Chapter 5

[34]Simply as a physical object.

[35]That of symbolic architecture.

[36]Als Momente eines Subjektes.That is as the constituent parts of the mind of one individual.

[37]Herod. I,c.181.

[38]I,c.98.

[39]I, p. 469.

[40]As in obelisks, Memnons, etc.

[41]II,c.162.

[42]c.106.

[43]Symb. (2nd ed.), p. 469. The solar city of Heliopolis.

[44]XXXVI, 14, and XXXVII, 8.

[45]Creutzer I, p. 778.

[46]"History of Architecture," vol. I, p. 69.

[47]Wandungen.I presume this refers to every kind of subdivision no less than boundary walls.

[48]Pracktgewänden.Presumably this refers to the isolated structures in which the columns are built—having flat surfaces like walls.

[49]Balken.The word would suggest perhaps that Hegel means here beams of any kind.

[50]II,c.155.

[51]Her. II,c.108.

[52]Herodotus dwells on this in the above passage.

[53]II,c.148.

[54]Commentators of Herodotus point out that we have no direct evidence here of their number, which, comparing this with Strabo's account, is doubtful, and still more so the number of the chambers (οἱκήματα). Strabo says there were twenty-seven courts. The connection between the halls was not an architectural one but by means of the chambers and colonnades (παστάδες). See Blakesley's notes, vol. I, pp. 279-80. Neither from Herodotus nor Hegel is it very easy to form a clear notion of the building.

[55]"History of Ancient Building," vol. I, p. 75.

[56]XXXVI, 19.

[57]Ein Individuelles.Lit., An individual entity.

[58]The relative pronoun refers to the separation of both aspects.

[59]II,c.126-7.

[60]Her. II,c.125.

[61]Geschichte der Baukunst der Alten, I, S. 55.

[62]Symbolical significance.

[63]Wolff's and Buttmann's Mus., B. I, p. 536.

[64]Hegel uses the coined wordosirirtI presume in this sense.

[65]Abstraction.Abstract in the sense of possessing no ideal complexity.

[66]Verständig.Comes under the categories of the Understanding.

[67]Lit., "Find the element that is congenial."

[68]That is, the principle of geometrical design and that of organic structure.

[69]That is the beauty and the ulterior aim of utility.

[70]Verständig.See note above.

[71]The sphere of mechanical gravity.

[72]I presumeAufwandemeans expense here; it would be more reasonable perhaps to say "waste of room," columns being only too often so much more expensive for their size.

[73]That is, the free treatment of line under scientific forms of abstraction rather than limited to specific modes of organic form in Nature.

[74]Der Verständigen Gesetzmässigkeit.The principle of scientific architecture.

[75]Immediate imitation, that is.

[76]Of classical art.

[77]Symbol des Innern.

[78]That is, apart from the classical type.

[79]That is, the scientific reason of abstract principle or rule.

[80]Weil beim Oblongum in der Gleichheit und Ungleichheit ist.That is, more pleasure is derived from contrast than mere similarity. He then qualifies or explains the general principle.

[81]Eurhythmie, that is, eurhythmy or a rhythmic movement between the several parts.

[82]I presume this is the meaning ofdie Theoriehere. That is the purposeful motive of the architectural skeleton of the fabric—what explains it rationally.

[83]Schiebens.It is possible that Hegel uses the word in its primary sense of "shifting."

[84]The idea is slightly confused in the course of the sentence. It is not the necessity (des Bedürfnisses) to build a stable house which has to be held in position, etc., but the structure which that necessity forces men to construct in a certain way.

[85]Ihre eigenen Momente."Its unique traits" is possibly adequate here.

[86]Hegel probably has in his mind when using the expressionverständig bestimmtethe close analogy between the self-exclusive concreteness of reason and the completeness of the circular figure.

[87]It is not quite clear what Hegel means by theKöpfen der Deckenbalken.The technical word that corresponds toDeckenbalkenis "joists"; here, according to the words that follow, it would appear to mean either the last horizontal line of the architrave or the entire growth of the triglyph. As he uses the wordZwischenraümenafter we appear to be driven on the latter alternative. The frieze, of course, was the entire space between cornice and architrave, including both triglyphs and metopes.

[88]Calledfemora.They were divided by two gutters or drills. The triglyph slightly projected and united perpendicularly cornice and architrave.

[89]Die Baukunst nach den Grunds. der Alten, Berlin, 1808, S. III.

[90]He means that the distinct functions are not assigned to those features of the building to which they are naturally or most essentially related.

[91]Hirt,Geschichte der Baukunst, III, S. 14-18, and II, S. 151.

[92]He refers to the columns placed round.

[93]Gesch. d. Bauk.I, S. 251.

[94]BysebstständigHegel means apparently that there must be nothing in their external form that would divert attention from their essential character.

[95]Auf dem Unterbau.I presume this means generally that portion beneath the ground.

[96]I presume what is meant is that in one case the drills or grooves are hollowed in round shape and towards the base in square shape.

[97]What is precisely meant by the expressiondurch prismatische EinschnitteI frankly do not know. The expressionBalkenis evidently used to mark the association between the slabs of stone and beams or rafters.

[98]That is, the spaces between the lower part of the cornice and the uppermost slab of the entablature.

[99]Thecoussinetis that part of the Ionic capital between the abacus and quarter round, which serves to form the volute. There are four volutes or spiral scrolls in the Ionic capital.

[100]Themutuleis the projecting block worked under the corona of the Doric cornice.

[101]Hirt,Gesch. der Baukunst, I, S. 254.

[102]This must, I think, refer to the main moulding of the architrave immediately resting on the column.

[103]Seneca, Ep. 90.

[104]Lit., "Is raised to infinitude."

[105]As it is, for example, by Greek capitals.

[106]Lit., "In its penetration into the most spiritual (innerste, ideal) particularity."

[107]Sich verselbstständigen.Hegel means that the main purpose of the exterior is expressed on the face of it.

[108]I presume the wordDurchbrechenis here used in its specific architectural sense.

[109]Ein Malen.

[110]Keine in sich seyende Seele.I presume Hegel means that being an artificial fragment of Nature's landscape it lacks the infinite horizon and the living relation to the whole.

Over against the inorganic nature of Spirit, in the form we find given it by art in architecture, Spirit opposes itself directly in the sense that the work of art receives and displays spirituality as its actual content. The necessity of this advance we have already adverted to. It underlies the notion of Mind, which differentiates itself under the twofold aspect of subjective self-substantive[111]existence and pure objectivity. In this latter form of externality the ideal substance, it is true, makes its appearance by virtue of the architectonic treatment; such, however, does not amount to a complete transfusion of the objective material, or a conversion of it into an entirely adequate expression of Spirit (Mind), such as suffers it, and only it, to appear. Consequently art withdraws itself from the inorganic realm, which architecture, under its yoke of the laws of gravity, has striven to bring nearer as a means of Spirit's expression, to that of the Ideal, which forthwith then independently asserts itself in its more lofty truth without this intermingling with what is inorganic. It is during this, return passage of Spirit to its own native realm[112]from out of the world of masses and material substance that we come acrosssculpture.

The first stage, however, in this new sphere is, as yet, nowithdrawal of mind into the completelyidealworld of subjective consciousness[113], so that the representation of what is of Spirit would require what is itself a purely ideal mode of expression. Rather Spirit grasps itself, in the first instance, only in so far as it is still expressed inbodilyshape, and therein possesses its homogeneous and determinate existence. The art which accepts for its content this attitude to the possessions of Spirit will consequently have, as its due function, to clothe spiritual individuality as a manifestation undermaterialconditions, and we may add, in what is actually material to the senses. For discourse and speech are also indications[114]which Spirit assumes under the form of externality, but they belong to a mode of objectivity, which, instead of possessing the attributes we attach to matter in its immediate and concrete sense, is merely as tone, motion, the undulation of an entire body and the rarified element, the atmosphere, a communication of such Spirit. What I call immediate corporeality, on the contrary, is the spatial mode of material substance such as stone, wood, metal, or clay, wholly spatial in all three dimensions. The form, however, which is adequate to Spirit is, as we have already seen, the unique bodily form which belongs to it; and it is through this that sculpture makes what is of Spirit actual in a whole which is subject to the spatial condition.

From this point of view sculpture stands on the same plane asarchitecture[115]to the extent, namely, that it gives form to the sensuous material as such, or what is material according itsspatialcondition as matter. It is, however, to a like extent distinguishable from architecture by virtue of the fact that it does not work up the inorganic substance, as the opposite of Spirit, into an environment created by Spirit and endowed with its purpose in forms to which a purpose is attached which is exterior to it; rather it sets before us spirituality itself in the bodily shape which,from the standpoint of the notion, is adequate to Spirit and its individuality. In other words its efficient function and independent self-subsistency brings indivisibly before our sight both aspects, body and spirit, as one whole. The configuration of sculpture, therefore, breaks away from the specific function of architecture, which is to serve Spirit merely as an external Nature and environment, and assumes a really independent position. Despite, however, this separation the image of sculpture remains in essential relation to its environment. A statue or group, and yet more a relief, cannot be made without considering the place in which such a work of art is to be situated. One ought not first to complete a work of sculpture and then consider where it is likely to be put, but it should in the very conception of it be associated with a definite exterior world, and its spatial form and local position. In this respect sculpture retains a specific relation to the architectural aspect of space. For the primary object of statues is that of being temple images and being set up in the shrine of the sanctuary, just as in Christian churches painting supplies images for the altar, and Gothic architecture also attests a similar connection between works of sculpture and their local position. Temples and churches, however, are not the only place for statues, groups of statuary and reliefs. In a similar way halls, staircases, gardens, public squares, doors, single columns and arches of triumph receive an animation from the forms of sculpture; and every statue, even though placed in dissociation from such a wider environment, requires a pedestal of its own to mark its local position and base. And here we must conclude what we have to say as to the association of sculpture with or distinction from architecture.

If we further compare sculpture with the other arts we shall find that it is more especiallypoetryandpaintingwhich will engage our attention. Small statues no less than groups present to us the spiritual form in complete bodily shape, man, in short, as he exists. Sculpture therefore appears to possess the truest means of representing what is spiritual, whereas both painting and poetry have the contrary appearance of being more remote from Nature for the reason that painting makes use of the mere surface instead of the sensuous totality of the spatial condition, which ahuman form and all other natural things actually assume; speech, too, to a still less degree, expresses the reality of body, being merely able to transmit ideas of the same by means of tone.

However, the truth of the matter is precisely the reverse of this. For although the image of sculpture appears no doubt to possess from the start the natural form as it stands, it is just this externality of body and nature reproduced in gross material which is not the nature of Spirit as such. If we regard the essential character of it its peculiar existence is that expressed by means of speech, acts, and affairs which develop its ideal or soul-life, and disclose its true existence.

In this respect sculpture has to yield the place of honour and pre-eminently when contrasted withpoetry.No doubt clarity of outline[116]is superior in the plastic arts, in which the bodily presence is placed before our sight, but poetry too can describe the exterior figure of a man, such as his hair, forehead, cheeks, size, dress, pose and so forth, though of course not with the precision and sufficiency of sculpture. What it loses, however, in this respect is made up by the imagination, which, moreover, does not require for the mere conception of an object such a fixed and definite outline, and before everything else brings before us man in hisaction, with all his motives, developments of fortune and circumstance, with all his emotions, discourses, everything that discovers the soul-life or throws light on external incidents. This sculpture is either wholly unable to do, or only in a very incomplete way for the reason that it neither can present to us the individual soul[117]in its particular inward life and passion, nor as poetry a sequence of expressed results, but only offer us the general characteristics of individuality, so far as the body expresses such, and whatever happens together in one particular moment of time, and this too in a state of repose without the progressive action of real life. In these respects, too, it is inferior to painting. For the expression of spiritual life receives in painting an emphatically more defined accuracy and vitality by means of the colour given to the human face and its light andshadow, not merely in the sense in which it satisfies generally the material substance of nature, but pre-eminently in the way it expresses physiognomy and the phenomena of emotion. It is possible, therefore, at first to entertain the view that sculpture requires merely for its greater perfection to associate the further advantages of painting with that itself possesses in the spatial totality, and to regard it as a mere act of caprice that it has made up its mind to dispense with the palette of the painter, or, as indicating a poverty and incapacity of its execution, that it entirely restricts its effort to one aspect of reality, namely, that of the material form, and withdraws its attention from that, much as the silhouette and the engraving may be set down as mere makeshifts[118]. We are, however, not warranted in thus applying such a term as "caprice" to genuine art. The form such as it is in the object of sculpture, remains in fact merely anabstractaspect of the concrete human bodily presence. Its presentments receive no variety from particularized colours and movements. This is, however, no defect due to accident, but a limitation of material and manner of presentment itself pre-supposed in the notion of art. For Art is a product of mind, and we may add of the more exalted and thoughtful mind. A work of this order claims as its object a content of this defined character, and consequently implies a mode of artistic realization which excludes other aspects. We have here a process similar to that observed in the different sciences where we find, for example, geometry exclusively adopts space as its object, jurisprudence law, philosophy the explication of the eternal Idea and its determinate existence and self-identity in the facts of experience, wherein each of the above mentioned sciences develops these objects by differentiation out of their differences, without one of them actually presenting to consciousness in its completeness that which we are accustomed in ordinary modes of thought to call concrete real existence.

Art then, as a creative informing activity of spiritual origination, proceeds step by step, and separates that which in the notion, in the nature of the thing, albeit not in its determinate existence, is separated. It retains such stagesconsequently in their self-exclusive finity, in order to elaborate them according to their distinct peculiarities. And what contributes to this notional distinction and exclusive separation in the spatial material substance, which constitutes the element of the plastic art is corporeality in its aspect of spatial totality and its abstract configuration, in other words bodily form simply, and the more detailed particularization of the same relatively to the variety of itscolorization.We find at this first stage the art of sculpture so placed relatively to the human form, which it treats as a stereo-metric body, merely, that is, according to form which it possesses in the three spatial dimensions. The work of art, whose process is in and through the sensuous material, must no doubt have an existence for another[119], with which forthwith the particularization commences. The primary art, however, which is concerned with the human bodily form as an expression of spiritual life, only proceeds so far in this "being for another" to the point of its first, or rather the still universal mode of Nature's own existence, that is to the point of mere visibility and existence in light generally, without uniting with the same in its presentment the relation of the latter to darkness, in which that which is visible is particularized in its own medium[120]and becomes colour. And the art occupying such a position is that of sculpture. For plastic art, which is unable as poetry to bring together the totality of the phenomenon in one equal element or world of idea, inevitably breaks up this totality[121].

For this reason we get on the one handobjectivity, which in so far as it is not the unique configuration of spirit, stands over against it as inorganic Nature. It is this relation of bare objectivity which converts architecture into a mere suggestive symbol, which does not possess its spiritual significance in itself. The point of extreme contrast to objectivity as such issubjectivity, that is the soul[122], emotional life in the entire range of all its particular movements, moods,passions, exterior and interior agitations and actions. Between these two we are confronted with the spiritual individuality which no doubt has a definite structure, but which is not as yet deepened to the extent of the essential ideality of the individual soul; in which, instead of the full personal singularity, the substantive universality of Spirit and its objects and characteristic traits is the prevailing factor. In its generality it is not as yet absolutely withdrawn into its own exclusive domain to the point of purely spiritual unity; rather it comes before us as this midway point[123]still hailing from the objective side, that is the side of inorganic Nature, and consequently even carries as part of itself corporeality, as the particular form of existence appropriate to spirit, in the body that not merely is its own, but also discloses it. In this mode of externality, which no longer remains something simply opposed to what is ideal, spiritual individuality has now to be displayed, not, however, as living form, that is to say as corporeality continuously referred back to the point of unity implied in the singularity of spiritual life, but rather as form set forth and manifested in its external guise, into the mould of which Spirit has no doubt been poured, without, however, being from this outward bond of association, made visible in the sense that it is so when it withdraws into its own essential and ideal domain[124].

From the above observations the two points to which we have already drawn attention become more clear, namely, first, that sculpture makes use of the human form directly, which is the actual existence of spiritual life, instead of accepting a mode of expression which is symbolical with a view to promoting the spiritual import of modes of appearance that are merelysuggestive.At the same time, secondly, it is content, as the manifestation of that mode of subjectivity which does not express emotion and the soul essentially unparticularized[125], withformandnothing more, where the focus of subjectivity is dissipated[126]. This is also the reasonwhy sculpture does not on the one hand present Spirit in action, in a series of movements, which both possess and testify to one aim nor in undertakings or exploits, wherein a certain character is made visible, but rather as persisting throughout in one objective way, and for this reason pre-eminently in the repose of form, the movement and grouping of which is merely a first and obvious commencement of action, not, however, in any sense acompletepresentment of the subjective life as agitated by all the conflicts that assail it whether within or without, or as its development is variously affected in contact with the external world. Consequently what we also miss in the figures of sculpture is precisely this revealed focus of the subjective life, the concentrated expression of soul assoul, namely, the glance of the eye, a fact upon which we shall have something further to say later. We miss it because such a figure presents to our sight Spirit embedded in corporeality, and Spirit, too, which has to show itself visible in the entire form. From another point of view an individuality, which is not as yet essentially separated into its component parts, that is, the object of sculpture, does not as yet require the painter's charm of colour as means to display it, a charm which is as capable of making visible, through the fine gradations and variety of its nuances, the entire wealth of particular traits of character, the absolute manifestation of spiritual presence, its ideal significance[127], as by means of the vital flash of the eye it will concentrate in a point all the vigour of the soul. Sculpture must not, in other words, accept a material which is not rendered necessary by its fundamental point of view. It only makes use of the spatial qualities of the human figure, not the colouring which depicts it. The figure of sculpture is in general of one colour, hewn from white not vari-coloured marble. And in the same way metals are used as the material of sculpture, this primitive substance, self-identical, essentially undifferentiated, a light in fluxion, if we may so express it, without the contrast and harmony of different colours[128]. The Greeks are indebted to their unrivalled artistic insight[129]for having grasped and firmly retained this point of view. No doubt we find, too, in Greek sculpture, to which we must for the main part confine ourselves, examples of coloured statuary; we must, however, take care in this respect to distinguish both the beginning and end of this art from that which is created at its culminating point.

In the same way we must discount that which is admitted by art in deference to traditional religion. We have already found it to be true in the classical type of art that it does not forthwith and immediately set forth the Ideal, in which its function is to discover its fundamental lines of definition, but in the first instance removes much that is inconsonant with it and foreign; it is the same case precisely with sculpture. It is forced to pass through many preliminary stages before it arrives at its perfection; and this initial process differs very considerably from its supreme attainment. The most ancient works of sculpture are of painted wood, as, for example, Egyptian idols; we find similar productions among the Greeks. We must, however, exclude such examples from genuine sculpture when the main point is to establish its fundamental notion. We are therefore in no way concerned to deny that there are many examples at hand of painted statues. It is, however, also a fact that the purer art-taste became, the more strongly "sculpture withdrew itself from a brilliancy of colour that was not really congenial, and with wise deliberation utilized, on the contrary, light and shadow in order to secure for the beholder's eye a greater softness, repose, clarity, and agreeableness[130]." As against the uniform colour of the bare marble we may no doubt not merely instance the numerous statues of bronze, but also in still stronger opposition the greatest and most excellent works, which, as in the case of the Zeus of Pheidias, were artificially coloured. But we are not here discussing absence of colour in such an extreme abstract sense. Moreover, ivory and gold are not primarily the use of colour as the painter employs it; and generally we may add that the various works of a definite art do not ever in fact retain fixedly their fundamental notion in so abstract and unyielding a way, inasmuch as they come into contact with the conditions oflife subject to aims of all kinds; they are placed in different environments, and are thereby associated with circumstances of an external kind, which inevitably modify their real and essential type. In this way the images of sculpture are not unfrequently executed in rich material such as gold and ivory. They are placed on magnificent chairs or stand on pedestals which display all the extravagance and luxuriousness of art, or receive costly decorations, in order that the nation, when face to face with such splendid works, may likewise enjoy the sense of its power and wealth. And sculpture in particular, for the reason that it is essentially, taken by itself, a more abstract art, does not on all occasions hold fast to such exclusiveness, but, on the one hand, introduces incidentally much that is of a traditional, scholastic, or local character as a contribution from its history, while, on the other, it ministers to vital popular necessities. Active humanity demands for its diversion variety, and seeks in diverse directions for a stimulus to its vision and imagination. We may take as an analogous case the reading aloud of Greek tragedies, which also brings before us the work of art under its more abstract form. In the wider field of external existence we have still to add, to make a public performance, living actors, costume, stage scenery, dancing, and music. And in like manner, too, the sculptured figure is unable to dispense with much that is supplementary on its own stage of reality. We are, however, only concerned here with the genuine work of sculpture as such; external aspects such as those above adverted to must not be permitted to prevent us bringing before the mind the notion of our subject-matter in its most ideal and exclusive sense of definition.

Proceeding now to the more definiteheads of divisionin this section we may observe that sculpture constitutes the very centre of theclassicaltype of art to such a degree that we are unable to accept the symbolical, classical and romantic types as distinctions which affect throughout and form the basis of our division. Sculpture is the genuine art of the classical Ideal simply. It is quite true that sculpture has also its stages in which it is in the grasp of thesymbolicaltype, as in Egypt for example. But these are rather preliminary stages of its historical evolution, no genuine distinctions which essentially affect the art of sculpture whennotionally considered, in so far, that is, as these exceptional examples, in the manner of their execution and the use that is made of them, rather belong to architecture than are strictly within the aim and purpose of sculpture. In a similar way, when we find theromantictype thereby expressed, sculpture passes beyond its rightful sphere, and only receives with the qualified imitation of Greek sculpture its exclusively plastic type. We must therefore look about us for a principle of division of another character.

In agreement with what we have just stated we shall find that it is from the particular way in which theclassical Idealmeans of sculpture acquires a form of reality that most fully expresses it that the focus of our present inquiry is derived. Before, however, we are in a position to make an advance in this evolution of the ideal figure of sculpture we must by way of introduction demonstrate what kind ofcontentandformare pertinent to the point of view of sculpture regarded as a specific art, and the course it follows by virtue of both until the point is reached where the classical Ideal is fully unfolded in the human form permeated by spiritual life, and in its shape as subject to spatial condition. From another point of view the classical Ideal stands, and falls with an individuality which is unquestionably substantive, but also to an equal degree essentially particularized, so that sculpture does not accept for its content the Ideal of the human form in itsgenerality, but the Ideal asspecifically defined; and, by virtue of this fact, it is variously displayed under forms distinct from each other. Such distinctions partly originate in the conception andrepresentationsimply, in part are due to thematerialin which such is realized, and which further, according to the way it affects execution, introduces points of severation on its own account, to both of which finally, as the last ground of difference, the various stages are related in thehistoricaldevelopment of sculpture.

Having made these observations we will indicate the course of our inquiry as follows.

In thefirstplace we have merely to deal with thegeneraldeterminants of the essentialcontentandform, such as are deducible from the notion of sculpture.

Secondly, as a further step, we have to differentiate moreclosely the nature of the classical Ideal, in so far as it attains a determinate existence in its most artistic form.

Thirdly, and finally, we shall find that sculpture avails itself of various types of presentation and material, and expands to a world of productions, in which, either under one aspect or another, the symbolical or romantic types also definitely assert themselves, albeit it is the classical which constitutes the true point of centre between them in plastic art[131].

Sculpture, to put the matter in general terms, conceives the astounding project of making Spirit imagine itself in an exclusively material medium, and so shape this external medium that it is presented to itself in such and recognizes the presentment to be the objective form adequate to its ideal substance.

In this respect our inquiry will take the following directions.

First, we have the question what kind ofspiritual lifeis capable of being reproduced in this material of a form entirely sensuous and spatial.

Secondly, we have to ask in what manner theformsof the spatial condition have to be modified in order to permit us a recognition of the spiritual in the bodily shape of beauty.

What we have generally to consider here is the unity between theordo rerum extensarumand that of theordo rerum idearum, the primal fair union of soul and body, in so far as spiritual ideality is expressed by sculpture exclusively in its bodily existence.

This union,thirdly, corresponds to what we have already found to be the Ideal of the classical type of art; and for this reason the plastic forms of sculpture are nothing less than the very art itself of the classical Ideal.

The elementary medium, in which sculpture realizes its creations is, as we have seen, the elementary, still universal material subject to spatial condition, in which no further particularization can be utilized for an artistic purpose than theuniversal spatial dimensions, and the more detailed[132]spatial forms which are compatible with these dimensions under their most beautiful configuration. Now what most exceptionally corresponds as content to this more abstract aspect of the sensuous material is theobjectivityof Spirit which reposes on its own resources, in so far, that is, as Spirit has neither differentiated itself in contradistinction to its universal substance, nor to its determinate existence in its bodily presence, and consequently is not as yet withdrawn as independent self-subsistency into its own subjective world. There are two points we would draw attention to here.

(a) Spirit as Spirit[133]is no doubt always subjectivity, that is ideal knowledge of the Self, the Ego. This Ego can, however, separate itself from everything that constitutes, whether in knowledge, volition, conception, feeling, action, or achievement, theuniversaland eternal content of Spirit, and can concentrate its hold on that aspect ofindividualexperience which is unique and contingent. It is thensubjectivity as suchwhich we have before us, which has let go the truly objective content of Spirit, and is self-related formally, and without content. In the case of self-satisfaction, for example, I can no doubt view myself from a certain standpoint in an entirely objective way and remain satisfied with myself on account of moral action. I do, however, as thus self-satisfied, already withdraw myself from the content of such action. I separate myself as a distinct person, as this particular Ego, from the universality of Spirit, in order to compare myself with it. The sense of unison of myself with myself through this comparison produces this self-satisfaction, in which this determinate Ego, as this core of unity, rejoices in itself. No doubt this personal Ego is involved in all that a man knows, wills, or carries out; but it makes an immense difference whether, in-dealing with knowledge and action, the matter of concern is the man's own unique Ego, or that in which the essential content of consciousness consists; whether, in other words, a man sinkshimself and his self-identity in this content, or lives in the unbroken seclusion of his subjective personality.

(α) In this exaltation over what is substantive[134]the subjective life passes into the abstract and disrupt world of personal inclination, the caprice and contingency of emotions and impulses, owing to which, in the changes to which it is subject in particular acts and undertakings, it grows dependent upon particular circumstances as they happen to arise, and is unable generally to dispense with this association with something else. In such a condition of dependence the individual life is nothing butfinitesubjectivity as contrasted with a real spirituality. And if this personal state essentially persists through the volition and knowledge which characterizes it in this contradiction of its conscious life, it can only further become involved—to put on one side the mere emptiness of its imaginings and self-conceits—in the deformity of character and its evil passions, in crime and moral offence, in malice, cruelty, obstinacy, envy, pride, insolence, and every other kind of the reverse side of human nature and its insubstantial finiteness.

(β) This province of the subjective life must be excluded in its entirety and without hesitation from the content of sculpture. The art is exclusively co-extensive with the objectivity of Spirit. And by the term objectivity we mean in this connection what is substantive, genuine, not transitory, the essential nature of Spirit, apart from its involvement in that which is accidental and evanescent, for which the individual person is responsible simply in his unmediated state of self-relation.

(γ) Spirit, however, even in its truly objective sense, can only realize itself as Spirit when associated withexplicit self-identity.Spirit is only Spirit as self-consciousness[135]. The position, however, of this aspect of individual consciousness in the spiritual content of sculpture is of such a character that it is not independently expressed, but displays itself as throughout interfused with this substantive content, and not formally reflected back upon itself apart from it. We may consequently affirm that though such a mode of objectivitypossesses a type of self-subsistency, yet it is a self-knowledge and volition which is not released from the content it fulfils, but forms an inseparable unity with it.

The presentment of Spirit in this complete and independent seclusion of what is essentially substantive and true, this unperturbed and unparticularized being of Spirit, is that which we name divinity in its contrast to finitude, which is the process of disruption into contingent existence, a world that is broken into complex forms and varied movement. From this point of view the function of sculpture is to present the Divine simply in its infinite repose and sublimity, timeless, destitute of motion, entirely without subjective personality in the strict sense and the conflict of action or situation. And in proceeding to the more detailed definition of our humanity in shape and character, it must, nevertheless, exclusively rivet its attention on what is unalterable and permanent, in other words what is truly substantive in its characterization, and merely select such aspects for its content, passing over what it finds there of an accidental or evanescent nature; and it must do so for the reason that the objectivity which it presents does not rightly include a differentiation of this fluctuating and fleeting kind, and one which comes into being by virtue of a subjective consciousness whose conception of itself is that of pure insulation. In a biography, for instance, which gives an account of the motley incidents, events, and exploits of some individual, we find as a rule the course of varied developments and fortuities finally closed by a character sketch which summarizes the entire breadth of detail in a few general qualities such as goodness, honest dealing, courage, exceptional intelligence, and so forth. Characteristics such as these we may term the permanent features of a personality; the remaining peculiarities it possesses are merely accidental features in the impersonation. It is just this stable aspect of life which it is the part of sculpture to present as the unique being and determinate substance of individuality. Yet we must not suppose that it creates allegories out of such general qualities. It rather builds up true individuals, which it conceives and informs as essentially complete and enclosed within their objective spiritual presence, in their self-subsistent repose, delivered thereby from all antagonismas against external objects. In the presentment of an individuality of this character by sculpture what is truly substantive is throughout the essential foundation, and neither purely subjective self-knowledge and emotion, nor a superficial and mutable singularity[136]must be permitted in any way to be predominant, but what is eternal in the god-like and our humanity should, divested of all the caprice and contingency of the particular self[137], be set before our eyes in its unimpaired clarity.

(b) The further point we would draw attention to consists in this, that the content of sculpture, for the reason that its material requires an external presentment in the complete form of the three spatial dimensions, is also unable to be aspiritual contentas such, that is, the ideality self-enclosed within and absorbed into itself, but rather in the sense that it is onlyexplicitin its opposed factor, in other words, thebodily form.The negation of what is external is already implied in the ideal subjective consciousness, and can therefore have no place here, where what is divine and human is accepted as content with exclusive reference to its objective characteristics. And it is only this self-absorbed objective aspect, which does not comprise ideal subjectivity in the strict sense[138], that gives free play to an externality conditioned in all its three dimensions, and is capable of being associated with such a spatial totality. For these reasons it is incumbent on sculpture that it only accept out of the objective content of Spirit that which admits of the fullest expression in external and bodily shape; if it do otherwise it simply selects a content which its specific material is unable to assimilate or to unite with an adequate mode of exposition.

We must now inquire into the nature of the bodilyformswhich are adapted to give an impression of a content of this kind.

Just as in classical architecture the dwelling-house is the anatomical skeleton framework which art has to inform with its accretions, in like manner sculpture, on its part, discovers thehuman formas the fundamental type for its figures. Whereas, however, the house is already a piece of human workmanship, though not as yet elaborated artistically, the structure of the human form, on the contrary, appears as a product of Nature unaffected by man. The fundamental type of sculpture is consequentlygivento it, that is, does not hail from human inventiveness. The expression, however, that the human form is a part of Nature is a very indefinite one, which we must submit to closer analysis.

In Nature it is the Idea, which is given there, as we have already found when discussing natural beauty, its primary and immediate mode of existence, receiving in animal life and its complete organic structure thenaturalexistence adequate to its notion. The organization of the animal frame is therefore a birth of the notion in its essential totality, which exists in this corporeal mode of being as soul, yet, as the principle of merely animal life, modifies the animal frame in the most varied classifications, albeit too every specific type continues to be subject to the general notion[139]. The fact that notion and bodily form, or more accurately, soul and body, correspond to one another—to fully understand this is the problem of natural philosophy. We should have to demonstrate that the different systems of the animal frame in their ideal[140]structure and conformation no less than their association, and the more definite organs in which the bodily existence is differentiated are in general accord with the phasal steps of the notion's movement, so that it becomes clear, to what extent we have here presented to us as real only the particular aspects of the soul-life whichare necessary. To develop this exposition, however, does not lie within the scope of the present inquiry.

The human form is not, however, as the animal form, merely the corporeal framework of the soul, but ofSpirit.In other words, spirit and soul are essentially to be distinguished. For the soul is merely this ideal and simple unity of self-subsistence attaching to the body in itscorporealaspect[141], whereas Spirit is the independent selfness of conscious andself-consciouslife together with all the emotions, ideas, and aims of such a conscious existence. In contemplating the immense difference which separates merely animal life from spiritual consciousness, it may appear strange that the bodily frame attaching to thelatter, the human body, is nevertheless so clearly homogeneous with that of animal life. It will tend, however, to decrease such an astonishment if we recall to mind the definition, which Spirit itself has authorized us to make in accordance with its own notion, that it is a mode of life and essentially therefore itself also aliving soulandnatural existence.As such living soul the life of conscious spirit, by virtue of the same notion that is inherent in the animal soul, is entitled to accept a body, which fundamentally in its general lines runs parallel to the organic structure of animal life. However superior to mere animal life Spirit may be it is evolved through[142]a corporeal frame whose visible appearance receives an identical articulation and principle of life with that which the notion of animal life in general underlies. Inasmuch as, however, and furthermore Spirit is not merely theIdeaasdeterminate existence, that is, the Idea as Nature and animal life, but the Idea which secures independence in its own free medium of ideality as Idea, the spiritual principle elaborates for itself its own specific mode of objectivity over and beyond that of animal life, simply, in other words, science, the reality of which is exclusively that of thought itself. Apart from thought, however, and its philosophical and systematized activity, Spirit is involved within an abounding life of feeling, inclination, idea, imagination, and so forth, which is fixed in a more direct or lessimmediate association with its vital being[143]and bodily frame, and consequently possesses a reality in the human body. In this reality, which is part of its own substance, Spirit asserts itself also as a principle of life, shines into it, transpierces it, and is made manifest to others by means of it. Consequently, in so far as the human body remains no purely natural existence, but has asserted itself also in its configuration and structure as the natural and sensuous existence of Spirit, it is, nevertheless, regarded as the expression of an ideality more exalted than that compatible with the purely animal body to be distinguished from it, despite the fact that the human body in its broad lines is in harmony with it. For this reason, however, that Spirit is itself soul and life, that is, an animal body, it is and can only be modifications, which the indwelling Spirit of one living body attaches to this corporeal form. As a manifestation of Spirit consequently the human shape is distinct from the animal by virtue of these modifications, albeit the distinctions of the human organism from the animal are as much the result of the unconscious creation of spiritual activities, as the soul of the animal kingdom is the informing though unconscious activity of the body that belongs to it.

We have thus reached the precise point of our present departure. In other words, the human body is present to the artist as Spirit's expression. What is more, he discovers it as such not merely in a general way, but also in particular characteristics it is pre-supposed to be the type which, in its form, its specific traits, its position and general habit, reflects the ideality of Spirit.

We shall find it a difficult matter to fix in clear terms of thought the precise nature of the association between spirit and body in their relation respectively to feeling, passion, and other spiritual conditions. It has, no doubt, been attempted to develop the same scientifically both from thepathognomical[144]point of view and thephysiognomical.Such attempts have hitherto not met with much success. For ourselves the science of physiognomy can only be of importancein so far as that of pathognomy is exclusively concerned with the mode under which definite feelings and passions are physically located in particular organs. It has been stated, for example, that the seat of anger is in the gall, of courage in the blood. Such statements, we may remark incidentally, are erroneous in their manner of expression. For even assuming the activity of particular organs corresponds to specific passions, we cannot say that anger, for instance, has its local position in the gall bladder, but, in so far as anger is corporeally related, the gall is pre-eminently that in which its active appearance asserts itself. In our present inquiry this pathognomical aspect does not, as already stated, concern us, because sculpture has merely to deal with that which passes over from the ideal side of Spirit into the external aspect offormpermitting Spirit thus to be visible in the physical environment. The sympathetic interaction between the internal organism and the feeling soul is no object of sculpture; indeed, we may add, it is unable to accept much which appears on the external surface itself, such as the tremble of the hand and the entire body in an outburst of anger, the movement of the lips, and others of like nature.

With regard to physiognomical science I will limit myself to this observation. If the work of sculpture, which has as its fundamental basis the human form, has to exhibit the way in which the bodily presence as such manifests not only the divine and human aspect of Spirit in its broadest and most substantive features, but also the particular character of a definite individuality in this divine presence, we are no doubt compelled to discuss what parts, traits, and conformations of the body are fully accordant with any specific mode of ideality. We are indeed forced upon such an inquiry by the sculpture of antiquity, which we must as a matter of fact admit includes the expression of individual god-like characters with that of divinity generally. Such an admission does not, however, amount to an assertion that the association of spiritual expression with bodily form is merely a matter of accident and caprice rather than the creation of a figure of self-subsistent actuality. In this connection every organ must, in a general way, be looked at from two points of view, as a mode of expression that possesses its physicalside no less than its spiritual. We need hardly caution our readers that the method of Gall in conducting such an inquiry is inadmissible. This writer reduces Spirit to what is little better than a Calvary.

(a) The advance of sculpture, in respect to the content which its function is to declare, is limited to the investigation how far the substantive and at the same time individual condition of spiritual life is made vital in bodily form, receiving therein determinate existence and form. In other words, through the content adequate to genuine sculpture the contingentindividualization of the external appearanceis from one point of view excluded, and this applies both to the spiritual and physical aspects of the presentment. Only that which persists, and is universal and according to rule in the human form is the object of a work of sculpture. And this is so albeit we have the additional necessity to individualize the universal in such a way that not only the abstract law but an individual form, which is brought into the closest fusion with it, is placed before our eyes.

(b) From another point of view it is necessary that sculpture, as we have seen, be kept unaffected by purely contingentpersonal life[145], and all expression of such in the independent ideal mode under which it asserts itself. For this reason an artist, in dealing with physiognomical characteristics, is not entitled to move in the direction of individual manner[146]. For a facial manner is simply just this appearance on the surface of an individual idiosyncrasy and some particular aspect of emotion, idea, and volition. A man by his chance expressions of countenance expresses the feelings he has as some particular person, whether it be in his exclusive relation to his own life, or in his self-relation to exterior objects, or other persons. One sees, for example, on the street, more particularly in little towns, in many, or rather the majority of men, that they are exclusively preoccupied, in their demeanour and expression of face, with themselves, their dress and attire, in general terms, that is, their purelypersonal particularity, or, at least, matters of momentary importance, and any unforeseen or accidental features thus presented. Countenances which express pride, envy, self-satisfaction, depreciation, and so forth, are of this nature. Moreover, the feeling and contrast of substantive being with my personal idiosyncrasy may be responsible for such alterations of expression. Humility, defiance, threats, fear, are expressed in this way. In a felt contrast of this kind we find already a separation between the individual in the subjective sense and the universal asserted. Reflection on what is truly substantive continually leans in the direction of merely personal considerations, so that it is the individual rather than the substantive character which is predominant in the content. The form, however, which remains severely true to the principle of sculpture ought neither to express this severation nor the predominance of the personal aspect above adverted to.

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