of an original 
 emotion. The former may lie either in the weakness 
 of the impression which we receive from original suf- 
 fering, in which case we say that our heart remains 
 cold, and we are sensible of neither sorrow nor enjoy- 
 ment ; or it lies in the strong perceptions which resist 
 the given impression, and weaken or entirely destroy 
 the enjoyment of compassion by their preponderance 
 in the mind. 
 
 There is, with every tragic emotion, the representa- 
 tion of incongruity ( Ziveckwidrigkeit ) , which in every 
 case, if the emotion would be pleasing, leads to a rep- 
 resentation of a higher congruity (with a design). It 
 depends upon the relation between these two opposite 
 representations, whether pleasure or displeasure pre- 
 dominates on occasion of an emotion. If the represen- 
 tation of incongruity is more lively than that of the 
 
318 
 
 THE TRAGIC ART. 
 
 opposite, or if the design which is violated is of greater 
 importance than that which is fulfilled, displeasure will 
 always have the upper hand ; and this may be true ob- 
 jectively of the human race, or only subjectively of in- 
 dividuals. 
 
 If displeasure at the cause of a misfortune becomes 
 too strong, it wakens our compassion for him who suf- 
 fers. Two entirely distinct perceptions cannot exist at 
 the same time in the mind in a high degree. Indig- 
 nation against the originator of the suffering will be- 
 come the prevailing emotion, and every other feeling 
 must give way to it. So our sympathy is always weak- 
 ened, if the unfortunate person whom we ought to 
 compassionate, has plunged into ruin through his own 
 unpardonable guilt, or, from weakness of intellect and 
 from imbecility, does not know how to extricate him- 
 self, while he has an opportunity. It injures not a little 
 our sympathy with the unfortunate Lear, abused by 
 his ungrateful daughters, that the childish old man 
 should resign his crown so inconsiderately, and divide 
 his love so foolishly among his daughters. In Cronegh's 
 tragedy, Olinthus and Sophronia, the most fearful suf- 
 fering to which we see both of these martyrs to their 
 faith exposed, can but feebly excite our compassion, 
 and their sublime heroism can extort but little admira- 
 tion, because madness alone can prompt an action like 
 that by which Olinthus brought himself and his whole 
 people to the edge of ruin. 
 
 Our compassion is equally weakened, if the origina- 
 tor of a misfortune, whose innocent victim we ought to 
 
THE TRAGIC ART. 
 
 319 
 
 compassionate, fills our soul with abhorrence. The 
 tragic poet will always mar the perfection of his work, 
 if he cannot succeed without introducing a villain, 
 and if he is compelled to deduce greatness of suffering 
 from greatness of crime. Shakspeare's Iago and Lady 
 Macbeth, Cleopatra in Roxolana, Franz Moor in the 
 Robbers, testify for this assertion. A poet, who un- 
 derstands his true interest, will not let misfortune de- 
 pend upon an evil will which meditates misfortune, nor 
 still less upon a deficiency of intellect, but upon the 
 stress of circumstances. If it does not result from 
 moral sources, but from external things, which neither 
 have a will nor are subject to one, our compassion is 
 purer, and, at least, is not weakened by any representa- 
 tion of moral incongruity. But then the sympathizing 
 spectator is not exempt from the unpleasant feeling of 
 an incongruity in nature, which in this case moral 
 conformity alone can save. Compassion mounts to a 
 degree much higher, if its objects are both him who 
 suffers and him who originates the suffering. This 
 can occur only if the latter excites neither our hatred 
 nor our contempt, but has been brought against his in- 
 clination, to become the author of misfortune. Thus 
 it is a preeminent beauty in the German Iphigenia, 
 that the king of Taurus, the only one who opposes the 
 wishes of Orestes and his sister, never forfeits our re- 
 gard, and even extorts love from us at last. 
 
 This species of the affecting is yet surpassed by that 
 in which the cause of misfortune is not only not contra- 
 dictory to morality, but is only possible through moral- 
 
320 
 
 THE TRAGIC ART. 
 
 ity, and where the reciprocal suffering only results 
 from the representation of the suffering awakened. Of 
 this kind is the situation of Chimenen and Roderic, in 
 the Cid of Peter Corneille : unquestionably, as regards 
 the complication of events, the master-piece of the 
 tragic stage. Honor and filial duty arm Roderic's 
 hand against the father of his beloved, and bravery 
 gives him the victory ; honor and filial duty arouse 
 against him a fearful accuser and persecutor in Chime- 
 nen, the daughter of the slain. Both act against their 
 inclination, which shrinks from the misfortune of the 
 persecuted object, with an anxiety equal to the zeal 
 with which moral duty causes it to summon this mis- 
 fortune. Then both win our highest regard, because 
 they fulfil a moral duty at the cost of inclination, both 
 inflame our compassion to the highest degree, because 
 they surfer voluntarily, and from a motive which ren- 
 ders them highly estimable. Here then our compas- 
 sion is so little disturbed by contrary feelings, that it 
 rather burns with twofold intensity ; and our sympa- 
 thetic pleasure can still be sobered by a shade of sad- 
 ness, only through the impossibility of reconciling the 
 idea of adversity with the greatest worthiness for pros- 
 perity. Yet, however much may be gained in the fact 
 that our displeasure at this incongruity concerns no 
 moral being, but takes the most harmless direction, 
 and is turned against necessity, it is all counterbalanced 
 by that blind subjection to destiny, which is always so 
 humiliating and mortifying to free, self-determining 
 beings. It is this which still leaves something to be 
 
THE TRAGIC ART. 321 
 
 desired even in the admirable pieces of the Grecian 
 stage, because in all of these a final appeal is made to 
 necessity, and a knot is always left undone for our 
 reason, which is wont to demand that there should be 
 reason. But this too is loosed, and with it every 
 shadow of displeasure vanishes, when man has attained 
 the last and highest point of his moral culture, the one 
 to which the emotive Art can raise him. This hap- 
 pens, if this dissatisfaction with destiny falls away and 
 is merged in a conjecture, or rather, in a distinct con- 
 sciousness of a teleological connection of things, of an 
 elevated order, of a beneficent Will. Then, the re- 
 freshing representation of complete design in the great 
 whole of nature, is united with our enjoyment at the 
 perception of moral harmony ; and the apparent vio- 
 lation of the former, which moved us to sorrow in the 
 single case, becomes only an incentive for our reason 
 to search in universal laws for a vindication of this 
 special case, and to dissolve the single discord in the 
 great harmony. Grecian Art never mounted to this 
 pure height of tragic emotion, because neither the pop- 
 ular religion nor even the philosophy of the Greeks had 
 matured them for such an effort. It is reserved for 
 modern art, which enjoys the advantage of receiving a 
 purer material from an enlightened philosophy, to fulfil 
 this lofty demand, and thus to unfold the whole moral 
 dignity of Art. If we must really despair of ever re- 
 storing Grecian Art, because the philosophic genius 
 of the age and modern culture are unfavorable to po- 
 etry, yet they operate less detrimentally for the Tragic 
 21 
 
322 
 
 THE TRAGIC ART. 
 
 Art, which is more secure upon a moral base. Per- 
 haps our culture compensates that special art for the 
 robbery which it has committed upon Art in general. 
 
 As the force of tragic emotion is weakened by the 
 introduction of disagreeable representations and feel- 
 ings, and the pleasure it produces is thereby diminished, 
 so, on the other hand, by approximating too closely to 
 the original emotion, it may deviate to a point where 
 the grief will preponderate. It has been remarked, 
 that displeasure during emotion originates from the re- 
 lation of its object to our sensuousness, and pleasure 
 from the relation of the emotion itself to our moral 
 sense. Then there is presupposed a definite proportion 
 between our sensuousness and our morality, which de- 
 termines the proportion of displeasure to pleasure dur- 
 ing mournful emotions, and which can neither be alter- 
 ed or reversed, without also reversing the feelings of 
 pleasure and displeasure in emotion, or changing each 
 to its opposite. The more actively sensuousness reigns 
 in our dispositions, the weaker will be the influence of 
 the moral sense, and inversely, the more power the 
 former loses, the more strength the latter wins. Then 
 that which gives a preponderance to the sensuousness 
 in our dispositions, must necessarily, from the constraint 
 which it imposes upon the moral sense, diminish our 
 enjoyment in emotions, which results only from this 
 moral sense : likewise all that gives an impulse to the 
 latter in our minds, disarms grief of its sting, even in 
 cases of original emotion. But our sensuousness ac- 
 tually acquires this preponderance, if the representa- 
 
THE TRAGIC ART. 
 
 323 
 
 lions of sorrow rise to such a degree of vivacity, as to 
 make it impossible for us to distinguish the communi- 
 cated from an original emotion, our own Me from the 
 subject of the suffering, or truth from fiction. It also 
 acquires this preponderance, if it is favored by an ac- 
 cumulation of its objects, and by the delusive light 
 which an excited imagination throws around them. 
 On the other hand, nothing is better suited to refer it 
 back again to its limits, than the cooperation of super- 
 sensuous, moral ideas, upon which, as spiritual points 
 of vantage, the reason may sustain itself in rising out 
 of the dim atmosphere of the feelings into a clearer 
 horizon. Hence the great charm which universal 
 truths or maxims, scattered judiciously through a dra- 
 matic dialogue, have had for all cultivated nations, and 
 hence the almost excessive use to which they were ap- 
 propriated by the Greeks. Nothing is more welcome to 
 a moral disposition, than to be roused from sensuous 
 service to self-activity and to be restored to its free- 
 dom, after a long sustained condition of mere suffer- 
 ing. 
 
 So much for the causes which restrict our compas- 
 sion, and obstruct enjoyment at tragic emotions. The 
 conditions must now be enumerated, under which com- 
 passion is demanded and the pleasure of emotion is 
 most infallibly and strongly aroused. 
 
 All compassion presupposes representations of suf- 
 fering, and its degree of intensity depends upon their 
 liveliness, truth, completeness and duration. 
 
324 
 
 THE TRAGIC ART. 
 
 1. The more lively the representations are, the more 
 decisively the mind is invited to activity, the more its 
 sensuousness is attracted, and then the more power- 
 fully the moral ability is called into opposition. But 
 representations of suffering may subsist in two dif- 
 ferent ways, which are not equally favorable to viva- 
 city of impression. Sufferings which we witness affect 
 us more strongly than those of which we first make ex- 
 perience through narration or description. The former 
 abolish the free play of our imagination, and press to 
 our hearts by the shortest route, as they come into di- 
 rect contact with our sensuousness. In a narration, on 
 the contrary, the particular is first elevated to the uni- 
 versal, from which it is afterward cognized ; then much 
 strength is already withdrawn from the impression by 
 this necessary operation of the intellect. But a feebler 
 impression cannot become undisputed master of the 
 mind ; it will give room for heterogeneous representa- 
 tions to weaken its effect and to distract the attention. 
 The exhibitory narrative also transports us very often 
 from the mental condition of the persons acting into 
 that of the narrator, which interrupts the delusion so 
 necessary for creating compassion. As often as the 
 narrator intrudes in his own person, there arises a ces- 
 sation of the action, and also one unavoidably in our 
 sympathizing emotion ; this occurs, when the dramatic 
 poet forgets himself in the progress of his dialogue, 
 and puts observations into the mouth of the speaker, 
 which only an unconcerned spectator could make. 
 Hardly one of our modern tragedies is free from this 
 
THE TRAGIC ART. 
 
 325 
 
 errof ; yet the French alone have exalted it to a rule. 
 Direct, living presence and embodiment are necessary, 
 then, in order to give to our representations of suffering 
 that vigor, which is requisite to produce a high degree 
 of emotion. 
 
 2. But we can receive the most lively impressions of 
 a suffering, without being brought to a notable degree 
 of compassion, if these impressions are wanting in 
 truth. We must create for ourselves a conception of 
 the suffering in which we should participate ; the re- 
 quisite for this is its agreement with something which 
 existed previously within us. That is to say, the pos- 
 sibility of compassion depends upon the perception or 
 supposition of a likeness between us and the subject of 
 the suffering. Where this likeness can be cognized, 
 compassion is always the necessary result : where it is 
 wanting, compassion is impossible. The greater and 
 the more apparent the likeness, the more lively our 
 compassion is ; the less considerable the former is, 
 the weaker the latter is. If we would feel another's 
 emotion reproduced in ourselves, we must have all the 
 internal conditions for such an emotion, in order that 
 the external causes which gave, by their union, origin 
 to another's emotion, may also exert a like influence 
 upon us. We must be able, without doing violence to 
 ourselves, to exchange our personality with him, to 
 transfer for the moment our own Me into his condition. 
 But how is it possible for us to have perception of an- 
 other's condition, if we have not previously found our- 
 selves in this other person ? 
 
326 
 
 THE TRAGIC ART. 
 
 This likeness covers the whole mental disposition, 
 so far as this is necessary and universal. But univer- 
 sality and necessity are the special characteristics of 
 our moral nature. The sensuous ability can be differ- 
 ently determined by contingent causes ; even our cog- 
 nitive faculty is dependent upon mutable conditions ; 
 our morality alone rests upon itself, and is therefore 
 the best fitted to serve as a safe and universal measure 
 of this likeness. Then we call that representation a 
 true one, which we find to coincide with our form of 
 thought and perception, which already stands in a cer- 
 tain relationship to our own train of thought, and which 
 our mind embraces with facility. If the likeness 
 touches our mental peculiarity, our particular deter- 
 minations of general human character, which may be 
 abstracted without detriment to this general character, 
 then that representation is true only for us. But if it 
 touches the universal and essential Form which we at- 
 tribute to the whole race, it is to be regarded as object- 
 ively true. The sentence of the first Brutus, the sui- 
 cide of Cato, had a subjective truth for the Romans. 
 The representations and feelings from which the ac- 
 tions of both those men resulted, do not directly flow 
 from an universal nature, but mediately from a human 
 nature specially defined. In order to share these feel- 
 ings with them, we must possess a Roman disposition, 
 or at least be able to assume it for a moment. On the 
 contrary, it is only necessary to be men, in order to be 
 thrown into lofty emotion by the heroic sacrifice of a 
 Leonidas, by the quiet submission of an Aristides, by 
 
THE TRAGIC ART. 327 
 
 the voluntary death of a Socrates, or to be affected to 
 tears by the terrible reverse of a Darius. We con- 
 cede an objective truth to such representations, in con- 
 tradistinction to the former, because they coincide with 
 subjective nature, and thereby maintain an universality 
 and necessity just as severe as if they were independent 
 of every subjective condition. 
 
 Finally, the delineation which is subjectively true, 
 is not to be confounded with arbitrary determinations, 
 because it rests upon those that are contingent. The 
 subjectively True also results at last from the universal 
 organization of the human mind, which was specially 
 defined only by special circumstances, both being its 
 necessary conditions. If the decision of Cato could 
 contradict the universal laws of human nature, it would 
 no longer be subjectively true. Representations of the 
 latter kind have a narrower sphere of operation, only 
 because they presuppose other determinations, besides 
 those which are universal. The Tragic Art can em- 
 ploy them with greater intensive effect, by renouncing 
 that which is extensive : still, the unconditioned True, 
 the purely human in human relations, will constantly 
 be its most available material, because therewith the 
 universality of impression is secured, without the need 
 of resigning its strength. 
 
 3. After liveliness and truth in tragic delineations, 
 the third requisite is completeness. The representa- 
 tion must exhaust all that which must be given from 
 without, in order to throw the mind into the designed 
 emotion. If a spectator with disposition ever so Ro- 
 
328 THE TRAGIC ART. 
 
 man, would make the mental condition of Cato his 
 own, if he would appropriate the last decision of the 
 republican, he must find this decision founded not only 
 in the Roman's soul, but also in his circumstances : 
 both his external and internal situation in its whole 
 connection, must be apparent to him, and no single 
 link should fail in the chain of determinations, with 
 which the last decision of the Roman is necessarily 
 connected. The truth itself of a delineation is not gen- 
 erally cognizable without this completeness, for nothing 
 but the similarity of circumstances, which we must 
 completely penetrate, can justify our judgment concern- 
 ing the similarity of perceptions; because the emotion 
 results only from the union of external and internal con- 
 ditions. If we are to decide whether we would have 
 acted as Cato did, we must above all things imagine 
 ourselves in Cato's whole external situation; and not 
 till then are we competent to estimate our perceptions 
 against his own, to plant a conclusion upon the like- 
 ness, and to pass judgment upon its truth. 
 
 This completeness of delineation is only possible 
 through the union of many single representations and 
 perceptions, which are related to each other as cause 
 and effect, and, by combination, complete a totality for 
 our cognition. If these representations would strongly 
 move us, they must all make a direct impression upon 
 our sensuousness, and be induced by a manifested action, 
 since the narrative form always weakens this impres- 
 sion. Then completeness of tragic delineation depends 
 upon a series of single, embodied actions, which league 
 themselves with the tragic action as with a whole. 
 
THE TRAGIC ART. 329 
 
 4. Finally, the representations of suffering must 
 have a prolonged effect upon us, if they would excite a 
 high degree of emotion. We find the emotion into 
 which a foreign suffering transports us, to be a condi- 
 tion of constraint, from which we hasten to liberate 
 ourselves ; and the delusion which is so intolerable for 
 compassion vanishes with too much facility. Then the 
 mind must be forcibly bound to these representations, 
 and be deprived of the liberty of prematurely disengag- 
 ing itself from the delusion. Vivacity of the represen- 
 tations and strength of the impressions which infringe 
 upon our sensuousness, are inadequate for this purpose : 
 for the more violently the susceptiveness is attracted, 
 the more vigorously does the soul's reacting power ex- 
 ert itself to overcome the impression. But the poet 
 who would move us need not weaken this spontaneous 
 power ; for the lofty enjoyment which tragic emotions 
 secure to us, lies in the conflict itself with the suffering 
 sensuousness. Then if the mind, regardless of its re- 
 sisting spontaneity, would remain attached to the per- 
 ceptions of suffering, they must sustain a skilful, peri- 
 odic interruption, and even be relieved by antago- 
 nistic perceptions — in order to recur with augmented 
 strength, and renew the oftener the vivacity of the first 
 impression. The alternation of perceptions is the most 
 powerful remedy of weariness and the effect of habi- 
 tude. This alternation refreshes the exhausted sensu- 
 ousness, and the gradation of the impressions excites 
 the spontaneity to a proportional resistance. It must 
 be incessantly employed in maintaining its freedom 
 
330 THE TRAGIC ART. 
 
 against the stress of sensuousness, but not so as to gain 
 the victory before the climax, still less to succumb in 
 the struggle : else the suffering is at an end in the first 
 case, and the activity in the second, while emotion can 
 only be excited by the union of both. The great secret 
 of the Tragic Art lies in the dexterous management of 
 this conflict ; it there displays itself in its most brilliant 
 light. 
 
 This purpose makes necessary a series of alternating 
 representations, with an appropriate combination of 
 many actions corresponding to these representations, 
 on which the main action, and, through that, the de- 
 signed tragic impression, winds off completely, like a 
 clew from the spindle, and envelops the mind at last as 
 with an unyielding net. The artist, if the figure is 
 here allowable, first gathers thriftily all the single rays 
 of the object which he makes the instrument of his 
 tragic design, and beneath his hands they become as 
 lightning, which inflames all hearts. If the tyro hurls 
 at once and fruitlessly the whole thunderbolt of horror 
 and of fear, the artist attains his purpose step by step, 
 by little strokes, and penetrates the soul completely, 
 just because he moved it gently and by degrees. 
 
 If now we draw results from the previous investiga- 
 tions, we have the following conditions, which lie at 
 the foundation of tragic emotion. First, the object of 
 our compassion must belong to our genus, in the entire 
 sense of this word, and the action in which we are to 
 participate must be a moral one, that is, it must be 
 
THE TRAGIC ART. 
 
 331 
 
 comprehended within the province of freedom. Se- 
 cond, the suffering, its sources and its degrees, must be 
 entirely communicated to us in a succession of com- 
 bined events; and moreover, in the third place, it must 
 be objectively presented, not set forth mediately through 
 description, but directly through action. Art unites and 
 fulfils all these conditions in tragedy. 
 
 Accordingly Tragedy would be poetic imitation of a 
 consistent series of events (a complete action), which 
 shows us men in a condition of suffering, and whose 
 design is the excitement of our compassion. 
 
 It is firstly, imitation of an action : and is dis- 
 tinguished from the other kinds of composition which 
 only narrate or describe, by the conception of imita- 
 tion. In tragedies, single events at the moment of 
 their occurrence are represented as present, before the 
 imagination or before the sense ; and directly present 
 without the mediation of a third power. The epic, 
 the romance, the simple narration remove the action 
 into the distance, by means of their Form, because 
 they interpose the narrator between the acting per- 
 sons and the reader. But the past, the remote weak- 
 ens, as we know, the impression and the emotion of 
 sympathy : the present strengthens it. All narrative 
 forms convert the present into the past : all dramatic 
 forms make the past to be present. 
 
 Secondly, Tragedy is imitation of a series of events, 
 of an action. It is an imitative representation not 
 only of the perceptions and emotions of tragic per- 
 sons, but of the events from which they sprang, and 
 
332 
 
 THE TRAGIC ART. 
 
 which occasioned their development : this distinguishes 
 it from lyrical composition, which, it is true, likewise 
 gives poetic imitations of certain mental conditions, but 
 not of actions. An elegy, a song, an ode, can set forth 
 in imitation the present mental state of the poet, 
 (whether in his own or in an ideal person) as condi- 
 tioned by special circumstances, and in so far they are 
 certainly comprehended under the conception of Trag- 
 edy ; but they do not entirely satisfy its conditions, 
 because they are restricted to representations of feel- 
 ings alone. Other essential distinctions lie in the dif- 
 ferent design of these modes of composition. 
 
 Thirdly, Tragedy is imitation of a complete action. 
 A single occurrence, however tragic it may be, gives 
 as yet no Tragedy. Many events, mutually sustained 
 as cause and effect, must unite themselves appropriately 
 into a whole, if truth — that is, the unison of a repre- 
 sented emotion, character, and the like, with the na- 
 ture of our own souls, which is the only ground of 
 compassion, — would be cognized. If we do not feel 
 that we ourselves would have suffered and acted in the 
 same way, under like circumstances, our sympathy 
 continues dormant. Then it is necessary that we 
 should pursue the represented action through its whole 
 continuity, and see it result from the soul of its origina- 
 tor by a natural gradation, during the joint operation 
 of external circumstances. Such is the rise, progress 
 and completion, before our eyes, of the curiosity of 
 CEdipus, the jealousy of Othello. And in this way 
 alone can the great gulf be filled, which exists between 
 
THE TRAGIC ART. 
 
 333 
 
 the peace of an innocent soul and the conscience-pangs 
 of a criminal, between a fortunate man's proud security 
 and his fearful ruin, — in short, the gulf between the 
 tranquil state of a reader's mind at the commencement 
 of an action, and the stormy excitement of his feelings 
 at its close. 
 
 A series of many cohering incidents is demanded, to 
 excite within us an alternation of mental emotions, 
 which preserves the attention, calls forth all our spirit- 
 ual ability, enlivens the nagging impulse for action, 
 and inflames it all the more by postponing the final sat- 
 isfaction. The mind finds aid against the suffering of 
 sensuousness nowhere but in the moral sense. Then 
 in order to summon the latter more pressingly, the 
 tragic artist must prolong the torments of the former, 
 but at the same time offering to it periodic alleviations 
 in order to make the triumph of the moral sense more 
 difficult and signal. This double process is only pos- 
 sible by means of a series of actions, which are judi- 
 ciously chosen and united for that purpose. 
 
 Fourthly, Tragedy is poetic imitation of a compas- 
 sionable action, and thus differs from historic imitation. 
 It would be the latter, if it pursued a historic design, if 
 it sought to give instruction concerning occurrences 
 and the manner of their occurrence. In this case it 
 would be obliged to confine itself entirely to historic 
 correctness, for its object would be defeated without a 
 true representation of actual events. But Tragedy has 
 a poetic design, that is, it represents an action in order 
 to move, and to delight by the emotion. Then if it 
 
334 
 
 THE TRAGIC ART. 
 
 employs a given material in conformity with this its de- 
 sign, it possesses freedom in imitation : it contains the 
 power, and even the obligation, to subordinate historic 
 truth to the laws of poetry, and to elaborate the given 
 material according to its requisitions. But as it is 
 prepared to attain its design, which is emotion, only 
 under the condition of the greatest harmony with the 
 laws of Nature, it stands, without detriment to its his- 
 toric freedom, under the rigorous law of natural truth, 
 which is called poetic truth in contradistinction from 
 that which is historic. Thus it is plain in what way 
 poetic truth may often suffer from a severe regard for 
 historic truth, and inversely, how poetic truth may gain 
 so much the more by a stupid violation of historic 
 truth. As the tragic poet, and generally every poet, is 
 only subject to the law of poetic truth, the most scru- 
 pulous regard for historic truth can never absolve him 
 from his obligation as a poet, can never serve to excuse 
 a transgression of poetic truth, or a deficiency of inter- 
 est. Hence it betrays very narrow conceptions of the 
 Tragic Art, and of composition in general, to drag the 
 tragic poet before the tribunal of History, and to de- 
 mand instruction from him, who already by virtue of 
 his name is pledged for emotion and delight alone. 
 Then even if the poet himself should have surrendered 
 his artistic privilege by an anxious submission to his- 
 toric truth, thus silently admitting the jurisdiction of 
 History over his product, Art rightfully summons him 
 before its tribunal : and if a Death of Herrmann, a 
 Minona, a Fust von Stromberg, cannot abide the in- 
 
THE TRAGIC ART. 
 
 335 
 
 vestigation, they must be considered very moderate 
 tragedies, with ever so much punctilious attention to 
 costume, and to the character of the age and people. 
 
 Fifthly, Tragedy is imitation of an action which 
 shows us men in the condition of suffering. The ex- 
 pression, men, is nothing less than superfluous, and 
 only serves to denote accurately the limits within which 
 Tragedy is confined in its choice of objects. Our sym- 
 pathy can be aroused only by the suffering of sensuo- 
 moral beings, like ourselves. Then beings which are 
 discharged from all the restraints of morality — as evil 
 spirits are figured in popular superstition or in the 
 poet's imagination — and men, who are like them, — 
 also beings who are free from the constraint of sensu- 
 ousness, as we imagine pure intelligences to be, and 
 men, who have withdrawn themselves from this con- 
 straint to a greater extent than human weakness allows 
 — all these are equally worthless for the purposes of 
 Tragedy. In general the conception of suffering, and 
 of a suffering in which we should participate, al- 
 ready determines that only men, in the full sense of 
 the word, can be the objects of it. A pure intelli- 
 gence cannot suffer, and a human subject who ap- 
 proximates in an unusual degree to this pure intelli- 
 gence, can never excite a great amount of pathos, be- 
 cause his moral nature affords a too prompt protection 
 against the suffering of a weak sensuousness. An en- 
 tirely sensuous subject, without morality, and such na- 
 tures as approach that state, are certainly capable of 
 the most fearful degree of suffering, because their sen- 
 
336 
 
 THE TRAGIC ART. 
 
 suousness has a preponderating influence, but, being 
 sustained by no moral feeling, they become a prey to 
 this pain : and we turn away with displeasure and aver- 
 sion from a suffering which is entirely helpless from an 
 absolute inactivity of the reason. Then the tragic poet 
 justly gives the preference to mixed characters, and his 
 heroic ideal lies at a point equidistant from the aban- 
 doned and the perfect. 
 
 Finally, Tragedy combines all these qualities, in 
 order to arouse the emotion of sympathy. Many of the 
 regulations which the tragic poet makes, are equally 
 applicable to another design, as for instance, one that 
 is moral or historical ; but that he intends precisely 
 the tragic design and no other, frees him from all de- 
 mands which do not coincide with it, but at the same 
 time obliges him to conform to this latter design, in 
 every special application of the above established rules. 
 
 The final ground, to which all rules for a definite 
 mode of composition relate, is called the design of this 
 mode : the combination of means whereby a mode of 
 composition attains its design, is called its Form. 
 Then Design and Form stand to each other in the 
 closest relation. The latter is determined, and pre- 
 scribed as necessary, by the former ; and the fulfilled 
 design will be the result of a felicitously regarded 
 form. 
 
 As every mode of composition pursues a design pe- 
 culiar to itself, it will therefore be distinguished from 
 other modes by a peculiar form, for the form is the me- 
 dium through which it attains its design. That which 
 
THE TRAGIC ART. 
 
 337 
 
 it performs distinctively, it must perform by virtue of 
 its distinctive quality. The design of Tragedy is, 
 Emotion ; its form, imitation of an action inducing 
 suffering. Many modes of composition can have, in 
 common with Tragedy, the same action for its object. 
 Many modes can pursue that which is the design of 
 Tragedy, Emotion, although not as their main design. 
 Then that which is distinctive in Tragedy consists in 
 the relation of the form to the design, that is, in the 
 manner in which it uses its object with respect to its 
 design, the way in which it attains its design through 
 its object. 
 
 If it is the design of Tragedy to excite compassion- 
 ate emotion, but if its form is the medium through 
 which it attains this design, imitation of a moving ac- 
 tion must be the continent (Inbegriff) of all the con- 
 ditions under which the compassionating emotion is 
 most strongly excited. 
 
 The product of a mode of composition is complete, 
 in which the form peculiar to this mode has been used 
 in the best way for the attainment of its design. Then 
 a Tragedy is complete, in which the tragic form, that 
 is, the imitation of a moving action, has been made 
 most available for the excitement of compassionate 
 emotion. Those Tragedies, then, will be the most 
 complete, in which the excited sympathy is less the 
 effect of the Matter than of the best employed tragic 
 Form. We may regard this as the ideal of Tragedy. 
 
 Many tragedies, in other respects full of lofty poetic 
 beauty, are dramatically faulty, because they do not 
 22 
 
338 
 
 THE TRAGIC ART. 
 
 seek to attain the design of Tragedy by the best appli- 
 cation of tragic form : and others are so, because they 
 attain by the tragic form a design other tharr^tbat of 
 Tragedy. Not a few of our most admired pieces affect 
 us solely on account of the Matter, and we are suffi- 
 ciently generous or careless, to attribute to the bung- 
 ling artist as a mer it this property of the material. With 
 respect to other pieces we seem to forget entirely the 
 purpose for which the poet has collected us together in 
 the theatre; and content to be agreeably entertained 
 by the brilliant play of imagination and wit, we never 
 observe that we leave it with untouched hearts. Should 
 venerable Art, (for such is that which speaks to the 
 divinity within us) commit its case to such arbiters 
 through such champions ? Mediocrity alone is inspired 
 by the contentment of the public, but genius is dis- 
 couraged and disgraced 
 
THE 
 
 PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 The reason, like the heart, has its epochs and its 
 destinies, but its history is more rarely developed. We 
 seem to be satisfied with developing the passions in 
 their extremes, aberrations and consequences, without 
 regarding their intimate connection with the thought- 
 system of the individual. The universal root of moral 
 depravity is a partial and fluctuating philosophy, so 
 much the more dangerous, since it deceives the De- 
 misted reason with a show of legality, truth and con- 
 viction, and is therefore less under the restraint of a 
 native moral sentiment. On the contrary, an enlight- 
 ened understanding elevates even the sentiments — the 
 head must fashion the heart. 
 
 In an epoch like the present, when the simplification 
 and diffusion of reading have so wonderfully increased 
 the thinking community, when the blissful resignation 
 
342 
 
 PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 of ignorance begins to give way to a dawning improve- 
 ment, and only a few are willing to remain stationary 
 where the accidents of birth have cast them, it appears 
 to be not entirely unimportant to watch the roused and 
 progressive reason in certain crises, to adjust certain 
 truths and errors which insinuate themselves into mor- 
 als, and may be respectively the source of happiness 
 and misery, — and at least, to point out the hidden 
 rocks upon which the proud reason has so often suf- 
 fered shipwreck. We seldom arrive at truth except 
 through extremes ; we must first exhaust error — and 
 often madness — before we can attain the radiant goal 
 of peaceful wisdom. 
 
 A few friends, animated with a like ardor for truth 
 and moral beauty, who have arrived at the same per- 
 suasion from very different routes, and now view the 
 travelled path with tranquil looks, have united in a pro- 
 ject to unfold some revolutions and epochs of thought, 
 some excesses of the speculative understanding : and 
 under the fiction of two young men of unequal charac- 
 ters, to give them to the world in the form of a corres- 
 pondence. The following letters are the commence- 
 ment of this experiment. 
 
 Thus opinions which are set forth in these letters, can 
 only be relatively true or false, according as the world 
 is reflected in either soul, and in no other. The pro- 
 gress of the correspondence will demonstrate, how these 
 partial, often exaggerated, often contradictory assertions, 
 will resolve themselves finally into a universal, refined 
 and steadfast form of truth. 
 
PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 343 
 
 Skepticism and free-thinking are the fever-paroxysms 
 of the human spirit, and, even by the unnatural con- 
 vulsions which they cause in well organized minds, 
 must at last promote established health. The more 
 dazzling and seducing the error, the greater triumph 
 for the truth ; the more torturing the doubt, the greater 
 the summons to conviction and settled certainty. But 
 it is necessary to expose this doubt, this error ; know- 
 ledge of the disease must precede the cure. If an im- 
 petuous youth fails to discern the truth, it loses as little 
 as virtue and religion, when the vicious disown them. 
 
 These previous remarks were necessary, in order to 
 specify the point of view, from which we wish the fol- 
 lowing correspondence to be read and judged. 
 
344 
 
 PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 JULIUS TO RAPHAEL. 
 
 In October. 
 
 You have left me, Raphael, and fair Nature disap- 
 pears — the leaves fall yellow from the trees, and a sad 
 Autumn-mist settles like a pall over the exhausted 
 fields. I wander solitary through the melancholy coun- 
 try, calling loudly upon your name, and am vexed that 
 my Raphael does not answer me. 
 
 I had endured your last embraces. The mournful 
 rattling of the carriage which bore you hence, at length 
 had died away. I, so happy, had already raised a be- 
 neficent hillock over the joys of the past, but now you 
 stand anew in these scenes, like a departed spirit, and 
 are present with me again in each favorite spot of our 
 rambles. I have climbed these rocks by your side, 
 and wandered through this boundless field of vision. 
 In the dim sanctuary of these beech trees we first con- 
 ceived the bold ideal of our friendship. It was here 
 that we first opened the ancestral tables of the spirit, 
 and Julius found in Raphael so near a kinsman. There 
 is no fountain, no thicket, no hill, where a memory of 
 vanished bliss does not ever dash athwart my peace. 
 All, all has conspired against my recovery ; for wher- 
 ever I tread, I recall the sad scene of our separation. 
 
 What have you created me, Raphael? What so 
 lately has become of me! Great, dangerous man, 
 
PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 345 
 
 would that I had never known you, or never lost you ! 
 Hasten back upon the wings of love, return, or the 
 tender shoot of your planting is gone. Can your mild 
 spirit venture to leave your attempted work so far from 
 its completion. The ground-pillars of your proud wis- 
 dom totter in my brain and heart, all the splendid pal- 
 aces built by you, fall prostrate, and the bruised worm 
 writhes sorrowfully among the ruins. 
 
 Happy Eden-time, when with blindfold eyes I reeled 
 through life, like one drunken — when every curiosity 
 and wish were bounded by the paternal horizon — 
 when a clear sunset portended for me nothing loftier 
 than a fair auroral morrow — when only a gazette ad- 
 monished me of the world, only the death-knell, of 
 eternity, only spectre tales, of an account beyond the 
 grave — when I still quailed before a spirit of Evil and 
 clung the more affectionately to the Divinity. I felt 
 and was happy. Raphael has taught me to think, and 
 I am in the path to lament my creation. 
 
 Creation 1 — That is only a sound without sense, 
 which my reason cannot admit. There was a time 
 when I was conscious of nothing, when none were con- 
 scious of me 5 so we say, I was not. That time is no 
 more, and so we say that I am created. But we know 
 nothing more of the millions who have appeared for 
 centuries, and yet we say they are. On what do we 
 ground the right to affirm a beginning and deny an 
 end ? We maintain that the cessation of spiritual exist- 
 ence contradicts the infinite goodness. Then did this 
 infinite goodness first originate with the creation of 
 
346 
 
 PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 the world ? If there has been a period when spirits did 
 not exist, was the infinite goodness, even a whole pre- 
 vious eternity, ineffective ? If the fabric of the world 
 is a perfection of the Creator, was his perfection in- 
 complete before the world's creation ? But such a pre- 
 sumption contradicts the idea of the perfected God, then 
 were there no creation — whither, Raphael, have I 
 reasoned myself ? Fearful labyrinth of my conclu- 
 sions ! I reject the Creator, as soon as I believe in a 
 God. Then wherefore do I need a God, if I suffice 
 without a Creator ? 
 
 You have stolen the belief which gave me joy. You 
 have taught me to despise, where once I worshipped. 
 A thousand things were so venerable to me, before 
 your gloomy wisdom exposed them. I saw a throng 
 press church-ward, I heard their inspired devotion 
 unite in fraternal worship — twice I stood by the bed 
 of death, twice saw — the mighty miracle of religion, 
 the hope of heaven victorious over the terrors of anni- 
 hilation, and the fresh beams of joy kindling in the dim 
 eye of the dying. 
 
 Divine, yes divine must the doctrine be, I cried, 
 which the best of men acknowledge, which conquers so 
 mightily, and so wonderfully consoles. Your cold wis- 
 dom quenched my enthusiasm. For you said to me, 
 just as many once thronged around the hermae and the 
 temples of Jupiter, just as many have as cheerfully 
 mounted their funeral-pile in honor of their Brahma. 
 Shall that which you find so odious in paganism, prove 
 the divinity of your doctrine ? 
 
PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 347 
 
 Believe nothing but your own reason, you continued. 
 There is nothing holy but truth. What the reason re- 
 cognizes, is truth. I obeyed you, sacrificed all iny 
 opinions, fired, like that desperate conqueror, all my 
 ships, when I landed on this island, and destroyed all 
 hopes of retreat. I can no longer be reconciled with 
 an opinion which I once derided. My reason is now 
 all to me, my only guarantee for divinity, virtue, im- 
 mortality. Woe to me henceforth, if I find this to be 
 only a surety for denial, if my veneration sinks before 
 its conclusions, if a shattered brain-thread agitates its 
 operations. Henceforth my happiness depends upon 
 the harmonious action of the sensorium. Woe to me, 
 if the strings of this instrument give an uncertain sound 
 in the critical periods of my existence — if my convic- 
 tions flutter with my pulsations ! 
 
 JULIUS TO RAPHAEL. 
 
 Your doctrine has flattered my pride. I was a 
 prisoner — you have led me forth to the day ; the 
 golden light and the illimitable expanse have delighted 
 my eyes. Hitherto I was content with the modest fame 
 of being called a good son of my family, a friend of my 
 friends, a useful member of society ; you have changed 
 me into a citizen of the universe. My desires had 
 
348 
 
 PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 made yet no inroad upon the rights of the great. I 
 tolerated the fortunate, since beggars tolerated me. 
 I blushed not to envy one part of humanity, since a 
 still greater part remained for me to pity. Now I 
 learned for the first time, that my claim to enjoyment 
 was as weighty as that of my brethren. Now I per- 
 ceived that I appropriated a portion of atmosphere no 
 greater or less, than the lords of the earth. Raphael 
 severed every bond of conformity and opinion. I felt 
 myself entirely free ; for the reason, said Raphael to me, 
 is the only monarchy in the world of spirit ; I bore my 
 imperial throne in my brain. All things in heaven and 
 on earth, have no value, no estimation, beyond that 
 conceded by the reason. The whole creation is mine, 
 for I possess an indisputable authority to enjoy it fully. 
 All spirits — one degree lower than the Infinite Spirit 
 
 — are my peers, since we all obey one principle, do 
 homage to one sovereign. 
 
 How elevated and magnificent sounds this annuncia- 
 tion ! What store for my thirst after knowledge ! But 
 
 — unhappy contradiction of Nature — this free, aspir- 
 ing spirit is wound into the inflexible, immutable clock- 
 work of a mortal body, embroiled with its little wants, 
 yoked to its petty destinies, — this god is banished to a 
 world of worms. The vast space of Nature is open to 
 his activity, but he may not entertain two ideas at once. 
 His eyes bear him to the porch-lamp of divinity, but he 
 himself must slowly and painfully creep towards it 
 through the elements of time. To exhaust one enjoy- 
 ment he must renounce all others ; two unlimited de- 
 
PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 349 
 
 sires are too great for his narrow heart. Each newly 
 acquired joy costs him the sum of all the former ones, 
 and the present moment is the sepulchre of all the past. 
 A lover's hour is a pulsation deducted from friendship. 
 
 Wherever I look, Raphael, how confined is man ! 
 How great the distance between his pretensions and 
 their fulfilment ! How enviable his beneficent slumber 
 — wake him not ! He is so happy till he begins to 
 ask, whither he must go, and whence he came. Rea- 
 son is a torch in a dungeon. The prisoner knew no- 
 thing of the light, but a dream of freedom gleamed over 
 him, like a flash in the night, which leaves it all the 
 darker. Our philosophy is the unfortunate curiosity 
 of CEdipus, who never ceased to inquire, till the hide- 
 ous oracle solved itself: 
 
 " Who and whence art thou, never canst thou know ! " 
 
 Does your wisdom recompense me for that of which 
 it has deprived me ? If you had no key to heaven, why 
 should you have forced me from the earth ? If you 
 knew beforehand, that the way to wisdom led through 
 the frightful defiles of doubt, why did you hazard the 
 innocent peace of your Julius upon this doubtful cast ? 
 
 If something bad 
 
 Is lying all too near upon the Good 
 Which I had thought to do, I fain forbear 
 To do the Good. 
 
 You have torn down a hut that was inhabited, and have 
 founded on the place a splendid palace of the dead. 
 
350 PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 Raphael, I demand my soul from you. I am not 
 happy. My courage has gone, and I distrust my own 
 powers. Write to me quickly ! Only your healing 
 hand can pour balm into my burning wound. 
 
 RAPHAEL TO JULIUS. 
 
 Happiness like ours, Julius, without interruption, 
 would be too much for a human lot. This thought of- 
 ten haunted me in the full enjoyment of our friendship. 
 What then embittered my bliss, was a wholesome pre- 
 paration to alleviate my present condition. Having 
 been tempered in the stern school of resignation, I am 
 more alive to the consolation of seeing in our separa- 
 tion an easy sacrifice, wherewith to compensate destiny 
 for the joys of a future union. You never knew till 
 now, what renunciation is. For the first time you 
 suffer. 
 
 And yet perhaps it is for your benefit that I am just 
 now torn from your side. You are afflicted with a dis- 
 ease, from which, in order to be secure from a relapse, 
 you can only recover of yourself. The more forsaken 
 you feel, the more you will call into requisition every 
 remedy within yourself ; the less immediate alleviation 
 you receive from deceitful palliatives, the more surely 
 you will succeed in totally eradicating the evil. 
 
PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 351 
 
 I do not repent of having roused you from your sweet 
 dream, although your present condition is painful. I 
 have done nothing but hasten a crisis, which sooner or 
 later infallibly occurs to such souls as your own, while 
 everything depends upon the period of life in which it 
 is endured. There are situations in which it is fearful 
 to despair of truth and virtue. Woe to him, who has 
 to contend with the subtilties of a refining reason, while 
 still under the dominion of passion. I have fully ex- 
 perienced what that is, and to guard you from such a fate, 
 nothing remained for me but to render this unavoidable 
 contagion harmless by inoculation. 
 
 And what more favorable moment could I choose for 
 it, Julius ? You stood before me in the full vigor of 
 youth, body and spirit in the lordliest prime, oppressed 
 by no cares, fettered by no passion, free and strong, to 
 meet the great conflict whose reward is the noble calm 
 of conviction. Truth and error were not yet woven 
 into your interests. Your enjoyments and virtues were 
 independent of both. You needed no bug-bear to warn 
 you from low excesses. A taste for nobler pleasures 
 had made them odious to you. You were good from in- 
 stinct, from unpolluted moral grace. I had nothing to 
 fear for your morality, if a structure fell, on which it 
 was not founded. And so your misgivings do not 
 alarm me. I know you too well, Julius, whatever a 
 melancholy humor may suggest to you ! 
 
 Ungrateful man! You slander reason, you forget 
 what joys it has already afforded you. Even if you 
 could have avoided during life the perils of skepticism, 
 
352 
 
 PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 it would have been my duty not to have withheld en- 
 joyments from you, of which you were capable and de- 
 serving. The point on which you stood was not wor- 
 thy of you. The path, up which you toiled, compen- 
 sated you for all of which I deprived you. I remember 
 with what transport you blessed the moment when the 
 scales fell from your eyes. And perhaps that ardor, 
 with which you embraced the truth, has led your all- 
 devouring fancy to an abyss, from which you shrink 
 with horror. 
 
 I must follow the track of your inquiries, in order 
 to discover the source of your complaints. Once you 
 wrote down the result of your reflections. Send me 
 that paper and then I will answer you. 
 
 JULIUS TO RAPHAEL. 
 
 This morning I have been rummaging my papers, and 
 have recovered a lost essay, composed in those happy 
 hours of my proud enthusiasm. Raphael, how that 
 whole period has changed : like the wooden scaffolding 
 of the stage when the lights are gone. My heart sought 
 for itself a philosophy, and fancy interposed her dreams. 
 That which was warmest was for me the truest. 
 
 I search for the laws of spirit — I strive to reach the 
 
PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 353 
 
 infinite, but I forget to demonstrate that they really 
 exist : and so a bold attack of Materialism overthrows 
 my creation. 
 
 Peruse this fragment, dear Raphael. May you suc- 
 ceed in rekindling the expiring sparks of my enthu- 
 siasm, in reconciling me with my genius — but as for 
 my pride, it has sunk so deeply that even Raphael's ap- 
 probation will hardly raise it again. 
 
 23 
 
354 
 
 PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 THEOSOPHY OF JULIUS. 
 
 WORLD AND MIND. 
 
 The universe is a thought of the Deity. Since this 
 ideal spirit-form has stepped forth into reality and the 
 new-born world has embodied the draught of its maker 
 — pardon me this human representation — it is the 
 business of every thinking being to discover the first 
 outline in this existing whole, the principle of the 
 machine, the unity in the composition ; to search for 
 the law in the phenomenon and to analyze the struc- 
 ture to its ground-plan. Thus I find only a single 
 mode (Erscheinung) in nature, namely, Mind, the 
 thinking essence. The great embodiment which we 
 call World, now remains to me remarkable, only be- 
 cause it is at hand to denote by symbols the manifold 
 expressions of that essence. All within and without 
 me is only a hieroglyph of a power which resembles 
 me. The laws of Nature are the ciphers, which Mind 
 combines, to make itself intelligible to Mind — the al- 
 phabet, by whose means all spirit communicates with 
 the Father of spirits and with itself. Harmony, truth, 
 order, beauty, excellence, give me joy, because they 
 place me in the active condition of their designer, their 
 possessor, because they reveal to me the presence of a 
 
PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 355 
 
 rational, sensible being, and leave me to divine my 
 affinity with that being. A new experience in this 
 kingdom of truth, gravitation, the discovered circulation 
 of the blood, the nature-system of Linnaeus, tell me di- 
 rectly the same as an antique recovered from Hercu- 
 laneum — both give only a reflection of a spirit, a new 
 acquaintance with an existence like my own. I con- 
 verse with the Infinite through the instrument of Na- 
 ture, through universal history : I read the soul of the 
 artist in his Apollo. 
 
 Reason from effect to cause, Raphael, if you would 
 persuade yourself. Every condition of the human 
 soul has somewhere a similitude in the physical crea- 
 tion, whereby it is indicated, and not artists and poets 
 alone, but even the most abstract reasoners, have sup- 
 plied themselves from this rich magazine. Lively ac- 
 tivity we call fire, time is a stream which hurriedly rolls 
 away, eternity is a circle : a secret conceals itself in 
 the midnight, and truth dwells in the sun. I even be- 
 gin to believe, that the future destiny of the human 
 soul lies prophesied in the dark oracle of the material 
 creation. Each coming spring, which attracts the bud- 
 ding plant from the earth's bosom, gives me insight into 
 the sad enigma of death, and confutes my anxious fears 
 of an eternal sleep. The swallow, which we find tor- 
 pid in winter, and see revived in spring, the dead ca- 
 terpillar which lifts itself, renewed as a butterfly, in the 
 air, afford us striking symbols of our immortality. 
 
 How notable does all become to me ! Now, Ra- 
 phael, everything around me is teeming with life. I 
 
356 PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 find no desert in the whole of Nature. Wherever I 
 discover a body, there I suppose a spirit — where I 
 perceive motion, there I divine a thouo-ht. 
 
 o 
 
 Where no dead lie buried, where no resurrection is, 
 
 still the Almighty speaks to me through His works, and 
 so I understand the doctrine of an omnipresent God. 
 
 IDEA. 
 
 All spirits are attracted by perfection. All — with 
 some departures, but no single exception — all strive 
 after the condition in which they have the highest free 
 utterance of their powers, all possess the common im- 
 pulse to extend the sphere of their activity, to absorb 
 all things, to collect and appropriate what they recog- 
 nize as good, as excellent, as attractive. Intuition of 
 the beautiful, the true, the excellent, is a momentary 
 possession of those qualities. We ourselves step into 
 whatever condition we perceive. We are possessors of 
 a virtue, authors of an action, discoverers of a truth, 
 holders of a happiness, at the moment when we enter- 
 tain a conception of them. We ourselves become the 
 object of our perceptions. Do not here confuse me, 
 Raphael, with a dubious sneer; this supposition is the 
 foundation upon which I ground all the subsequent 
 
PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 357 
 
 argument, and we must agree, before I can have the 
 courage to complete my edifice. 
 
 The internal feeling of every one responds to this. 
 If, for example, we admire a deed of magnanimity, valor, 
 wisdom, does not a secret consciousness in our hearts 
 whisper, that we are able to do the like? Does not 
 the deep blush which mantles our cheeks while listen- 
 ing to a history of such, betray that our modesty trem- 
 bles at the consequent admiration — that we are em- 
 barrassed at the praise which the ennobling of our na- 
 tures must acquire for us ? Yes, at such a moment 
 even our bodies harmonize with every motion of the 
 actor, and openly express that our souls have passed 
 over into his condition. When present, Raphael, 
 where a great event was related before a numerous as- 
 sembly, did you never perceive how the narrator him- 
 self expected the incense and absorbed the applause 
 which was offered up to his hero ; and if you were ever 
 the narrator, did you not surprise your heart in this 
 pleasant illusion? You have had examples, Raphael, 
 of the eagerness with which I can quarrel with my 
 bosom friend for the reading of a beautiful narrative 
 or an excellent poem, and my heart would secretly 
 confess, that it only envied you the laurel which passes 
 from the actor to the narrator. A quick and deep art- 
 istic feeling for virtue passes universally as a great dis- 
 position for virtue, as on the contrary one does not 
 hesitate to suspect the heart of a man, whose head 
 comprehends moral beauty slowly and with difficulty. 
 
 Do not object tome, that frequently, through a lively 
 
353 
 
 PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 recognition of a perfection the opposite imperfection 
 discovers itself, that a deep enthusiasm for excellence 
 often seizes even the wicked, that a desire for lofty 
 herculean greatness sometimes animates the weak. I 
 know, for example, that our admired Haller, who so 
 manfully unmasked the cherished inanity of idle rank, 
 to whose philosophical greatness I have paid the tribute 
 of so much veneration, — that even he was unable to 
 refuse the still emptier inanity of a knight's-star, which 
 was an affront to his greatness. I am convinced that 
 in the happy moment of the ideal, the artist, the phi- 
 losopher, and the poet are actually the great and good 
 men whose image they portray ; but with many this 
 ennobling of the spirit is only an unnatural condition, 
 violently induced by a quicker agitation of the blood, 
 a bolder flight of fancy ; but which for that very reason 
 vanishes in haste, like every other enchantment, and de- 
 livers the exhausted heart to the despotic whim of ab- 
 ject passions. The exhausted heart, I say — for an 
 universal experience teaches, that the relapsing sinner 
 is always the more desperate, that the renegades of vir- 
 tue only take a sweeter compensation in the arms of 
 vice for the onerous constraint of repentance. 
 
 I wished to prove, Raphael, that an external condi- 
 tion is our own, if we perceive it ; that perfection be- 
 comes our own at the instant when we create for our- 
 selves a representation of it, that our satisfaction at 
 truth, beauty and virtue finally resolves itself into the 
 consciousness of a personal nobility, a personal enrich- 
 ment ; and I think I have proved it. 
 
P HILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 359 
 
 We have conceptions of the wisdom, goodness and 
 justice of the Most High, but none of his omnipotence. 
 To denote his omnipotence we assist ourselves with 
 the serial representation of three successions ; Nothing, 
 His Will, Something. It is darkness and chaos — 
 God says let there be light, and there is light. If we 
 had a real idea of his active omnipotence, we should be 
 creators, as He is. 
 
 Then every perfection which I perceive, becomes 
 my own — it gives me joy because it is my own, I 
 desire it because I love myself. Perfection in nature 
 is no property of matter, but of spirit. All spirits are 
 happy in their perfection. I desire the happiness of all 
 spirits, because I love myself. The felicity which I 
 imagine, becomes my felicity; therefore it behoves me 
 to awaken these representations, to repeat, to elevate 
 them — it behoves me to diffuse felicity around me. 
 Whatever beauty, whatever excellence, whatever en- 
 joyment I produce externally, I produce internally; 
 whatever I neglect or destroy, I neglect to my own 
 loss : I desire felicity for others, because I desire it for 
 myself. Desire for the felicity of others we call benevo- 
 lence. 
 
360 
 
 PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 LOVE. 
 
 Now, dear Raphael, let me look around. The 
 height is gained, the mist has fallen, I stand as in a 
 blooming landscape, girt by immensity. A purer sun- 
 shine has illuminated all my conceptions. 
 
 Then Love — the fairest phenomenon in the animated 
 creation, the omnipotent magnet in the world of spirit, 
 the source of devotion and the noblest virtue — Love is 
 only the reflection of this single power, an attraction of 
 the excellent, founded on an instantaneous exchange of 
 personality, a reciprocity of being. 
 
 If I hate, I deprive myself of something ; if I love, I 
 am the richer by what I love. Pardon is the recovery 
 of an alienated possession — human hatred a prolonged 
 suicide — selfishness the greatest poverty of a created 
 being. 
 
 When Raphael stole from my last embrace, my soul 
 was rent, and I wept at the loss of my fairer half. On 
 that holy evening — you well remember — when our 
 souls for the first time passionately came in contact, all 
 your great feelings were mine, I laid claim to your ex- 
 cellence through my eternal right of possession alone ; 
 prouder to love you, than to be loved by you, for the 
 first has made me a Raphael. 
 
 Such the powerful impulse of affection, 
 That in gentle stress of sweet connection, 
 
PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 Bound our hearts forever into one ! 
 Raphael, hand in hand with thee ascending, 
 I essay the path that upward tending, 
 
 Melts within the spirit-sun. 
 
 Happy, ah thrice happy ! Have I found thee, 
 Out of millions twined myself around thee. 
 
 And of millions thou alone art mine. 
 Let then Chaos with returning ocean, 
 Dash all atoms in a wild commotion — 
 
 Ever will my heart repose on thine. 
 
 In thine eyes a kindred glance bestowing, 
 See I not my own Elysium glowing ? 
 
 Only do I love myself in thee. 
 Nature decks herself in brighter splendor, 
 And the heaven lying clear and tender, 
 
 Mirrored in my friend I see. 
 
 Gently dries her tears reviving sorrow, 
 Seeking on the breast of love to borrow 
 
 Respite sweet from passion's wave. 
 And the bliss that tortures yet entrances, 
 Raphael, seeks within thy spirit-glances 
 
 Longingly a rapturous grave. 
 
 If alone within creation living, 
 
 Souls to crags my fancy would be giving, 
 
 I would kiss them and embrace. 
 Should I vex the ether with my sighing, 
 All the clefts would cheer me with replying — 
 
 Sympathy is wide as space. 
 
 Love finds no place in the unison of souls, but only 
 in their harmony. I recognize with pleasure my feel- 
 ings again in the mirror of your own, but I devour 
 
362 
 
 PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 with fiery longing the nobler ones, in which I am de- 
 ficient. One principle governs love and friendship. 
 The tender Desdemona loves her Othello for the dan- 
 gers which he has encountered ; the manly Othello 
 loves her for the tears which she shed for him. 
 
 There are moments in life, when we are disposed to 
 press to our bosom every flower and every distant star, 
 every lofty spirit of our divining — an embracing of all 
 nature, as of our beloved. You understand me, Ra- 
 phael. The Divinity is already very near to that man, 
 who has succeeded in collecting all beauty and great- 
 ness, all excellence, both in the small and great of na- 
 ture, and in evolving from this manifoldness the great 
 unity. The whole creation sinks into his personality. 
 If each man loved all men, then every individual would 
 possess the world. 
 
 The philosophy of our times — I fear — contradicts 
 this doctrine. Many of our thinkers have lent them- 
 selves to sneer out of the human soul this heavenly im- 
 pulse, to obliterate the seal of Divinity, and to dissipate 
 this energy, this noble enthusiasm, in the cold, deathly 
 breath of a sordid indifference. In the slavish feeling 
 of their own abasement, they have contracted with 
 Self-love, that dangerous enemy of benevolence, to ex- 
 plain a phenomenon which was too godlike for their 
 narrow hearts. They have woven their comfortless 
 doctrine out of a paltry egoism, and have made their 
 own limitations the unit-measure of the Creator : de- 
 generate slaves, who cry down freedom amid the clank 
 of their fetters. Swift, who has converted the fault of 
 
PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 363 
 
 folly into the infamy of humanity, and first wrote his 
 own name on the pillory which he built for the whole 
 race — Swift himself could not inflict upon human na- 
 ture a wound so deadly as these perilous thinkers, who 
 adorn Self-love with all the display of subtilty and gen- 
 ius, and ennoble it to a system. 
 
 Why should it undervalue the whole race, because a 
 few members happen to despair of its worth ? 
 
 I confess freely, I believe in the reality of a disinter- 
 ested Love. I am lost, if there is none — I give up di- 
 vinity, immortality and virtue. I have no evidence re- 
 maining for these hopes, if I cease to have faith in 
 Love. A spirit who loves himself alone, is an atom 
 floating in the immeasurable void. 
 
 SACRIFICE. 
 
 But love has produced effects which seem to con- 
 tradict its own nature. 
 
 I can imagine, that I increase my own happiness by 
 a sacrifice which I bring to the happiness of another — 
 but what if this sacrifice be my life? And history has 
 examples of such a sacrifice, and I feel deeply that it 
 ought to cost me nothing to die for Raphael's safety. 
 How is it possible, that we consider death a means to 
 
364 
 
 PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 increase the sum of our enjoyments. How can the 
 cessation of my existence consist with the improvement 
 of my being? 
 
 The supposition of an immortality destroys this con- 
 tradiction — but it also defaces forever the lofty grace 
 of this phenomenon. Love forbids regard to a reward- 
 ing future. There must be virtue which suffices even 
 without the thought of immortality, which effects the 
 same sacrifice, even at the peril of annihilation. 
 
 True, it ennobles the human soul to sacrifice present 
 to eternal advantage — it is the highest point of egoism 
 — but egoism and love divide mankind into two very 
 dissimilar classes, whose limits never interfere. Ego- 
 ism erects its centre in itself ; Love plants it beyond it- 
 self, in the axis of the eternal All. Love intends unity : 
 egoism is solitude. Love is the co-ruling citizen of a 
 flourishing republic ; egoism, a despot in a desolate crea- 
 tion. Egoism sows for gratitude, love is willing to 
 reap ingratitude. Love bestows, egoism lends — the 
 same in the sight of the judging truth, whether it lends 
 on the enjoyment of the next moment, or on the pros- 
 pect of a martyr-crown — the same, whether the inter- 
 est falls in this life or in the other. 
 
 Imagine, Raphael, a truth, which will benefit the 
 whole human race to distant centuries — suppose too, 
 this truth condemns its confessor to death, and can 
 only be proved, only be believed, if he dies. Imagine 
 then a man with the clear, embracing sunlight of gen- 
 ius, with the fire-wheel of inspiration, with the whole 
 sublime capacity for Love. Let the perfect ideal of that 
 
PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 great effect rise in his soul — in the hour of dark mis- 
 giving let all the happy ones whom he will make, pass 
 before him — let the present and the future crowd at 
 once into his spirit, — and now answer me, does this 
 man need the reference to another life ? 
 
 The sum of all these feelings will weave themselves 
 into his personality, will flow into one with his Me. 
 He himself is the mankind which he now imagines. 
 It is a body, in which his life hangs like a drop of 
 blood, forgotten and superfluous, — how quickly will 
 he shed it for its safety ! 
 
 GOD. 
 
 Every perfection in the universe is united in God. 
 God and Nature are two Magnitudes, equal to each 
 other. 
 
 The whole sum of harmonious activity, which exists 
 together in the divine Substance, is isolated in Nature, 
 the fac-simile of that Substance, into innumerable 
 grades and measures. Nature (allow me this figurative 
 expression) is an infinitely divided God. 
 
 The divine Me has dispersed itself into numberless 
 sensible substances, as a white beam of light is decom- 
 posed by the prism into seven colored rays. And a di- 
 vine being would be evolved from the union of all these 
 
3G6 
 
 PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 substances, as the seven colored rays dissolve again into 
 the clear light-beam. The existing form of Nature is 
 the optic glass, and all the activities of spirits are only 
 an infinite color-play of that simple divine ray. Should 
 it ever please the Almighty to shatter this prism, then 
 the barrier betwixt himself and the world would fall to 
 ruin, all spirits would disappear into one Infinite spirit, 
 all accords would melt into one harmony, all streams 
 would rest in one ocean. 
 
 The attraction of the elements gave to Nature its 
 material form. The attraction of spirits multiplied and 
 continued to infinity must finally lead to the abolition 
 of that separation, or (may I utter it, Raphael?) create 
 God. Such an attraction is Love. 
 
 Then Love, dear Raphael, is the ladder on which we 
 climb to a likeness unto God. Without assumption 
 and unconsciously, we tend thitherward. 
 
 Lifeless clay -groups are we, if despising — 
 We are gods, if each the other prizing, 
 
 For the sweet constraint of love we pine. 
 Through the ranks of spirits uncreating, 
 Upward rules this impulse unahating, 
 
 Even to the throne divine. 
 
 Hand in hand, with never checked career, 
 From the pagan to the Grecian seer 
 
 Standing next the lowest seraph's place, 
 Wander we in circling dance fraternal, 
 Till within the sea of light eternal 
 
 Sinking, vanish time and space. 
 
PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 367 
 
 Friendless yearned the universal Maker, 
 Framing spirit for His joy's partaker, 
 
 Holy mirror of His holiness ; 
 Yet no equal with the Highest dwelleth, 
 But eternity around Him swelleth 
 
 From the cup of Life's excess. 
 
 Love, Raphael, is the potent arcanum, again to re- 
 store the degraded king of gold from the unsightly 
 chalk, to rescue the eternal from the perishable, and 
 the great oracle of Duration from the destroying brand 
 of Time. 
 
 "What is the sum of all the preceding? 
 
 Let us perceive excellence, and it becomes our own. 
 Let us become intimate with the lofty, ideal Unity, and 
 we shall cling together with fraternal love. Let us plant 
 beauty and joy, and we reap the same. Let us think 
 clearly, and we shall love passionately. Be ye perfect, 
 even as your Father in heaven is perfect, said the 
 Founder of our faith. Weak humanity recoiled at this 
 injunction, therefore he expresses himself more intelli- 
 gibly : love one another. 
 
 Wisdom, with the sunny look, 
 Mighty goddess, cannot hrook 
 Love's triumphant presence ! 
 
 Up the steep and starry road, 
 To the Infinite's abode, 
 
 Who before thee going 
 Boldly rends the veil away, 
 Through the grave lets in the day, 
 
 Heaven to thee showing ? 
 
368 
 
 PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 Thither lured she not at will, 
 Could we be immortal still ? 
 
 Can the angels Godward press, 
 
 Saving through her holiness? 
 Love alone conducts the soul 
 To the Father of the Whole — 
 
 All her might confess. 
 
 Here, Raphael, you have the creed of my reason, a 
 hasty outline of my attempted creation. In such wise 
 have the seeds sprung up, which yourself scattered in 
 my soul. Rejoice or laugh or blush at your pupil, as 
 you please ; but this philosophy has ennobled my heart, 
 and adorned the* perspective of my life. It is possible, 
 dear friend, that the whole frame-work of my conclu- 
 sions has been an unsubstantial vision. The world, as 
 I have here portrayed it, is perhaps nowhere actual but 
 in the brain of your Julius : perhaps after the lapse of 
 the million years of that Judge, on whose seat the 
 promised wiser man sits, I may be ashamed of my raw 
 design at sight of the true original. All this may hap- 
 pen, I expect it ; but then if reality bears no resem- 
 blance to my dreams, it will be a more majestic, a 
 more delightful surprise. Should my ideas indeed be 
 fairer than the ideas of the eternal Creator? What — 
 would He suffer his sublime work of art to fall below 
 the anticipations of a mortal connoisseur ? It is the 
 very ordeal of his great achievement, and the sweetest 
 triumph for the greatest of spirits, that false conclu- 
 sions and illusory perceptions of himself do no harm, 
 that every serpent-fold of the licentious reason at last 
 
PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 369 
 
 strikes into the strait path of eternal truth, that finally 
 the same mouth receives all its lingering tributaries. 
 Raphael, what ideas does that artist awake in me, who, 
 however deformed in a thousand copies, still preserves 
 his identity in all the thousand, and whom even the 
 desecrating hand of a bungler cannot deprive of that 
 homage which is his due. 
 
 Besides, if my statement were entirely false, and 
 what is more, utterly spurious, I am convinced that it 
 must be so necessarily ; and yet it is possible that all 
 results may coincide therewith. Our whole knowledge, 
 as all philosophers agree, consists in a conventional 
 illusion, with which nevertheless the strictest truth may 
 subsist. Our purest conceptions are by no means 
 images of things, but only their necessarily determined 
 and coexisting signs. Neither God, nor the human 
 soul, nor the world are actually that which we consider 
 them. Our ideas of those things are only the endemic 
 forms, through which the planet which we inhabit 
 transmits them to us. Our brain belongs to this planet, 
 consequently also the idioms of our conceptions which 
 lie stored there. But the power of the soul is peculiar, 
 necessary, and ever like itself ; the caprice of the ma- 
 terial through which it expresses itself, does not alter 
 the eternal laws by which that expression is made, so 
 long as this caprice does not contradict itself, so long 
 as the symbol corresponds to the thing symbolized. 
 Just as reflection unfolds the relations of the dioms, 
 these relations must actually exist in the things them- 
 selves. Then truth is no property of the idioms, but of 
 24 
 
370 
 
 PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 the results — not the similarity of the symbol with the 
 thing symbolized, of the conception with the object, 
 but the agreement of this conception with the laws of 
 reflection. In the same way mathematics makes use 
 of figures which exist nowhere but upon paper, and 
 finds by means of them what exists in the actual world. 
 What similarity, for example, have the letters A and B, 
 the signs : and = t -j- and — , with the fact that con- 
 stitutes our result ? And yet the comet, predicted for 
 centuries, advances from the farthest heaven — the ex- 
 pected planet crosses the disk of the sun ! Columbus 
 the world-discoverer, ventures, on the infallibility of his 
 calculation, the hazardous strife with an unexplored 
 ocean, to seek the second half yet wanting to the known 
 hemisphere, the great island Atlantis, wherewith to fill 
 the chasm on his chart. He found it, this island of his 
 paper, and his reckoning was just. Would it have 
 been less so, if a hostile storm had shattered his ships, 
 or driven them back to their port t The human reason 
 makes a similar calculation, if it surveys the supersen- 
 suous with the aid of the sensuous, and applies the 
 mathematics of its results to the physics of the hidden 
 world. But the reckoning still wants its last proof, 
 for no traveller has returned from that land, to recount 
 its discovery. 
 
 Human nature, and each individual, has its own 
 limitations. For the former we will console ourselves 
 reciprocally : the latter will excuse to Raphael the in- 
 experience of his Julius. I am poor in conceptions, a 
 stranger to many sciences which are deemed indispen- 
 
PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 371 
 
 sable to researches of this kind. I have belonged to 
 no philosophical school, and have read few books. It 
 may be, that here and there I substitute my fancies for 
 the stricter deductions of reason, that I sell the free 
 play of my blood, the doubts and needs of my heart, for 
 sober wisdom ; even that, my friend, should not cause 
 me to rue the lost moments. It is actual gain for the 
 universal perfection, it was the foresight of the All-wise 
 spirit, that the wandering reason should people the 
 chaotic land of dreams, and fertilize the barren soil of 
 contradiction. We esteem not only the mechanical 
 artist, who polishes the rough diamond into the gem, 
 but also the other, who ennobles the common stone 
 into the specious dignity of the diamond. Assiduous 
 Form can sometimes cause the massive truth of Matter 
 to be forgotten. Every exercise of reflection, every re- 
 fined subtilty of the spirit, is a slight step towards its 
 perfection — and every perfection must attain existence 
 in the complete world. Reality does not restrict itself 
 to the absolutely necessary, it comprehends also the re- 
 latively necessary; every production of the brain, every 
 tissue of wit, has an inviolable right of citizenship in 
 this higher sense of creation. In the infinite design of 
 nature, no activity need be omitted, no degree of plea- 
 sure be wanting to the universal happiness. The 
 world's great steward, who does not let a mote fall use- 
 less, or a corner remain unpeopled, where there is still 
 room for animate enjoyment, who nourishes asps and 
 spiders with the poisons that are deadly to man, who 
 calls out a growth from the province of corruption, who 
 
372 
 
 PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 dispenses frugally the little buds of rapture which might 
 generate delirium, who finally elaborates vice and folly 
 into excellence, and knew how to weave the great idea 
 of imperial Rome from the lust of Tarquinius Sextus, 
 — this inventive spirit should not reject even error for 
 his great designs, and let this ample world-tract in the 
 human soul lie savage and joyless. Every aptness of 
 the reason, even in error, increases its aptness for the 
 reception of truth. 
 
 Dear friend of my soul, let me constantly add my 
 mite to the vast web of human wisdom. The sun-im- 
 age is painted differently in the dew-drop of the morn- 
 ing and in the majestic mirror of the earth-girdling 
 ocean ! But shame upon the dull and misty morass 
 which never receives and never gives it back ! A 
 million plants drink from the four elements of nature. 
 A store-house stands open for all ; but they mingle and 
 produce their sap in a million different ways. Such 
 fair manifoldness proclaims a rich lord of the house. 
 There are four elements from which all spirits create ; 
 their Me, Nature, God and the Future. All unite and 
 produce in a million different ways, but there is one 
 truth which, like a prime axle, passes through all re- 
 ligions and all systems — " approach the God of your 
 own conceptions." 
 
PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 373 
 
 RAPHAEL TO JULIUS. 
 
 It would be bad, truly, if there were no other way 
 of giving you peace, Julius, than by again restoring to 
 you a belief in the firstling of your reflections. I have 
 found again in your papers, with inward satisfaction, 
 those ideas whose germination I witnessed, They are 
 worthy of a soul like yours, but you cannot and need 
 not remain stationary here. There are joys for every 
 age, and pleasures for each stage of the spirit. 
 
 It must indeed be hard for you to tear yourself from 
 a system which was so entirely adapted to the exigen- 
 cies of your heart. No other, I venture to say, will 
 again take root so deeply within you, and perhaps you 
 only need to be left entirely to yourself, to become 
 sooner or later reconciled again with your favorite 
 ideas. You would soon discover the weak points of 
 opposing systems, and then, with equal indemonstrable- 
 ness, seize the most desirable, or perhaps find new 
 reasons for saving, at least the essential, even at the 
 expense of some bold assertions. 
 
 But all this is not in my plan. You should attain to a 
 higher f reedom of spirit, where you would no longer 
 need such helps. Truly this is not the work of a mo- 
 ment. The usual aim of the earliest culture is subju- 
 gation of the spirit, and of all the tricks of education, 
 this at first almost always succeeds. Even you, with all 
 
374 
 
 PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 the elasticity of your character, appeared destined, 
 more than a thousand others, to a willing submission to 
 the sway of opinions, and this condition of minority 
 would have the longer lasted with you, the less you felt 
 its oppression. Your head and heart are in the closest 
 union. The doctrine becomes estimable to you through 
 the teacher. You soon succeed in discovering its in- 
 teresting side, in exalting it according to the wants of 
 your heart, and in consoling yourself by resignation for 
 those points which must offend you. You despise at- 
 tacks against such opinions, as the malicious revenge 
 of a slavish soul under the rod of its task-master. You 
 paraded your chains, which you thought you bore from 
 free choice. 
 
 Thus I found you, and I saw with grief, how often in 
 the enjoyment of your happiest moments, and in the 
 expression of your noblest powers, you was oppressed 
 by an anxious reference to others. The consequence 
 with which you acted according to your convictions, 
 and your strength of soul which lightened every sacri- 
 fice, were doubled restrictions upon your activity and 
 happiness. I determined at once to frustrate those ig- 
 norant attempts to force a spirit like your own into the 
 mould of a common head. All depended upon making 
 you conscious of the worth of self-reflection, and upon 
 inspiring you with confidence in your own powers. 
 The result of your first essay was favorable to my de- 
 sign. It is true, your imagination was more exercised 
 thereby, than your intellect. Its conjectures made 
 quicker reparation for the loss of your dearest convic- 
 
PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 375 
 
 tions, than you could expect from the snail-pace of cold- 
 blooded inquiry, which advances step by step from the 
 known to the unknown. But this inspiring system 
 gave you the first satisfaction in this new field of ac- 
 tivity, and I was very careful not to disturb a welcome 
 enthusiasm, which the development of your finest 
 traits demanded. Now the scene has changed ; a re- 
 turn to the guardianship of your childhood is forever 
 intercepted. Your way leads onward, and you need 
 no more indulgence. 
 
 It need not surprise you, that a system like your own 
 could not endure the test of a severe criticism. All 
 experiments of this kind, which resemble yours in 
 boldness and extent, have no other fate. Nothing too 
 was more natural, than that your philosophical career 
 should begin with you individually, as with mankind 
 in the mass. The universe was always the first object 
 of human investigation ; and hypotheses concerning its 
 origin and the connection of its parts, had employed 
 the greatest thinkers for centuries, when Socrates called 
 down the philosophy of his age from heaven to earth. 
 But the limits of human wisdom were too narrow for 
 the proud curiosity of his followers. New systems 
 arose from the ruins of the old. The ingenuity of 
 later times ransacked the boundless field of the possi- 
 ble answers to that ever-recurring question concerning 
 the mysterious principle of nature, which no human 
 experience could disclose. Some indeed succeeded in 
 giving the results of their meditations some show of 
 precision, fullness and evidence. There are many 
 
3TC 
 
 PHILOSOPHICAL LETTER? 
 
 juggling arts, by which the vain reason seeks to con- 
 ceal its contusion at not being able, in the extension of 
 its knowledge, to surpass the bounds of human nature. 
 By dissecting a conception into the individual elements, 
 from which it was at first arbitrarily compounded, one 
 easily imagines that he has discovered new truths. A 
 latent presumption soon serves for the first link in a 
 chain of conclusions, whose defects one knows how to 
 conceal craftily ; and the surreptitious inferences are 
 admired as lofty wisdom. One soon amasses partial 
 data, in order to found a hypothesis, being silent about 
 the opposing phenomena : or one changes the signifi- 
 cation of words to suit the wants of the syllogism. 
 And these are not mere artifices of the philosophical 
 charlatan, in order to deceive his public ; but even the 
 most honest, impartial inquirer often uses unconscious- 
 ly the same means, to quiet his thirst for knowledge, 
 as soon as he has once transgressed the sphere, in 
 which alone his reason can enjoy its activity with cer- 
 tainty of success. 
 
 These intimations must not a little surprise you. Ju- 
 lius, after what you have once heard from me. And 
 yet they are not the products of a skeptical caprice. I 
 can render you an account of the grounds on which 
 they rest, but I should have to premise with a some- 
 what dry discussion of the nature of human cognition, 
 which I rather defer to a time when it might better 
 meet your wants. You are not yet in a frame of mind to 
 be interested with the humbling truths concerning the 
 limits of human wisdom. Inquire first into the system 
 
PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 377 
 
 which conflicts with your own ; examine it with equal 
 impartiality and rigor, and proceed in like manner 
 with other theories, with which you have lately become 
 acquainted. And if none of all your demands are per- 
 fectly satisfied, then the question will occur to you, 
 whether these demands were actually legitimate. 
 
 "A sorry consolation," will you say: "is resigna- 
 tion, then, my only prospect after so many glowing 
 hopes ? Was it worth while to invite me to the full ex- 
 ercise of my reason, only to restrain it exactly where it 
 began to be most available to me ? Must I then learn 
 to know a higher enjoyment, only to feel the more pain- 
 fully my confinement ? " 
 
 And yet it is just this disheartening feeling under 
 which I would so readily oppress you. To remove 
 everything which hinders your full enjoyment of your 
 being, to quicken in you the germ of every lofty inspi- 
 ration — the consciousness of your soul's nobility — 
 this is my aim. You are roused from the slumber in- 
 to which you were rocked by subservience to foreign 
 opinions; but you will never fulfil the measure of 
 greatness for which you are destined, if you spend your 
 strength in striving after an unattainable goal. This 
 state of things might last till now, and was too one 
 natural result of your newly acquired freedom. The 
 ideas which hitherto have most occupied you, must ne- 
 cessarily have given the first directions to your spirit's 
 activity ; and your own experience would have taught 
 you sooner or later, whether this was, of all possible 
 ones, the most fruitful. My business was only to ac- 
 celerate, if possible, this period. 
 
378 
 
 PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 It is a common prejudice, to estimate the greatness 
 of the man according to the matter on which he is em- 
 ployed, not according to the manner in which he elabo- 
 rates it. But a higher being certainly honors the 
 stamp of completion even in the smallest sphere, while 
 on the contrary he looks down in pity upon the vain 
 attempt to comprehend with insect-glance the universe. 
 Among all the ideas that are contained in your essay, 
 I can least allow the position, that it is the highest des- 
 tiny of man to divine the spirit of the Creator in his 
 works. It is true, I know no nobler form for the ac- 
 tivity of the most perfect being, than Art. But you 
 seem to have overlooked an important difference. The 
 universe is no mere embodiment of an ideal, like the 
 completed work of a human artist. The latter rules 
 despotically over the dead matter which he uses for the 
 representation of his ideas. But in the work of divine 
 art, the peculiar value of each of its element is preserv- 
 ed, and that sustaining glance which He vouchsafes to 
 each germ of energy, even in the smallest creature, 
 glorifies the Master as much as the harmony of the 
 boundless whole. Life and Freedom, in the greatest 
 possible extent, is the seal of divine creation. It is 
 never more sublime, than where its ideal seems most 
 to be deficient. But in our present limitations we can- 
 not embrace this loftier perfection. We survey too 
 small a part of the universe, and our ear cannot detect 
 the ultimate chord of its vast crowd of dissonances. 
 Each step which we mount in the scale of being, will 
 make us more susceptible for this scientific pleasure, 
 
PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS. 
 
 379 
 
 but even then it possesses value only as a means, only 
 so far as it inspires us with a like activity. Idle as- 
 tonishment at some far distant greatness can never pos- 
 sess a lofty merit. Neither material for his agency, 
 nor power, can be wanting to the nobler man, to be- 
 come himself a Creator in his own sphere. And this 
 vocation is yours also, Julius. Once discern this fact, 
 and you will never again mourn over the barriers, 
 which your thirst for knowledge cannot surpass. 
 
 And this is the period which I await, in order to see 
 you completely reconciled with me. The extent of 
 your powers must first be fully recognized by you, be- 
 fore you can estimate the value of their freest utterance. 
 Till then be still angry with me, only distrust not your- 
 self. 
 
 THE END. 
 
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 253 
 
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