{"collection":"philosophy-ethics","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_73827/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_73827","id":"gutenberg_73827","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/73827","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Language & Communication","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Criticism"],"text":"\u201cExtraordinarily interesting. . . . He is erudite and he is intelligent;\nhe makes the courageous attempt to be at the same time scientific\nand psychological; and he has the great advantage of having at\nhis disposal a knowledge of semantics. His terms are clear, useful,\nand conveniently few.\u201d\u2014_The Nation_.\n\n\u201cWhat he has done is to make thinking about art clearer, and\nabout life, too. This is precisely the merit of Richards\u2019 remarkable\nvolume.\u201d\u2014_Christian Science Monitor_.\n\n\u201cThe book is compact with stimulating criticism of the great\ncritics of the ages, and with numberless original suggestions\non all phases of the creation and appreciation of art.\u201d\u2014_Springfield\nRepublican_.\n\n\u201cAn important contribution to the rehabilitation of English\ncriticism\u2014perhaps, because of its sustained scientific nature, the\nmost important yet made. . . . The principles enunciated are pursued\nin more particular aspects of literary criticism, always with a clear\nrest and consequent elucidation. Parallel applications to the arts of\npainting, sculpture, and music form the subjects of three chapters.\nAnother important chapter deals with the availability of the poet\u2019s\nexperience.\u201d\u2014_The Criterion, London_.\n\n\u201cMr. Richards is an entertaining writer, whose work avoids easily\nthe tedium of a technical treatise.\u201d\u2014_The British Journal of\nPsychology_.\n\n\n\n\nTranscriber\u2019s Note:\n\nThis eBook was created from a 1928 edition, scans of which are\navailable from the Internet Archive. Tildes (~) indicate words\nthat were set in Fraktur script in the original text.\n\nNew original cover art included with this eBook is granted to\nthe public domain.\n\n\n\n\n International Library of Psychology\n Philosophy and Scientific Method\n\n\n\n PRINCIPLES OF\n LITERARY\n CRITICISM\n\n BY\n I. A. RICHARDS\n FELLOW OF\n MAGDALENE COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE\n\n NEW YORK\n HARCOURT, BRACE AND COMPANY\n LONDON: KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRUBNER & CO. LTD.\n\n PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY\n LUND HUMPHRIES\n LONDON \u00b7 BRADFORD\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\n I. THE CHAOS OF CRITICAL THEORIES\n\n II. THE PHANTOM \u00c6STHETIC STATE\n\n III. THE LANGUAGE OF CRITICISM\n\n IV. COMMUNICATION AND THE ARTIST\n\n V. THE CRITICS\u2019 CONCERN WITH VALUE\n\n VI. VALUE AS AN ULTIMATE IDEA\n\n VII. A PSYCHOLOGICAL THEORY OF VALUE\n\n VIII. ART AND MORALS\n\n IX. ACTUAL AND POSSIBLE MISAPPREHENSIONS\n\n X. POETRY FOR POETRY\u2019S SAKE\n\n XI. A SKETCH FOR A PSYCHOLOGY\n\n XII. PLEASURE\n\n XIII. EMOTION AND THE C\u0152NESTHESIA\n\n XIV. MEMORY\n\n XV. ATTITUDES\n\n XVI. THE ANALYSIS OF A POEM\n\n XVII. RHYTHM AND METRE\n\n XVIII. ON LOOKING AT A PICTURE\n\n XIX. SCULPTURE AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF FORM\n\n XX. THE _IMPASSE_ OF MUSICAL THEORY\n\n XXI. A THEORY OF COMMUNICATION\n\n XXII. THE AVAILABILITY OF THE POET\u2019S EXPERIENCE\n\n XXIII. TOLSTOY\u2019S INFECTION THEORY\n\n XXIV. THE NORMALITY OF THE ARTIST\n\n XXV. BADNESS IN POETRY\n\n XXVI. JUDGMENT AND DIVERGENT READINGS\n\n XXVII. LEVELS OF RESPONSE AND THE WIDTH OF APPEAL\n\n XXVIII. THE ALLUSIVENESS OF MODERN POETRY\n\n XXIX. PERMANENCE AS A CRITERION\n\n XXX. THE DEFINITION OF A POEM\n\n XXXI. ART, PLAY, AND CIVILISATION\n\n XXXII. THE IMAGINATION\n\n XXXIII. TRUTH AND REVELATION THEORIES\n\n XXXIV. THE TWO USES OF LANGUAGE\n\n XXXV. POETRY AND BELIEFS\n\n APPENDIX A ON VALUE\n\n APPENDIX B ON MR. ELIOT\u2019S POETRY\n\n\n\n\nPREFACE\n\n\nA book is a machine to think with, but it need not, therefore,\nusurp the functions either of the bellows or the locomotive.\nThis book might better be compared to a loom on which it is proposed\nto re-weave some ravelled parts of our civilisation. What is\nmost important about it, the interconnection of its several points\nof view, might have been exhibited, though not with equal clarity,\nin a pamphlet or in a two-volume work. Few of the separate items\nare original. One does not expect novel cards when playing so\ntraditional a game; it is the hand which matters. I have chosen\nto present it here on the smallest scale which would allow me\nto fit together the various positions adopted into a whole of\nsome firmness. The elaborations and expansions which suggest\nthemselves have been constantly cut short at the point at which\nI thought that the reader would be able to see for himself how\nthey would continue. The danger of this procedure, which otherwise\nhas great advantages both for him and for me, is that the different\nparts of a connected account such as this mutually illumine one\nanother. The writer, who has, or should have, the whole position\nin his mind throughout, may overlook sources of obscurity for\nthe reader, due to the serial form of the exposition. This I\nhave endeavoured to prevent by means of numerous cross-references,\nforwards and backwards.\n\nBut some further explanation of the structure of the book is\ndue to the reader. At sundry points\u2014notably in Chapters VI,\nVII, and XI-XV\u2014its progress appears to be interrupted by lengthy\nexcursions into theory of value, or into general psychology.\nThese I would have omitted if it had seemed in any way possible\nto develop the argument of the rest strongly and clearly in their\nabsence. Criticism, as I understand it, is the endeavour to discriminate\nbetween experiences and to evaluate them. We cannot do this without\nsome understanding of the nature of experience, or without theories\nof valuation and communication. Such principles as apply in criticism\nmust be taken from these more fundamental studies. All other\ncritical principles are arbitrary, and the history of the subject\nis a record of their obstructive influence. The view of value\nimplied throughout is one which must be held in some form by\nvery many persons. Yet I have been unable to discover anywhere\nany statement of it to which I might satisfactorily refer the\nreader. I had to make a fairly full statement with applications\nand illustrations myself. And I had to put in the forefront of\nthe book where, to the more exclusively literary reader, it will\nappear a dry and uninviting tract to be crossed for problematical\nadvantages. The same remarks apply to the second theoretical\nexpansion, the psychological chapters; they are to the value\nchapters, I fear, as a Sahara to a Gobi. No other choice seemed\nopen if I did not wish my later, critical, sections to be misunderstood,\nthan to include as a preliminary what amounts to a concise treatise\non psychology. For nearly all the topics of psychology are raised\nat one point or another by criticism, but raised from an angle\nwhich ordinary text-books do not contemplate. These two deserts\npassed, the rest of the book accords, I believe, much more closely\nwith what may be expected of an essay in criticism, although\nthe language in which some of the more obvious remarks are couched\nmay seem unnecessarily repellant. The explanation of much of\nthe turgid uncouthness of its terminology is the desire to link\neven the commonplaces of criticism to a systematic exposition\nof psychology. The reader who appreciates the advantages so gained\nwill be forgiving.\n\nI have carefully remembered throughout that I am not writing\nfor specialists alone. The omissions, particularly as to qualifications\nand reservations, which this fact entails, should in fairness\nto myself be mentioned.\n\nMy book, I fear, will seem to many sadly lacking in the condiments\nwhich have come to be expected in writings upon literature. Critics\nand even theorists in criticism currently assume that their first\nduty is to be moving, to excite in the mind emotions appropriate\nto their august subject-matter. This endeavour I have declined.\nI have used, I believe, few words which I could not define in\nthe actual use which I have made of them, and necessarily such\nwords have little or no emotive power. I have comforted myself\nwith the reflection that there is perhaps something debilitated\nabout a taste for speculation which requires a flavouring of\nthe eternal and the ultimate or even of the literary spices,\nmystery and profundity. Mixed modes of writing which enlist the\nreader\u2019s feeling as well as his thinking are becoming dangerous\nto the modern consciousness with its increasing awareness of\nthe distinction. Thought and feeling are able to mislead one\nanother at present in ways which were hardly possible six centuries\nago. We need a spell of purer science and purer poetry before\nthe two can again be mixed, if indeed this will ever become once\nmore desirable. In the Second Edition I added a note on Mr. Eliot\u2019s\npoetry which will elucidate what I mean here by purity, and some\nsupplementary remarks upon Value; in the Third, a few minor improvements\nhave been made.\n\nIt should be borne in mind that the knowledge which the men of\nA.D. 3000 will possess, if all goes well, may make all our \u00e6sthetics,\nall our psychology, all our modern theory of value, look pitiful.\nPoor indeed would be the prospect if this were not so. The thought,\n\u201cWhat shall we do with the powers, which we are so rapidly developing,\nand what will happen to us if we cannot learn to guide them in\ntime?\u201d already marks for many people the chief interest of existence.\nThe controversies which the world has known in the past are as\nnothing to those which are ahead. I would wish this book to be\nregarded as a contribution towards these choices of the future.\n\nBetween the possession of ideas and their application there is\na gulf. Every teacher winces when he remembers this. As an attempt\nto attack this difficulty, I am preparing a companion volume,\n_Practical Criticism_. Extremely good and extremely bad\npoems were put _unsigned_ before a large and able audience.\nThe comments they wrote at leisure give, as it were, a stereoscopic\nview of the poem and of possible opinion on it. This material\nwhen systematically analysed, provides, not only an interesting\ncommentary upon the state of contemporary culture, but a new\nand powerful educational instrument.\n\n I. A. R.\n\n_Cambridge, May_, 1928.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I\n\nThe Chaos of Critical Theories\n\n O monstrous! but one half-pennyworth of bread to this intolerable\n deal of sack!\u2014_The First Part of King Henry the Fourth._\n\n\nThe literature of Criticism is not small or negligible, and its\nchief figures, from Aristotle onwards, have often been among\nthe first intellects of their age. Yet the modern student, surveying\nthe field and noting the simplicity of the task attempted and\nthe fragments of work achieved, may reasonably wonder what has\nbeen and is amiss. For the experiences with which criticism is\nconcerned are exceptionally accessible, we have only to open\nthe book, stand before the picture, have the music played, spread\nout the rug, pour out the wine, and the material upon which the\ncritic works is presently before us. Even too abundantly, in\ntoo great fullness perhaps: \u201cMore warmth than Adam needs\u201d the\ncritic may complain, echoing Milton\u2019s complaint against the climate\nof the Garden of Eden; but he is fortunate not to be starved\nof matter like the investigator of psychoplasm. And the questions\nwhich the critic seeks to answer, intricate though they are,\ndo not seem to be extraordinarily difficult. What gives the experience\nof reading a certain poem its value? How is this experience better\nthan another? Why prefer this picture to that? In which ways\nshould we listen to music so as to receive the most valuable\nmoments? Why is one opinion about works of art not as good as\nanother? These are the fundamental questions which criticism\nis required to answer, together with such preliminary questions\u2014What\n_is_ a picture, a poem, a piece of music? How can experiences\nbe compared? What is value?\u2014as may be required in order to approach\nthese questions.\n\nBut if we now turn to consider what are the results yielded by\nthe best minds pondering these questions in the light of the\neminently accessible experiences provided by the Arts, we discover\nan almost empty garner. A few conjectures, a supply of admonitions,\nmany acute isolated observations, some brilliant guesses, much\noratory and applied poetry, inexhaustible confusion, a sufficiency\nof dogma, no small stock of prejudices, whimsies and crotchets,\na profusion of mysticism, a little genuine speculation, sundry\nstray inspirations, pregnant hints and random _aper\u00e7us_;\nof such as these, it may be said without exaggeration, is extant\ncritical theory composed.\n\nA few specimens of the most famous utterances of Aristotle, Longinus,\nHorace, Boileau, Dryden, Addison, Wordsworth, Coleridge, Carlyle,\nMatthew Arnold, and some more modern authors, will justify this\nassertion. \u201cAll men naturally receive pleasure from imitation.\u201d\n\u201cPoetry is chiefly conversant about general truth.\u201d \u201cIt demands\nan enthusiasm allied to madness; transported out of ourselves\nwe become what we imagine.\u201d \u201cBeautiful words are the very and\npeculiar light of the mind.\u201d \u201cLet the work be what you like,\nprovided it has simplicity and unity.\u201d \u201cDe Gustibus. . .\u201d \u201cOf\nwriting well right thinking is the beginning and the fount.\u201d\n\u201cWe must never separate ourselves from Nature.\u201d \u201cDelight is the\nchief, if not the only end; instruction can be admitted but in\nthe second place.\u201d \u201cThe pleasures of Fancy are more conducive\nto health than those of the understanding.\u201d \u201cThe spontaneous\noverflow of powerful feeling.\u201d \u201cThe best words in the best order.\u201d\n\u201cThe whole soul of man in activity.\u201d \u201cUnity in variety.\u201d \u201cThe\nsynthetic and magical power of the imagination.\u201d \u201cThe eye on\nthe object.\u201d \u201cThe disimprisonment of the soul of fact.\u201d \u201cThe\nidentification of content and form.\u201d \u201cA criticism of Life.\u201d \u201cEmpathy\nfavourable to our existence.\u201d \u201cSignificant form.\u201d \u201cThe expression\nof impressions,\u201d etc. etc.\n\nSuch are the pinnacles, the _apices_ of critical theory,\nthe heights gained in the past by the best thinkers in their\nattempt to reach explanations of the value of the arts. Some\nof them, many of them indeed, are profitable starting-points\nfor reflection, but neither together, nor singly, nor in any\ncombination do they give what is required. Above them and below\nthem, around and about them can be found other things of value,\nof service for the appreciation of particular poems and works\nof art; comment, elucidation, appraisal, much that is fit occupation\nfor the contemplative mind. But apart from hints such as have\nbeen cited, no explanations. The central question, What is the\nvalue of the arts, why are they worth the devotion of the keenest\nhours of the best minds, and what is their place in the system\nof human endeavours? is left almost untouched, although without\nsome clear view it would seem that even the most judicious critic\nmust often lose his sense of position.\n\n\n\nBut perhaps the literature of Criticism is the wrong place in\nwhich to expect such an inquiry. Philosophers, Moralists and\n\u00c6stheticians are perhaps the competent authorities? There is\ncertainly no lack of treatises upon the Good and the Beautiful,\nupon Value and upon the \u00c6sthetic State, and the treasures of\nearnest endeavour lavished upon these topics have not been in\nvain. Those investigators who have relied upon Reason, upon the\nSelect Intuition and the Ineluctable Argument, who have sat down\nwithout the necessary facts to think the matter out, have at\nleast thoroughly discredited a method which apart from their\nlabours would hardly have been suspected of the barrenness it\nhas shown. And those who, following Fechner, have turned instead\nto the collection and analysis of concrete, particular facts\nand to empirical research into \u00e6sthetics have supplied a host\nof details to psychology. In recent years especially, much useful\ninformation upon the processes which make up the appreciation\nof works of art has been skilfully elicited. But it is showing\nno ingratitude to these investigators if we point out certain\ndefects of almost all experimental work on \u00e6sthetics, which make\ntheir results at best of only indirect service to our wider problems.\n\nThe most obvious of these concerns their inevitable choice of\nexperiments. Only the simplest human activities are at present\namenable to laboratory methods. \u00c6stheticians have therefore been\ncompelled to begin with as simple forms of \u2018\u00e6sthetic choice\u2019\nas can be devised. In practice, line-lengths and elementary forms,\nsingle notes and phrases, single colours and simple collocations,\nnonsense syllables, metronomic beats, skeleton rhythms and metres\nand similar simplifications have alone been open to investigation.\nSuch more complex objects as have been examined have yielded\nvery uncertain results, for reasons which anyone who has ever\n_both_ looked at a picture or read a poem _and_ been inside a\npsychological laboratory or conversed with a representative\npsychologist will understand.\n\nThe generalisations to be drawn from these simple experiments\nare, if we do not expect too much, encouraging. Some light upon\nobscure processes, such as empathy, and upon the intervention\nof muscular imagery and tendencies to action into the apprehension\nof shapes and of sequences of sounds which had been supposed\nto be apprehended by visual or auditory apparatus alone, some\ninteresting facts about the plasticity of rhythm, some approach\ntowards a classification of the different ways in which colours\nmay be regarded, increased recognition of the complexity of even\nthe simplest activities, these and similar results have been\nwell worth the trouble expended. But more important has been\nthe revelation of the great variety in the responses which even\nthe simplest stimuli elicit. Even so unambiguous an object as\na plain colour, it has been found, can arouse in different persons\nand in the same person at different times extremely different\nstates of mind. From this result it may seem no illegitimate\nstep to conclude that highly complex objects, such as pictures,\nwill arouse a still greater variety of responses, a conclusion\nvery awkward for any theory of criticism, since it would appear\nto decide adversely the preliminary question: \u201cHow may experiences\nbe compared?\u201d which any such theory must settle if the more fundamental\nquestions of value are to be satisfactorily approached.\n\nBut just here a crucial point arises. There seems to be good\nreason to suppose that the more simple the object contemplated\nthe more varied the responses will be which can be expected from\nit. For it is difficult, perhaps impossible, to contemplate a\ncomparatively simple object by itself. Inevitably it is taken\nby the contemplator into some context, and made part of some\nlarger whole, and under such experimental conditions as have\nyet been devised it seems not possible to guarantee the kind\nof context into which it is taken. A comparison with the case\nof words is instructive. A single word by itself, let us say\n\u2018night,\u2019 will raise almost as many different thoughts and feelings\nas there are persons who hear it. The range of variety with a\nsingle word is very little restricted. But put it into a sentence\nand the variation is narrowed; put it into the context of a whole\npassage, and it is still further fixed; and let it occur in such\nan intricate whole as a poem and the responses of competent readers\nmay have a similarity which only its occurrence in such a whole\ncan secure. The point will arise for discussion when the problem\nof corroboration for critical judgments is dealt with later (cf.\npp. 166, 178, 192). It had to be mentioned here in order to explain\nwhy the theory of criticism shows no great dependence upon experimental\n\u00e6sthetics, useful in many respects as these investigations are.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II\n\nThe Phantom \u00c6sthetic State\n\n None of his follies will he repent, none will he wish to repeat; no\n happier lot can be assigned to man.\u2014_Wilhelm Mester_.\n\n\nA more serious defect in \u00e6sthetics is the avoidance of considerations\nas to value. It is true that an ill-judged introduction of value\nconsiderations usually leads to disaster, as in Tolstoy\u2019s case.\nBut the fact that some of the experiences to which the arts give\nrise are valuable and take the form they do because of their\nvalue is not irrelevant. Whether this fact is of service in analysis\nwill naturally depend upon the theory of value adopted. But to\nleave it out of account altogether is to run the risk of missing\nthe clue to the whole matter. And the clue has in fact been missed.\n\nAll modern \u00e6sthetics rests upon an assumption which has been\nstrangely little discussed, the assumption that there is a distinct\n_kind_ of mental activity present in what are called \u00e6sthetic\nexperiences. Ever since \u201cthe first rational word concerning beauty\u201d[1]\nwas spoken by Kant, the attempt to define the \u2018judgment of taste\u2019\nas concerning pleasure which is disinterested, universal, unintellectual,\nand not to be confused with the pleasures of sense or of ordinary\nemotions, in short to make it a thing _sui generis_, has\ncontinued. Thus arises the phantom problem of the \u00e6sthetic mode\nor \u00e6sthetic state, a legacy from the days of abstract investigation\ninto the Good, the Beautiful and the True.\n\nThe temptation to align this tripartite division with a similar\ndivision into Will, Feeling and Thought was irresistible. \u201cAll\nthe faculties of the Soul, or capacities, are reducible to three,\nwhich do not admit of any further derivation from a common ground:\nthe _faculty of knowledge_, the _feeling of pleasure or\ndispleasure_, and the _faculty of desire_\u201d[2] said Kant.\nLegislative for each of these faculties stood Understanding,\nJudgment and Reason respectively. \u201cBetween the faculties of knowledge\nand desire stands the feeling of pleasure, just as judgment is\nintermediate between understanding and reason.\u201d And he went on\nto discuss \u00e6sthetics as appertaining to the province of judgment,\nthe middle one of these three, the first and last having already\noccupied him in his two other Critiques of Pure and Practical\nReason respectively. The effect was virtually to annex \u00e6sthetics\nto Idealism, in which fabric it has ever since continued to serve\nimportant purposes.\n\nThis accident of formal correspondence has had an influence upon\nspeculation which would be ridiculous if it had not been so disastrous.\nIt is difficult even now to get out of ruts which have been seen\nto lead nowhere. With the identification of the provinces of\nTruth and Thought no quarrel arises, and the Will and the Good\nare, as we shall see, intimately connected, but the attempts\nto fit Beauty into a neat pigeon-hole with Feeling have led to\ncalamitous distortions. It is now generally abandoned,[3] although\nechoes of it can be heard everywhere in critical writings. The\npeculiar use of \u2018emotion\u2019 by reviewers, and the prevalence of\nthe phrase \u2018\u00e6sthetic emotion\u2019 is one of them. In view, then,\nof the objections to Feeling, something else, some special mode\nof mental activity, had to be found, to which Beauty could belong.\nHence arose the \u00e6sthetic mode. Truth was the object of the inquiring\nactivity, of the Intellectual or Theoretical part of the mind,\nand the Good that of the willing, desiring, practical part; what\npart could be found for the Beautiful? Some activity that was\nneither inquisitive nor practical, that did not question and\ndid not seek to use. The result was the \u00e6sthetic, the contemplative,\nactivity which is still defined, in most treatments[4], by these\nnegative conditions alone, as that mode of commerce with things\nwhich is neither intellectual inquiry into their nature, nor\nan attempt to make them satisfy our desire. The experiences which\narise in contemplating objects of art were then discovered to\nbe describable in some such terms, and system secured a temporary\ntriumph.\n\nIt is true that many of these experiences do present peculiarities,\nboth in the intellectual interest which is present and in the\nway in which the development of desires within them takes place,\nand these peculiarities\u2014detachment, impersonality, serenity and\nso forth\u2014are of great interest. They will have to be carefully\nexamined in the sequel.\n\nWe shall find that two entirely different sets of characters\nare involved. They arise from quite different causes but are\nhard to distinguish introspectively. Taken as marking off a special\nprovince for inquiry they are most unsatisfactory. They would\nyield for our purposes, even if they were not so ambiguous, a\ndiagonal or slant classification. Some of the experiences which\nmost require to be considered would be left out and many which\nare without importance brought in. To choose the \u00c6sthetic State\nas the starting-point for an inquiry into the values of the arts\nis in fact somewhat like choosing \u2018rectangular, and red in parts\u2019\nas a definition of a picture. We should find ourselves ultimately\ndiscussing a different collection of things from those we intended\nto discuss.\n\nBut the problem remains\u2014Is there any such thing as the \u00e6sthetic\nstate, or any \u00e6sthetic character of experiences which is _sui\ngeneris_? Not many explicit arguments have ever been given\nfor one. Vernon Lee, it is true, in _Beauty and Ugliness_,\np. 10, argues that \u201ca relation entirely _sui generis_ between\nvisible and audible forms and ourselves\u201d can be deduced from\nthe fact \u201cthat given proportions, shapes, patterns, compositions\nhave a tendency to recur in art.\u201d How this can be done it is\nhard to divine. Arsenic tends to recur in murder cases, and tennis\nin the summer, but no characters or relations _sui generis_\nanywhere are thereby proved. Obviously you can only tell whether\nanything is like or unlike other things by examining it and them,\nand to notice that one case of it is like another case of it,\nis not helpful. It may be suspected that where the argument is\nso confused, the original question was not very clear.\n\nThe question is whether a certain kind of experience is or is\nnot _like_ other kinds of experience. Plainly it is a question\nas to degree of likeness. Be it granted at once, to clear the\nair, that there are all sorts of experiences involved in the\nvalues of the arts, and that attributions of Beauty spring from\nall sorts of causes. Is there among these one kind of experience\nas different from experiences which don\u2019t so occur as, say envy\nis from remembering, or as mathematical calculation is from eating\ncherries? And what degree of difference would make it specific?\nPut this way it is plainly not an easy question to answer. These\ndifferences, none of them measurable, are of varying degree,\nand all are hard to estimate. Yet the vast majority of post-Kantian\nwriters, and many before him, have unhesitatingly replied, \u201cYes!\nthe \u00e6sthetic experience is peculiar and specific.\u201d And their\ngrounds, when not merely verbal, have usually been those of direct\ninspection.\n\nIt requires some audacity to run counter to such a tradition,\nand I do not do so without reflection. Yet, after all, the matter\nis one of classification, and when so many other divisions in\npsychology are being questioned and re-organised, this also may\nbe re-examined.\n\nThe case for a distinct \u00e6sthetic species of experience can take\ntwo forms. It may be held that there is some unique kind of mental\nelement which enters into \u00e6sthetic experiences and into no others.\nThus Mr Clive Bell used to maintain the existence of an unique\nemotion \u2018\u00e6sthetic emotion\u2019 as the _differentia_. But psychology\nhas no place for such an entity. What other will be suggested?\nEmpathy, for example, as Vernon Lee herself insists, enters into\ninnumerable other experiences as well as into \u00e6sthetic experiences.\nI do not think any will be proposed.\n\nAlternatively, the \u00e6sthetic experience may contain no unique\nconstituent, and be of the usual stuff but with a special form.\nThis is what it is commonly supposed to be. Now the special form\nas it is usually described\u2014in terms of disinterestedness, detachment,\ndistance, impersonality, subjective universality, and so forth\u2014this\nform, I shall try to show later, is sometimes no more than a\nconsequence of the incidence of the experience, a condition or\nan effect of communication. But sometimes a structure which can\nbe described in the same terms is an essential feature of the\nexperience, the feature in fact upon which its value depends.\nIn other words, at least two different sets of characters, due\nto different causes, are, in current usage, ambiguously covered\nby the term \u2018\u00e6sthetic.\u2019 It is very necessary to distinguish the\nsense in which merely putting something in a frame or writing\nit in verse gives it an \u2018\u00e6sthetic character,\u2019 from a sense in\nwhich value is implied. This confusion, together with other confusions,[5]\nhas made the term nearly useless.\n\nThe \u00e6sthetic mode is generally supposed to be a peculiar way\nof regarding things which can be exercised, whether the resulting\nexperiences are valuable, disvaluable or indifferent. It is intended\nto cover the experience of ugliness as well as that of beauty,\nand also intermediate experiences. What I wish to maintain is\nthat there is no such mode, that the experience of ugliness has\nnothing in common with that of beauty, which both do not share\nwith innumerable other experiences no one (except Croce; but\nthis qualification is often required) would dream of calling\n\u00e6sthetic. But a narrower sense of \u00e6sthetic is also found in which\nit _is_ confined to experiences of beauty and does imply\nvalue. And with regard to this, while admitting that such experiences\ncan be distinguished, I shall be at pains to show that they are\nclosely similar to many other experiences, that they differ chiefly\nin the connections between their constituents, and that they\nare only a further development, a finer organisation of ordinary\nexperiences, and not in the least a new and different kind of\nthing. When we look at a picture, or read a poem, or listen to\nmusic, we are not doing something quite unlike what we were doing\non our way to the Gallery or when we dressed in the morning.\nThe fashion in which the experience is caused in us is different,\nand as a rule the experience is more complex and, if we are successful,\nmore unified. But our activity is not of a fundamentally different\nkind. To assume that it is, puts difficulties in the way of describing\nand explaining it, which are unnecessary and which no one has\nyet succeeded in overcoming.\n\nThe point here raised, and particularly the distinction between\nthe two quite different sets of characters, on the ground of\nwhich an experience may be described as \u00e6sthetic or impersonal\nand disinterested, will become clearer at a later stage.[6]\n\n\n\nA further objection to the assumption of a peculiar \u00e6sthetic\nattitude is that it makes smooth the way for the idea of a peculiar\n\u00e6sthetic value, a pure art value. Postulate a peculiar kind:\nof experience, \u00e6sthetic experience, and it is an easy step to\nthe postulation of a peculiar unique value, different in kind\nand cut off from the other values of ordinary experiences. \u201cTo\nappreciate a work of art we need bring with us nothing from life,\nno knowledge of its ideas and affairs, no familiarity with its\nemotions.\u201d[7] So runs a recent extreme statement of the \u00c6sthetic\nHypothesis, which has had much success. To quote another example\nless drastic but also carrying with it the implication that \u00e6sthetic\nexperiences are _sui generis_, and their value not of the\nsame kind as other values. \u201cIts nature is to be not a part, nor\nyet a copy, of the real world (as we commonly understand that\nphrase), but a world in itself independent, complete, autonomous.\u201d[8]\n\nThis view of the arts as providing a private heaven for \u00e6sthetes\nis, as will appear later, a great impediment to the investigation\nof their value. The effects upon the general attitudes of those\nwho accept it uncritically are also often regrettable; while\nthe effects upon literature and the arts have been noticeable,\nin a narrowing and restriction of the interests active, in preciousness,\nartificiality and spurious aloofness. ~Art~ envisaged as a mystic,\nineffable virtue is a close relative of the \u2018\u00e6sthetic mood\u2019,\nand may easily be pernicious in its effects, through the habits\nof mind which, as an idea, it fosters, and to which, as a mystery,\nit appeals.\n\n\n[1] Hegel\u2019s _dictum, History of Philosophy_, iii, 543.\n\n[2] _Critique of Judgment_, transl. by Meredith, p. 15.\n\n[3] Dr Bosanquet was one of the last adherents. See his _Three\nLectures on \u00c6sthetics_.\n\n[4] E.g. Vernon Lee, _The Beautiful_.\n\n[5] E.g. Any choice for which the chooser cannot give his reasons\ntends in the laboratory to be called an \u2018\u00e6sthetic choice.\u2019\n\n[6] Cf. Chapters X and XXXII, and Impersonality, _Index_.\n\n[7] Clive Bell, _Art_, p. 25.\n\n[8] A.C. Bradley, _Oxford Lectures on Poetry_, p. 5.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III\n\nThe Language of Criticism\n\n . . . . I too have seen\n My vision of the rainbow Aureoled face\n Of her whom men name Beauty: proud, austere:\n Divinely fugitive, that haunts the world. . . .\n _The Dominion of Dreams_.\n\n\nWhatever the disadvantages of modern \u00e6sthetics as a basis for\na theory of Criticism, the great advance made upon prescientific\nspeculation into the nature of Beauty must also be recognised.\nThat paralysing apparition Beauty, the ineffable, ultimate, unanalysable,\nsimple Idea, has at least been dismissed and with her have departed\nor will soon depart a flock of equally bogus entities. Poetry\nand inspiration together, it is true, still dignify respectable\nquarters with their presence.\n\n\u201cPoetry, like life, is one thing. . . . Essentially a continuous\nsubstance or energy, poetry is historically a connected movement,\na series of successive integrated manifestations. Each poet,\nfrom Homer or the predecessors of Homer to our own day, has been,\nto some degree and at some point, the voice of the movement and\nenergy of poetry; in him, poetry has for the moment become visible,\naudible, incarnate; and his extant poems are the record left\nof that partial and transitory incarnation. . . . The progress\nof poetry, with its vast power and exalted function, is immortal.\u201d[9]\n\nA diligent search will still find many other Mystic Beings, for\nthe most part of a less august nature, sheltering in verbal thickets.\nConstruction, Design, Form, Rhythm, Expression . . . are more\noften than not mere _vacua_ in discourse, for which a theory\nof criticism should provide explainable substitutes.\n\nWhile current attitudes to language persist, this difficulty\nof the linguistic phantom must still continue. It has to be recognised\nthat all our natural turns of speech are misleading, especially\nthose we use in discussing works of art. We become so accustomed\nto them that even when we are aware that they are ellipses, it\nis easy to forget the fact. And it has been extremely difficult\nin many cases to discover that any ellipsis is present. We are\naccustomed to say that a picture is beautiful, instead of saying\nthat it causes an experience in us which is valuable in certain\nways.[10] The discovery that the remark, \u201cThis is beautiful\u201d,\nmust be turned round and expanded in this way before it is anything\nbut a mere noise signalling the fact that we approve of the picture,\nwas a great and difficult achievement. Even to-day, such is the\ninsidious power of grammatical forms, the belief that there is\nsuch a quality or attribute, namely Beauty, which attaches to\nthe things which we rightly call beautiful, is probably inevitable\nfor all reflective persons at a certain stage of their mental\ndevelopment.\n\nEven among those who have escaped from this delusion and are\nwell aware that we continually talk as though things possess\nqualities, when what we ought to say is that they cause effects\nin us of one kind or another, the fallacy of \u2018projecting\u2019 the\neffect and making it a quality of its cause tends to recur. When\nit does so it gives a peculiar obliquity to thought and although\nfew competent persons are nowadays so deluded as actually to\nhold the mystical view that there is a quality Beauty which inheres\nor attaches to external objects, yet throughout all the discussion\nof works of art the drag exercised by language towards this view\ncan be felt. It perceptibly increases the difficulty of innumerable\nproblems and we shall have constantly to allow for it. Such terms\nas \u2018construction\u2019, \u2018form\u2019, \u2018balance\u2019, \u2018composition\u2019, \u2018design\u2019,\n\u2018unity\u2019, \u2018expression\u2019, for all the arts; as \u2018depth\u2019, \u2018movement\u2019,\n\u2018texture\u2019, \u2018solidity\u2019, in the criticism of painting; as \u2018rhythm\u2019,\n\u2018stress\u2019, \u2018plot\u2019, \u2018character\u2019, in literary criticism; as \u2018harmony\u2019,\n\u2018atmosphere\u2019, \u2018development\u2019, in music, are instances. All these\nterms are currently used as though they stood for qualities inherent\nin things outside the mind, as a painting, in the sense of an\nassemblage of pigments, is undoubtedly outside the mind. Even\nthe difficulty of discovering, in the case of poetry, what thing\nother than print and paper is there for these alleged qualities\nto belong to, has not checked the tendency.\n\nBut indeed language has succeeded until recently in hiding from\nus almost all the things we talk about. Whether we are discussing\nmusic, poetry, painting, sculpture or architecture, we are forced\nto speak as though certain physical objects\u2014vibrations of strings\nand of columns of air, marks printed on paper, canvasses and\npigments, masses of marble, fabrics of freestone, are what we\nare talking about. And yet the remarks we make as critics do\nnot apply to such objects but to states of mind, to experiences.\n\nA certain strangeness about this view is often felt but diminishes\nwith reflection. If anyone says that \u2018The May Queen\u2019 is sentimental,\nit is not difficult to agree that he is referring to a state\nof mind. But if he declares that the masses in a Giotto exactly\nbalance one another, this is less apparent, and, if he goes on\nto discuss time in music, form in visual art, plot in drama,\nthe fact that he is all the while talking about mental happenings\nbecomes concealed. The verbal apparatus comes between us and\nthe things with which we are really dealing. Words which are\nuseful, indeed invaluable, as handy stop-gaps and makeshifts\nin conversation, but which need elaborate expansions before they\ncan be used with precision, are treated as simply as people\u2019s\nproper names. So it becomes natural to seek for the things these\nwords appear to stand for, and thus arise innumerable subtle\ninvestigations, doomed _ab initio_ as regards their main\nintent to failure.\n\n\n\nWe must be prepared then to translate, into phrases pedantic\nand uncouth, all the too simple utterances which the conversational\ndecencies exact. We shall find later, in their peculiar emotive\npower the main reason why, in spite of all manner of confusions\nand inconveniences, these current ways of speaking are retained.\nFor emotive purposes they are indispensable, but for clarity,\nfor the examination of what is actually happening, translations\nare equally a necessity.\n\nMost critical remarks state in an abbreviated form that an object\ncauses certain experiences, and as a rule the form of the statement\nis such as to suggest that the object has been said to possess\ncertain qualities. But often the critic goes further and affirms\nthat the effect in his mind is due to special particular features\nof the object. In this case he is pointing out something about\nthe object in addition to its effect upon him, and this fuller\nkind of criticism is what we desire. Before his insight can greatly\nbenefit, however, a very clear demarcation between the object,\nwith its features, and his experience, which is the effect of\ncontemplating it, is necessary. The bulk of critical literature\nis unfortunately made up of examples of their confusion.\n\nIt will be convenient at this point to introduce two definitions.\nIn a full critical statement which states not only that an experience\nis valuable in certain ways, but also that it is caused by certain\nfeatures in a contemplated object, the part which describes the\nvalue of the experience we shall call the _critical_ part.\nThat which describes the object we shall call the _technical_\npart. Thus to say that we feel differently towards wooden crosses\nand stone crosses is a technical remark. And to say that metre\nis more suited to the tender passion than is prose would be,\nas it stands, a technical remark, but here it is evident that\na critical part might easily be also present. All remarks as\nto the ways and means by which experiences arise or are brought\nabout are technical, but critical remarks are about the values\nof experiences and the reasons for regarding them as valuable,\nor not valuable. We shall endeavor in what follows to show that\ncritical remarks are merely a branch of psychological remarks,\nand that no special ethical or metaphysical ideas need be introduced\nto explain value.\n\nThe distinction between technical and critical remarks is of\nreal importance. Confusion here is responsible for some most\ncurious passages in the histories of the arts. A certain technique\nin certain cases produces admirable results; the obvious features\nof this technique come to be regarded at first as sure signs\nof excellence, and later as the excellence itself. For a while\nnothing, however admirable, which does not show these superficial\nmarks, gets fair consideration. Thomas Rymer\u2019s denigration of\nShakespeare, Dr Johnson\u2019s view of Milton\u2019s pauses, the aftermath\nof the triumph of Pope, archaistic sculpture, the Greek poses\nin the compositions of David, the imitations of C\u00e9zanne, are\nfamous instances; they could be multiplied indefinitely. The\nconverse case is equally common. An obvious technical blemish\nin a special case is recognised. It may be too many S\u2019s in a\nparticular line, or the irregularity and rimelessness of a \u2018Pindaric\u2019\nOde; henceforth any line superficially similar,\n\n The lustre of the long convolvulusses,\n\nany unrhymed lyric, is regarded as defective. This trick of judging\nthe whole by the detail, instead of the other way about, of mistaking\nthe means for the end, the technique for the value, is in fact\nmuch the most successful of the snares which waylay the critic.\nOnly the teacher knows (and sometimes he is guilty himself) how\ngreat is the number of readers who think, for example, that a\ndefective rime\u2014bough\u2019s house, bush thrush, blood good\u2014is sufficient\nground for condemning a poem in the neglect of all other considerations.\nSuch sticklers, like those with a scansion obsession (due as\na rule to Exercises in Latin Verse), have little understanding\nof poetry. We pay attention to externals when we do not know\nwhat else to do with a poem.\n\n[9] G. W. Mackail, _Lectures on Poetry_. Introduction.\n\n[10] We can diagrammatically represent the delusion as follows.\nWhat actually occurs is that A, a work of art, causes E an effect\n_in us_, which has the character b; A _causes_ E[b]. We _speak_\nas though we perceived that A has the quality B (Beauty); we are\nperceiving A[B]; and if we are not careful we think so too. No one\nof our recent revolutions in thought is more important than this\nprogressive rediscovery of what we are talking about. It is being\ninevitably followed by wide changes in our attitudes to the world and\nto fellow-creatures. One current in this change is towards tolerance,\nanother towards scepticism, a third towards far more secure founding\nof our motives of action. The startling philosophical changes in the\ngeneral outlook sometimes\u2019 predicted for Relativity (or for popular\nideas about it when once they become widespread) appear likely, if\nthey occur at all, to be engulfed by these more unobtrusive but more\ndomestic changes.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV\n\nCommunication and the Artist\n\n Poetry is the record of the best and happiest moments of the happiest\n and best minds.\u2014_The Defence of Poetry_.\n\n\nThe two pillars upon which a theory of criticism must rest are\nan account of value and an account of communication. We do not\nsufficiently realise how great a part of our experience takes\nthe form it does, because we are social beings and accustomed\nto communication from infancy. That we acquire many of our ways\nof thinking and feeling from parents and others is, of course,\na commonplace.\n\nBut the effects of communication go much deeper than this. The\nvery structure of our minds largely determined by the fact that\nman has been engaged in communicating for so many hundreds of\nthousands of years, throughout the course of his human development\nand beyond even that. A large part of the distinctive features\nof the mind are due to its being an instrument for communication.\nAn experience has to be formed, no doubt, before it is communicated,\nbut it takes the form it does largely because it may have to\nbe communicated. The emphasis which natural selection has put\nupon communicative ability is overwhelming.\n\nThere are very many problems of psychology, from those with which\nsome of the exponents of _Gestalt theorie_ are grappling to those by\nwhich psycho-analysts are bewildered, for which this neglected, this\nalmost overlooked aspect of the mind may provide a key, but it is\npre-eminently in regard to the arts that it is of service. For the\narts are the supreme form of the communicative activity. As we shall\nsee, most of the difficult and obscure points about the structures of\nthe arts, for example the priority of formal elements to content,[11]\nor the impersonality and detachment so much stressed by \u00e6stheticians,\nbecome easily intelligible as soon as we consider them from this angle.\nBut a possible misunderstanding must be guarded against. Although it is\nas a communicator that it is most profitable to consider the artist,\nit is by no means true that he commonly looks upon himself in this\nlight. In the course of his work he is not as a rule deliberately and\nconsciously engaged in a communicative endeavour. When asked, he is\nmore likely than not to reply that communication is an irrelevant or\nat best a minor issue, and that what he is making is something which\nis beautiful in itself, or satisfying to him personally, or something\nexpressive, in a more or less vague sense, of his emotions, or of\nhimself, something personal and individual. That other people are\ngoing to study it, and to receive experiences from it may seem to him\na merely accidental, inessential circumstance. More modestly still, he\nmay say that when he works he is merely amusing himself.\n\nThat the artist is not as a mule consciously concerned with communication,\nbut with getting the work, the poem or play or statue or painting\nor whatever it is, \u2018right\u2019, apparently regardless of its communicative\nefficacy, is easily explained. To make the work \u2018embody\u2019, accord\nwith, and represent the precise experience upon which its value\ndepends is his major preoccupation, in difficult cases an overmastering\npreoccupation, and the dissipation of attention which would be\ninvolved if he considered the communicative side as a separate\nissue would be fatal in most serious work. He cannot stop to\nconsider how the public or even how especially well qualified\nsections of the public may like it or respond to it. He is wise,\ntherefore, to keep all such considerations out of mind altogether.\nThose artists and poets who can be suspected of close separate\nattention to the communicative aspect tend (there are exceptions\nto this, of which Shakespeare might be one) to fall into a subordinate\nrank.\n\nBut this conscious neglect of communication does not in the least\ndiminish the importance of the communicative aspect. It would\nonly do so if we were prepared to admit that only our conscious\nactivities matter. The very process of getting the work \u2018right\u2019\nhas itself, so far as the artist is normal,[12] immense communicative\nconsequences. Apart from certain special cases, to be discussed\nlater, it will, when \u2018right\u2019, have much greater communicative\npower than it would have had if \u2018wrong\u2019. The degree to which\nit accords with the relevant experience of the artist is a measure\nof the degree to which it will arouse similar experiences in\nothers.\n\nBut more narrowly the reluctance of the artist to consider communication\nas one of his main aims, and his denial that he is at all influenced\nin his\u2019 work by a desire to affect other people, is no evidence\nthat communication is not actually his principal object. On a\nsimple view of psychology, which overlooked unconscious motives,\nit would be, but not on any view of human behaviour which is\nin the least adequate. When we find the artist constantly struggling\ntowards impersonality, towards a structure for his work which\nexcludes his private, eccentric, momentary idiosyncrasies, and\nusing always as its basis those elements which are most uniform\nin their effects upon impulses; when we find private works of\nart, works which satisfy the artist,[13] but are incomprehensible\nto everybody else, so rare, and the publicity of the work so\nconstantly and so intimately bound up with its appeal to the\nartist himself, it is difficult to believe that efficacy for\ncommunication is not a main part of the \u2018rightness\u2019[14] which\nthe artist may suppose to be something quite different.\n\nHow far desire actually to communicate, as distinguished from\ndesire to produce something with communicative efficacy (however\ndisguised), is an \u2018unconscious motive\u2019 in the artist is a question\nto which we need not hazard an answer. Doubtless individual artists\nvary enormously. To some the lure of \u2018immortality\u2019 of enduring\nfame, of a permanent place in the influences which govern the\nhuman mind, appears to be very strong. To others it is often\nnegligible. The degree to which such notions are avowed certainly\nvaries with current social and intellectual fashions. At present\nthe appeal to posterity, the \u2018nurslings of immortality\u2019 attitude\nto works of art appears to be much out of favour. \u201cHow do we\nknow what posterity will be like? They may be awful people!\u201d\na contemporary is likely to remark, thus confusing the issue.\nFor the appeal is not to posterity merely as living at a certain\ndate, but as especially qualified to judge, a qualification most\nposterities have lacked.\n\nWhat concerns criticism is not the avowed or unavowed motives\nof the artist, however interesting these may be to psychology,\nbut the fact that his procedure does, in the majority of instances,\nmake the communicative efficacy of his work correspond with his\nown satisfaction and sense of its rightness. This may be due\nmerely to his normality, or it may be due to unavowed motives.\nThe first suggestion is the more plausible. In any case it is\ncertain that no mere careful study of communicative possibilities,\ntogether with any desire to communicate, however intense, is\never sufficient without close natural correspondence between\nthe poet\u2019s impulses and possible impulses in his reader. All\nsupremely successful communication involves this correspondence,\nand no planning can take its place. Nor is the deliberate conscious\nattempt directed to communication so successful as the unconscious\nindirect method.\n\nThus the artist is entirely justified in his apparent neglect\nof the main purpose of his work. And when in what follows he\nis alluded to without qualification as being primarily concerned\nwith communication, the reservations here made should be recalled.\n\n\n\nSince the poet\u2019s unconscious motives have been alluded to, it\nmay be well at this point to make a few additional remarks. Whatever\npsycho-analysts may aver, the mental processes of the poet are\nnot a very profitable field for investigation. They offer far\ntoo happy a hunting-ground for uncontrollable conjecture. Much\nthat goes to produce a poem is, of course, unconscious. Very\nlikely the unconscious processes are more important than the\nconscious, but even if we knew far more than we do about how\nthe mind works, the attempt to display the inner working of the\nartist\u2019s mind by the evidence of his work alone must be subject\nto the gravest dangers. And to judge by the published work of\nFreud upon Leonardo da Vinci or of Jung upon Goethe (e.g. _The\nPsychology of the Unconscious_, p. 305), psycho-analysts tend\nto be peculiarly inept as critics.\n\nThe difficulty is that nearly all speculations as to what went\non in the artist\u2019s mind are unverifiable, even more unverifiable\nthan the similar speculations as to the dreamer\u2019s mind. The most\nplausible explanations are apt to depend upon features whose\nactual causation is otherwise. I do not know whether anyone but\nMr Graves has attempted to analyse _Kubla Khan_, a poem\nwhich by its mode of composition and by its subject suggests\nitself as well fitted for analysis. The reader acquainted with\ncurrent methods of analysis can imagine the results of a thoroughgoing\nFreudian onslaught.\n\nIf he will then open _Paradise Lost_, Book IV at line 223,\nand read onwards: for sixty lines, he will encounter the actual\nsources of not a few of the images and phrases of the poem. In\nspite of\u2014\n\n Southward through _Eden_ went a River large,\n Nor changed his course, but through the shaggie hill\n Pass\u2019d underneath ingulft . . .\n\nin spite of\u2014\n\n Rose a fresh Fountain, and with many a rill\n Waterd the Garden; thence united fell\n Down the steep glade, and met the neather Flood . . .\n\nin spite of\u2014\n\n Rowling on Orient Pearl and sands of Gold\n With mazie error under pendant shades\n Ran Nectar . . .\n\nin spite of\u2014\n\n Meanwhile murmuring waters fall\n Down the slope hills, disperst . . .\n\nhis doubts may still linger until he reaches\n\n Nor where _Abassin_ Kings thir issue Guard,\n Mount Amara.\n\nand one of the most cryptic points in Coleridge\u2019s poem, the Abyssinian\nmaid, singing of Mount Abora, finds its simple explanation. The\nclosing line of the poem perhaps hardly needs this kind of derivation.\n\nFrom one source or another almost all the matter of _Kubla\nKhan_ came to Coleridge in a similar fashion. I do not know\nwhether this particular indebtedness has been remarked before,\nbut _Purchas his Pilgrimage_, Bartram\u2019s _Travels in North\nand South Carolina_, and Maurice\u2019s _History of Hindostan_\nare well-known sources, some of them indicated by Coleridge himself.\n\nThis very representative instance of the unconscious working\nof a poet\u2019s mind may serve as a not inapposite warning against\none kind at least of possible applications of psychology in criticism.\n\n\n\nThe extent to which the arts and their place in the whole scheme\nof human affairs have been misunderstood, by Critics, Moralists,\nEducators, \u00c6stheticians . . . is somewhat difficult to explain.\nOften those who most misunderstood have been perfect in their\ntaste and ability to respond, Ruskin for example. Those who both\nknew what to do with a work of art and also understood what they\nwere doing, have been for the most part artists and little inclined\nfor, or capable of, the rather special task of explaining. It\nmay have seemed to them too obvious to need explanation. Those\nwho have tried have as a rule been foiled by language. For the\ndifficulty which has always prevented the arts from being explained\nas well as \u2018enjoyed\u2019 (to use an inadequate word in default of\nan adequate) is language.\n\n \u201cHappy who can\n Appease this virtuous enemy of man!\u201d\n\nIt was perhaps never so necessary as now that we should know\nwhy the arts are important and avoid inadequate answers. It will\nprobably become increasingly more important in the future. Remarks\nsuch as these, it is true, are often uttered by enthusiastic\npersons, and are apt to be greeted with the same smile as the\nassertion that the future of England is bound up with Hunting.\nYet their full substantiation will be found to involve issues\nwhich are nowhere lightly regarded.\n\nThe arts are our storehouse of recorded values. They spring from\nand perpetuate hours in the lives of exceptional people, when\ntheir control and command of experience is at its highest, hours\nwhen the varying possibilities of existence are most clearly\nseen and the different activities which may arise are most exquisitely\nreconciled, hours when habitual narrowness of interests or confused\nbewilderment are replaced by an intricately wrought composure.\nBoth in the genesis of a work of art, in the creative moment,\nand in its aspect as a vehicle of communication, reasons can\nbe found for giving to the arts a very important place in the\ntheory of Value. They record the most important judgments we\npossess as to the values of experience. They form a body of\nevidence which, for lack of a serviceable psychology by which\nto interpret it, and through the desiccating influence of abstract\nEthics, has been left almost untouched by professed students\nof value. An odd omission, for without the assistance of the\narts we could compare very few of our experiences, and without\nsuch comparison we could hardly hope to agree as to which are\nto be preferred. Very simple experiences\u2014a cold bath in an enamelled\ntin, or running for a train\u2014may to some extent be compared without\nelaborate vehicles; and friends exceptionally well acquainted\nwith one another may manage some rough comparisons in ordinary\nconversation. But subtle or recondite experiences are for most\nmen incommunicable and indescribable, though social conventions\nor terror of the loneliness of the human situation may make us\npretend the contrary. In the arts we find the record in the only\nform in which these things can be recorded of the experiences\nwhich have seemed worth having to the most sensitive and discriminating\npersons. Through the obscure perception of this fact the poet\nhas been regarded as a seer and the artist as a priest, suffering\nfrom usurpations. The arts, if rightly approached, supply the\nbest data available for deciding what experiences are more valuable\nthan others. The qualifying clause is all-important however.\nHappily there is no lack of glaring examples to remind us of\nthe difficulty of approaching them rightly.\n\n[11] See Chapter XXIV.\n\n[12] This point will be discussed in Chapter XXIV.\n\n[13] Again the normality of the artist has to be considered.\n\n[14] As will be seen, I am not going to identify \u2018beauty\u2019 with\n\u2018communicative efficacy\u2019. This is a trap which it is easy to\nfall into. A number of the exoteric followers of Croce may be\nfound in it, though not Croce himself.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V\n\nThe Critics\u2019 Concern with Value\n\n What hinders? Are you beam-blind, yet to a fault\n In a neighbour deft-handed? Are you that liar?\n And cast by conscience out, spendsavour salt?\n _Gerard Hopkins_.\n\n\nBetween the general inquiry into the nature of the good and the\nappreciation of particular works of art, there may seem to be\na wide gap, and the discussion upon which we are about to embark\nmay appear a roundabout way of approaching our subject. Morals\nhave often been treated, especially in recent times, as a side-issue\nfor criticism, from which the special concern of the critic must\nbe carefully separated. His business, so it has been said, is\nwith the work of art in itself, not with any consequences which\nlie outside it. These may be left, it has been supposed, to others\nfor attention, to the clergy perhaps or to the police.\n\nThat these authorities are sadly incompetent is a minor disadvantage.\nTheir blunderings are as a rule so ridiculous that the effects\nare brief. They often serve a useful purpose in calling attention\nto work which might be overlooked. What is more serious is that\nthese indiscretions, vulgarities and absurdities encourage the\nview that morals have little or nothing to do with the arts,\nand the even more unfortunate opinion that the arts have no connection\nwith morality. The ineptitudes of censors, their choice of censorable\nobjects, ignoble blasphemy, such as that which declared _Esther\nWaters_ an impure book, displays of such intelligence as considered\n_Madame Bovary_ an apology for adulterous wrong, innumerable\ncomic, stupefying, enraging interferences fully explain this\nattitude, but they do not justify it.\n\nThe common avoidance of all discussion of the wider social and\nmoral aspects of the arts by people of steady judgment and strong\nheads is a misfortune, for it leaves the field free for folly,\nand cramps the scope of good critics unduly. So loath have they\nbeen to be thought at large with the wild asses that they have\nvirtually shut themselves up in a paddock. If the competent are\nto refrain because of the antics of the unqualified, an evil\nand a loss which are neither temporary nor trivial increase continually.\nIt is as though medical men were all to retire because of the\nimpudence of quacks. For the critic is as closely occupied with\nthe health of the mind as the doctor with the health of the body.\nIn a different way, it is true, and with a wider and subtler\ndefinition of health, by which the healthiest mind is that capable\nof securing the greatest amount of value.\n\nThe critic cannot possibly avoid using some ideas about value.\nHis whole occupation is an application and exercise of his ideas\non the subject, and an avoidance of moral preoccupations on his\npart can only be either an abdication or a rejection under the\ntitle of \u2018morality\u2019 of what he considers to be mistaken or dishonest\nideas and methods. The term has a dubious odour, it has been\nhandled by many objectionable as well as admirable people, and\nwe may agree to avoid it. But the errors exemplified by censorship\nexploits are too common, and misconceptions as to the nature\nof value too easy to fall into and too widespread, for useful\ncriticism to remain without a general theory and an explicit\nset of principles.\n\nWhat is needed is a defensible position for those who believe\nthat the arts are of value. Only a general theory of value which\nwill show the place and function of the arts in the whole system\nof values will provide such a stronghold. At the same time we\nneed weapons with which to repel and overthrow misconceptions.\nWith the increase of population the problem presented by the\ngulf between what is preferred by the majority and what is accepted\nas excellent by the most qualified opinion has become infinitely\nmore serious and appears likely to become threatening in the\nnear future. For many reasons standards are much more in need\nof defence than they used to be. It is perhaps premature to envisage\na collapse of values, a transvaluation by which popular taste\nreplaces trained discrimination. Yet commercialism has done stranger\nthings: we have not yet fathomed the more sinister potentialities\nof the cinema and the loud-speaker, and there is some evidence,\nuncertain and slight no doubt, that such things as \u2018best-sellers\u2019\n(compare _Tarzan_ with _She_), magazine verses, mantelpiece\npottery, Academy pictures, Music Hall songs, County Council buildings,\nWar Memorials . . . are decreasing in merit. Notable exceptions,\nin which the multitude are better advised than the experts, of\ncourse occur sometimes, but not often.\n\nTo bridge the gulf, to bring the level of popular appreciation\nnearer to the consensus of best qualified opinion, and to defend\nthis opinion against damaging attacks (Tolstoy\u2019s is a typical\nexample), a much clearer account than has yet been produced,\nof why this opinion is right, is essential. These attacks are\ndangerous, because they appeal to a natural instinct, hatred\nof \u2018superior persons\u2019. The expert in-matters of taste is in an\nawkward position when he differs from the majority. He is forced\nto say in effect, \u201cI am better than you. My taste is more refined,\nmy nature more cultured, you will do well to become more like\nme than you are.\u201d It is not his fault that he has to be so arrogant.\nHe may, and usually does, disguise the fact as far as possible,\nbut his claim to be heard as an expert depends upon the truth\nof these assumptions. He ought then to be ready with reasons\nof a clear and convincing kind as to why his preferences are\nworth attention, and until these reasons are forthcoming, the\naccusations that he is a charlatan and a prig are embarrassing.\nHe may indeed point to years of preoccupation with his subject,\nhe may remark like the wiseacre Longinus, sixteen hundred years\nago, \u201cThe judgment of literature is the final outcome of much\nendeavour,\u201d but with him are many Professors to prove that years\nof endeavour may lead to nothing very remarkable in the end.\n\nTo habilitate the critic, to defend accepted standards against\nTolstoyan attacks, to narrow the interval between these standards\nand popular taste, to protect the arts against the crude moralities\nof Puritans and perverts, a general theory of value, which will\nnot leave the statement \u201cThis is good, that bad,\u201d either vague\nor arbitrary, must be provided. There is no alternative open.\nNor is it such an excursus from the inquiry into the nature of\nthe arts as may be supposed. For if a well-grounded theory of\nvalue is a necessity for criticism, it is no less true that an\nunderstanding of what happens in the arts is needed for the theory.\nThe two problems \u201cWhat is good?\u201d and \u201cWhat are the arts?\u201d reflect\nlight upon one another. Neither in fact can be fully answered\nwithout the other.\n\nTo the unravelling of the first we may now proceed.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI\n\nValue as an Ultimate Idea\n\n Some lovely glorious nothing I did see.\u2014_Aire and Angels_.\n\n\nIt has always been found far more easy to divide experiences[15]\ninto good and bad, valuable and the reverse, than to discover\nwhat we are doing when we make the division. The history of opinions\nas to what constitutes value, as to why and when anything is\nrightly called good, shows a bewildering variety. But in modern\ntimes the controversy narrows itself down to two questions. The\nfirst of these is whether the difference between experiences\nwhich are valuable and those which are not can be fully described\nin psychological terms; whether some additional distinctive \u2018ethical\u2019\nor \u2018moral\u2019 idea of a non-psychological nature is or is not required.\nThe second question concerns the exact psychological analysis\nneeded in order to explain value if no further \u2018ethical\u2019 idea\nis shown to be necessary.\n\nThe first question will not detain us long. It has been ably\nmaintained[16] and widely accepted that when we say that an experience\nis good we are simply saying that it is endowed with a certain\nethical property or attribute not to be reduced to any psychological\nproperties or attributes such as being desired or approved, and\nthat no further elucidation of this special ethical property\nby way of analysis is possible. \u2018Good\u2019 on this view is in no\nway a shorthand term for some more explicit account. The things\nwhich are good, it is held, are just good, possess a property\nwhich can be recognised by immediate intuition, and here, since\ngood is unanalysable, the matter must rest. All that the study\nof value can do is to point out the things which possess this\nproperty, classify them, and remove certain confusions between\nends which are good in themselves and means which are only called\ngood, because they are instrumental in the attainment of intrinsically\ngood ends. Usually those who maintain this view also hold that\nthe only things which are good for their own sakes and not merely\nas a means are certain conscious experiences, for example, knowledge,\nadmiring contemplation of beauty, and feelings of affection and\nveneration under some circumstances. Other things, such as mountains,\nbooks, railways, courageous actions, are good instrumentally\nbecause, and in so far as, they cause or make possible states\nof mind which are valuable intrinsically. Thus the occurrence\nof states of mind which are recognised as good is regarded as\nan isolated fact of experience, not capable of being accounted\nfor, or linked up with the rest of human peculiarities as a product\nof development in the way made familiar by the biological sciences.\n\nThe plausibility of this view derives principally from the metaphysical\nassumption that there are properties, in the sense of subsistent\nentities, which attach to existent particulars, but which might\nwithout absurdity be supposed to attach to nothing.\n\nThese metaphysical entities, variously named Ideas, Notions,\nConcepts or Universals, may be divided into two kinds, sensuous\nand supersensuous.[17] The sensuous are those which may be apprehended\nby the senses, such as \u2018red\u2019, \u2018cold\u2019, \u2018round\u2019, \u2018swift\u2019, \u2018painful\u2019,\nand the supersensuous, those apprehended not in sensuous perception\nbut otherwise. Logical relations, \u2018necessity\u2019 or \u2018impossibility,\u2019\nand such ideas as \u2018willing\u2019, \u2018end\u2019, \u2018cause\u2019, and \u2018being three\nin number\u2019, have in this way been supposed to be directly apprehensible\nby the mind. Amongst these supersensuous Ideas good is to be\nfound.\n\nNothing could be simpler than such a view, and to many people\nthe subsistence of such a property of goodness appears not surprising.\nBut to others the suggestion seems merely a curious survival\nof abstractionism, if such a term may be defended by its close\nparallel with obstructionism. A blind man in a dark room chasing\na black cat which is not there would seem to them well employed\nin comparison with a philosopher apprehending such \u2018Concepts\u2019.\nWhile ready for convenience of discourse to talk and even to\nthink as though Concepts and Particulars were separable and distinct\nkinds of entities, they refuse to believe that the structure\nof the world actually contains such a cleavage. The point is\nperhaps undiscussable, and is probably unimportant, except in\nso far as the habit of regarding the world as actually so cloven\nis a fruitful source of bogus entities, usually hypostatised\nwords. The temptation to introduce premature ultimates\u2014Beauty\nin \u00c6sthetics, the Mind and its faculties in psychology, Life\nin physiology, are representative examples\u2014is especially great\nfor believers in Abstract Entities. The objection to such Ultimates\nis that they bring an investigation to a dead end too suddenly.\nAn ultimate Good is, in this instance, just such an arbitrary\nfull stop.\n\nIt will be agreed that a less cryptic account of good, if one\ncan be given, which is in accordance with verifiable facts, would\nbe preferable, even though no means were available for refuting\nthe simpler theory. Upholders of this theory, however, have produced\ncertain arguments to show that no other view of good is possible,\nand these must first be briefly examined. They provide, in addition,\nan excellent example of the misuse of psychological assumptions\nin research, for although a psychological approach is often of\nthe utmost service, it can also be a source of obscurantism and\nover-confidence. The arguments against any naturalistic account\ndepend upon the alleged results of directly inspecting what is\nbefore our minds when we judge that anything is good. If we substitute,\nit is maintained, any account of good whatever for \u2018good\u2019 in\nthe assertion, \u2018This is good\u2019\u2014for example, \u2018This is desired\u2019\nor \u2018This is approved\u2019\u2014we can detect that what is substituted\nis different from \u2018good\u2019, and that we are not then making the\nsame judgment. This result, it is claimed, is confirmed by the\nfact that we can always ask, \u201cIs what is desired, or what is\napproved, good?\u201d however we may elaborate the account provided,\nand that this is always a genuine question which would be impossible\nwere the substituted account actually the analysis of good.\n\nThe persuasiveness of this refutation is found to vary enormously\nfrom individual to individual, for the results of the experiments\nupon which it relies differ. Those who have accustomed themselves to\nthe belief that good is a supersensuous simple Idea readily discover\nthe fraudulent character of any offered substitute, while those who\nhold some psychological theory of value, with equal ease identify\ntheir account with \u2018good\u2019. The further question, \u201cWhen and under what\nconditions can judgments be distinguished?\u201d arises, a question so\ndifficult to answer that any argument becomes suspect which depends\nupon assuming that they can be infallibly recognised as different. If\nfor any reason we wish to distinguish two judgments, we can persuade\nourselves, in any case in which they are differently formulated, that\nthey are different. Thus it has been thought that \u2018_a_ exceeds _b_\u2019 and\n\u2018_a_ is greater than _b_\u2019 are distinguishable, the first being supposed\nto state simply that _a_ has the relation \u2018exceeds\u2019 to _b_, while the\nsecond is supposed to state that _a_ has the relation \u2018is\u2019 to _greater_\nwhich again has the relation \u2018than\u2019 to _b_.[18] The conclusion to\nbe drawn from the application of such methods to the problem of the\nmeaning of Good would seem to be that they are not competent to decide\nanything about it\u2014by no means a valueless result.\n\nSince nothing can be concluded from a comparison of \u2018This is\ngood\u2019 with, let us say, \u2018This is sought by an impulse belonging\nto a dominant group\u2019, let us see whether light can be gained\nby considering analogous instances in which special distinct\nideas have for a time been thought indispensable only to yield\nlater to analysis and substitution. The case of Beauty is perhaps\ntoo closely related to that of Good for our purpose. Those who\ncan persuade themselves that Good is an unique irreducible entity\nmight believe the same of Beauty. An episode in the theory of\nthe tides is more instructive. It was once thought that the moon\nmust have a peculiar Affinity with water: When the moon is full\nthe tides are higher. Clearly the seas swell in sympathy with\nthe increase of the moon. The history of science is full of mysterious\nunique entities which have gradually evaporated as explanation\nadvanced.\n\nThe struggles of economists with \u2018utility\u2019, of mathematical philosophers\nwith \u2018points\u2019 and \u2018instants\u2019, of biologists with \u2018entelechies\u2019,\nand the adventures of psycho-analysts with \u2018the libido\u2019 and \u2018the\ncollective unconscious\u2019 are instances in point. At present theoretical\npsychology in particular is largely made up of the manipulation\nof similar suspects. The Act of Judgment, the relation of Presentation,\nImmediate Awareness, Direct Inspection, the Will, Feeling, Assumption,\nAcceptance, are only a few of the provisional ultimates introduced\nfor convenience of discussion. Some of them may in the end prove\nto be indispensable, but meanwhile they are not, to prudent people,\nmore than symbolic conveniences; theories dependent upon them\nmust not be allowed to shut off from investigation fields which\nmay be fruitful.\n\n[15] Throughout this discussion \u2018experience\u2019 will be used in a\nwide sense to stand for any occurrence in the mind. It is equivalent\nto \u2018mental state, or process.\u2019 The term has often unfortunate\nsuggestions of passiveness and of consciousness, but many of\nthe \u2018experiences\u2019 here referred to would ordinarily be called\n\u2018actions\u2019 and have parts which are not conscious and not accessible\nto introspection as important as those which are.\n\n[16] A chief advocate of this view is Dr G. E. Moore, whose _Principia\nEthica_ and _Ethics_ contain brilliant statements of the position.\n\n[17] Cf. F. Brentano, _The Origin of the Knowledge of Right and Wrong_,\npp. 12, 46.\n\n[18] Cf. Russell, _The Principles of Mathematics_, p. 100. \u201cOn this\nprinciple, from which I can see no escape, that every genuine word\nmust have some meaning, the _is_ and _than_ must form part of \u2018_a_\nis greater than _b_\u2019, which thus contains more than two terms and\na relation. The _is_ seems to state that _a_ has to _greater_ the\nrelation of referent, while the _than_ states similarly that _b_ has to\n_greater_ the relation of relatum. But \u2018_a_ exceeds _b_\u2019 may be held to\nexpress solely the relation of _a_ to _b_, without including any of the\nimplications of further relations.\u201d On the introspective comparison of\njudgments _The Meaning of Meaning_, by C. K. Ogden and the writer, may\nbe consulted.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII\n\nA Psychological Theory of Value\n\n Hands that can grasp, eyes\n that can dilate, hair that can rise\n if it must, these things are important not because a\n high-sounding interpretation can be put upon them, but because they are\n useful.\u2014_Marianne Moore_.\n\n\nThe method then by which any attempt to analyse \u2018good\u2019 has been\ncondemned is itself objectionable, and yields no sound reason\nwhy a purely psychological account of the differences between\ngood, bad, and indifferent experiences should not be given. The\ndata for the inquiry are in part supplied by anthropology. It\nhas become clear that the disparity among the states of mind\nrecognised as good by persons of different races, habits and\ncivilisations is overwhelming. Any observant child, it is true,\nmight discover in the home circle how widely people disagree,\nbut the effect of education is to suppress these scientific efforts.\nIt has needed the vast accumulations of anthropological evidence\nnow available to establish the fact that as the organisation\nof life and affairs alters very different experiences are perceived\nto be good or bad, are favoured or condemned. The Bakairi of\nCentral Brazil and the Tahitians, among others, are reported,\nfor example, to look upon eating with the same feelings which\nwe reserve for quite different physiological performances, and\nto regard the public consumption of food as a grave breach of\ndecency. In many parts of the world feelings of forgiveness towards\nenemies, for example, are looked upon as low and ignoble. The\nexperiences which one person values are thought vicious by another.\nWe must allow, it is true, for widespread confusion between intrinsic\nand instrumental values, and for the difficulty of identifying\nexperiences. Many states of mind in other people which we judge\nto be bad or indifferent are no doubt unlike what we imagine\nthem to be, or contain elements which we overlook, so that with\nfuller knowledge we might discover them to be good. In this manner\nit may be possible to reduce the reported disparity of value\nintuitions, but few people acquainted with the varying moral\njudgments of mankind will doubt that circumstances and necessities,\npresent and past, explain our approval and disapproval. We start,\nthen, with a hearty scepticism of all immediate intuitions, and\ninquire how it is that individuals in different conditions, and\nat different stages of their development, esteem things so differently.\n\nWith the exception of some parents and nursemaids we have lately\nall been aghast at revelations of the value judgments of infants.\nTheir impulses, their desires, their preferences, the things\nwhich they esteem, as displayed by the psycho-analysts, strike\neven those whose attitude towards humanity is not idealistic\nwith some dismay. Even when the stories are duly discounted,\nenough which is verifiable remains for _infans polypervers_\nto present a truly impressive figure dominating all future psychological\ninquiry into value.\n\nThere is no need here to examine in detail how these early impulses\nare diverted and disguised by social pressures. The rough outlines\nare familiar of the ways in which by growth, by the appearance\nof fresh instinctive tendencies, by increase of knowledge and\nof command over the world, under the control of custom, magical\nbeliefs, public opinion, inculcation and example, the primitive\nnew-born animal may be gradually transformed into a bishop. At\nevery stage in the astonishing metamorphosis, the impulses, desires,\nand propensities of the individual take on a new form, or, it\nmay be, a further degree of systematisation. This systematisation\nis never complete. Always some impulse, or set of impulses, can\nbe found which in one way or another interferes, or conflicts,\nwith others. It may do so in two ways, directly or indirectly.\nSome impulses are in themselves psychologically incompatible,\nsome are incompatible only indirectly, through producing contrary\neffects in the world outside. The difficulty some people have\nin smoking and writing at the same time is a typical instance\nof the first kind of incompatibility; the two activities get\nin each other\u2019s way by a psychological accident as it were. Interference\nof this kind can be overcome by practice to an unexpected degree,\nas the feats of jugglers show; some, however, are insurmountable;\nand these incompatibilities are often, as we shall see, of supreme\nconsequence in moral development. Indirect incompatibilities\narising through the consequences of our acts are more easy to\nfind. Our whole existence is one long study of them, from the\ninfant\u2019s first choice whether he shall use his mouth for screaming\nor for sucking, to the last codicil to his Will.\n\nThese are simple instances, but the conduct of life is throughout\nan attempt to organise impulses so that success is obtained for\nthe greater number or mass of them, for the most important and\nthe weightiest set. And here we come face to face again with\nthe problem of value. How shall we decide which among these are\nmore important than: others, and how shall we distinguish different\norganisations as yielding more or less value one than another?\nAt this point we need to be on our guard not to smuggle in any\npeculiar ethical, non-psychological, idea under some disguise,\nunder \u2018important\u2019 or \u2018fundamental\u2019, for example.\n\nAmong those who reject any metaphysical view of value it has\nbecome usual to define value as capacity for satisfying feeling\nand desire in various intricate ways.[19] For the purpose of tracing\nin detail the very subtle and varied modes in which people actually\nvalue things, a highly intricate treatment is indispensable,\nbut here a simpler definition will suffice.\n\nWe may start from the fact that impulses may be divided into\nappetencies and aversions, and begin by saying that anything\nis valuable which satisfies an appetency or \u2018seeking after.\u2019\nThe term \u2018desire\u2019 would do as well if we could avoid the implication\nof accompanying conscious beliefs as to what is sought and a\nfurther restriction to felt and recognised longings. The term\n\u2018want\u2019 used so much by economists has the same disadvantages.\nAppetencies may be, and for the most part are, unconscious, and\nto leave out those which we cannot discover by introspection\nwould involve extensive errors. For the same reason it is wiser\nnot to start from feeling. Appetencies then, rather than felt\nappetencies or desires, shall be our starting-point.\n\nThe next step is to agree that apart from consequences anyone\n_will actually prefer_ to satisfy a greater number of equal\nappetencies rather than a less. Observation of people\u2019s behaviour,\nincluding our own, is probably sufficient to establish this agreement.\nIf now we look to see what consequences can intervene to upset\nthis simple principle, we shall find that only interferences,\nimmediate or remote, direct: or indirect, with other appetencies,\nneed to be considered. The only _psychological_ restraints\nupon appetencies are other appetencies.[20]\n\nWe can now extend our definition. Anything is valuable which\nwill satisfy an appetency without involving the frustration of\nsome equal or _more important_ appetency; in other words,\nthe only reason which can be given for not satisfying a desire\nis that more important desires will thereby be thwarted. Thus\nmorals become purely prudential, and ethical codes merely the\nexpression of the mast general scheme of expediency[21] to which\nan individual or a race has attained. But we have still to say\nwhat \u2018important\u2019 stands for in this formulation. (Cf. p. 51).\n\nThere are certain evident priorities among impulses, some of\nwhich have been studied in various ways by economists under the\nheadings of primary wants and secondary wants. Some needs or\nimpulses must be satisfied in order that others may be possible.\nWe must eat, drink, sleep, breathe, protect ourselves and carry\non an immense physiological business as a condition for any further\nactivities. Some of these impulses, breathing, for example, can\nbe satisfied directly, but most of them involve us in complicated\ncycles of instrumental labour. Man for the most part must exert\nhimself half his life to satisfy even the primitive needs, and\nthese activities, failing other means of reaching the same ends,\nshare their priority. In their turn they involve as conditions\na group of impulses, whose satisfaction becomes only second in\nimportance to physiological necessities, those, namely, upon\nwhich communication and the ability to co-operate depend. But\nthese, since man is a social creature, also become more directly\nnecessary to his well-being.\n\nThe very impulses which enable him to co-operate in gaining his\ndinner would themselves, if not satisfied, wreck by their mere\nfrustration all his activities. This happens all through the\nhierarchy. Impulses, whose exercise may have been originally\nonly important as means, and which might once have been replaced\nby quite different sets, become in time necessary conditions\nfor innumerable quite different performances. Objects, again,\noriginally valued because they satisfy one need, are found later\nto be also capable of satisfying others. Dress, for example,\nappears to have originated in magical, \u2018life-giving,\u2019 ornaments[22],\nbut so many other interests derive satisfaction from it that\ncontroversy can still arise as to its primitive uses.\n\nThe instances of priorities given must only be taken as examples.\nIt is hardly necessary to remind the reader that for a civilised\nman, activities originally valuable as means only, often become\nso important through their connections with the rest of his activities,\nthat life without them is regarded as intolerable. Thus acts\nwhich will debar him from his normal relations with his fellows\nare often avoided, even at the cost of death. Total cessation\nof all activities is preferred to the dreadful thwarting and\nprivation which would ensue. The case of the soldier, or of the\nconscientious objector, is thus no exception to the principle.\nLife deprived of all but the barest physiological necessities,\nfor example, prison life, is for many people worse than non-existence.\nThose who even so incur it in defence of some \u2018moral ideal\u2019 do\nso because they are so organised, either permanently or temporarily,\nthat only in this way can their dominant impulses secure satisfaction.\nThe self-regarding impulses form only a part of the total activities\nof social man, and the impulse of the martyr to bear witness\nat any cost to what he regards as truth, is only one extreme\ninstance of the degree to which other impulses often assume supremacy.\n\nFor another reason any priorities mentioned must be taken only\nas illustrations. We do not know enough yet about the precedences,\nthe hierarchies, the modes of systematisation, actual and possible,\nin that unimaginable organisation, the mind, to say what order\nin any case actually exists, or between what the order holds.\nWe only know that a growing order is the principle of the mind,\nthat its function is to co-ordinate, and we can detect that in\nsome of its forms the precedence is different from that in others.\nThis we could do by observation, by comparing the drunken man\nwith the sober, but from our own experience of our own activity\nwe can go much further. We can feel differences between clear\ncoherent thinking and confusion or stupidity, between free, controlled\nemotional response and dull or clogged impassivity, between moments\nwhen we do with our bodies more delicate and dexterous things\nthan seem possible, and moments of clumsiness, when we are \u2018all\nthumbs\u2019, have no \u2018balance\u2019 or \u2018timing\u2019, and nothing \u2018comes off\u2019.\nThese differences are differences in momentary organisation,\ndifferences in precedence between rival possible systematisations.\nThe more permanent and more specifically \u2018moral\u2019 differences\nbetween individuals grow out of differences such as these and\ncorrespond to similar precedences between larger systems.\n\nThe complications possible in the systematisation of impulses\nmight be illustrated indefinitely. The plasticity of special\nappetencies and activities varies enormously. Some impulses can\nbe diverted more easily than others. Sex has a wider range of\nsatisfactions than hunger, for example; some are weaker than\nothers; some (not the same necessarily) can be suppressed in\nthe long run with less difficulty. Some can be modified; some\nobey the \u2018all or none\u2019 rule\u2014they must either be satisfied specifically\nor completely inhibited\u2014well-established habits may have this\npeculiarity. In judging the importance of any impulse all these\nconsiderations must be taken into account. The affiliations of\nimpulses, at present often inexplicable, need especially to be\nconsidered. Within the whole partially systematised organisation,\nnumerous sub-systems can be found, and what would be expected\nto be quite trivial impulses are often discovered to be important,\nbecause they belong to powerful groups. Thus there are reasonable\npersons who, without a high polish on their shoes, are almost\nincapacitated.\n\nThe importance of an impulse, it will be seen, can be defined\nfor our purposes as _the extent of the disturbance of other\nimpulses in the individual\u2019s activities which the thwarting of\nthe impulse involves_. A vague definition, it is true, but\ntherefore suitable to our at present incomplete and hazy knowledge\nof how impulses are related. It will be observed that no special\nethical idea is introduced. We can now take our next step forward\nand inquire into the relative merits of different systematisations.\n\nNo individual can live one minute without a very intricate and,\nso far as it goes, very perfect co-ordination of impulses. It\nis only when we pass from the activities which from second to\nsecond maintain life to those which from hour to hour determine\nwhat kind of life it shall be, that we find wide differences.\nFortunately for psychology we can each find wide enough differences\nin ourselves from hour to hour. Most people in the same day are\nBonaparte and Oblomov by turns. Before breakfast Diogenes, after\ndinner Petronius or Bishop Usher. But throughout these mutations\ncertain dispositions usually remain much the same, those which\ngovern public behaviour in a limited number of affairs varying\nvery greatly from one society or civilisation to another. Every\nsystematisation in the degree to which it is stable involves\na degree of sacrifice, but for some the price to be paid in opportunities\nforegone is greater than for others. By the extent of the loss,\nthe range of impulses thwarted or starved, and their degree of\nimportance, the merit of a systematisation is judged. That organisation\nwhich is least wasteful of human possibilities is, in short,\nthe best. Some individuals, hag-ridden by their vices, or their\nvirtues, to a point at which the law of diminishing returns has\ndeprived even these of their appropriate satisfactions, are still\nunable to reorganise; they go through life incapacitated for\nmost of its possible enjoyments.[23] Others, paralysed with their\nconflicts, are unable to do anything freely; whatever they attempt\nsome implicated but baffled impulse is still fitfully and fretfully\nstirring. The debauchee and the victim of conscience alike have\nachieved organisations whose price in sacrifice is excessive.\nBoth their individual satisfactions, and those for which they\nare dependent upon sympathetic relations with their fellows,\nan almost equal group, are unduly restricted. Upon grounds of\nprudence alone they have been injudicious, and they may be condemned\nwithout any appeal to peculiarly \u2018ethical\u2019 standards. The muddle\nin which they are forced to live is itself sufficient ground\nfor reprobation.\n\nAt the other extreme are those fortunate people who have achieved\nan ordered life, whose systems have developed clearing-houses\nby which the varying claims of different impulses are adjusted.\nTheir free, untrammelled activity gains for them a maximum of\nvaried satisfactions and involves a minimum of suppression and\nsacrifice. Particularly is this so with regard to those satisfactions\nwhich require humane, sympathetic, and friendly relations between\nindividuals. The charge of egoism, or selfishness, can be brought\nagainst a naturalistic or utilitarian morality such as this only\nby overlooking the importance of these satisfactions in any well-balanced\nlife. Unfair or aggressive behaviour, and preoccupation with\nself-regarding interests to the exclusion of due sensitiveness\nto the reciprocal claims of human intercourse, lead to a form\nof organisation which deprives the person so organised of whole\nranges of important values. No mere loss of social pleasures\nis in question, but a twist or restriction of impulses, whose\nnormal satisfaction is involved in almost all the greatest goods\nof life. The two senses in which a man may \u2018take advantage\u2019 of\nhis fellows can be observed in practice to conflict. Swindling\nand bullying, whether in business matters or in personal relations,\nhave their cost; which the best judges agree to be excessive.\nAnd the greater part of the cost lies of in the consequences\nof being found out, in the loss of social esteem and so forth,\nbut in actual systematic disability to attain important values.\n\nAlthough the person who habitually disregards the claims of his\nfellows to fair treatment and sympathetic understanding may be\ncondemned, in most cases, upon the ground of his own actual loss\nof values in such behaviour, this of course is not the reason\nfor the steps which may have to be taken against him. It may\nvery well be the case that a person\u2019s own interests are such\nthat, _if he understood them_, were well organised in other\nwords, he would be a useful and charming member of his community;\nbut, so long as people are about who are not well organised,\ncommunities must protect themselves. They can defend their action\non the ground that the general loss of value which would follow\nif they did not protect themselves far outweighs such losses\nas are incurred by the people whom they suppress or deport.\n\nTo extend this individual morality to communal affairs is not\ndifficult. Probably the best brief statement upon the point is\nthe following note by Bentham, if we interpret \u2018happiness\u2019 in\nhis formula not as pleasure but as the satisfaction of impulses.\n\n _June_ 29, 1827.\n\n1. Constantly actual end of action on the part of every individual\nat the moment of action, his greatest happiness, according to\nhis view of it at that moment.\n\n2. Constantly proper end of action on the part of every individual\nat the moment of action, his real greatest happiness from that\nmoment to the end of life.\n\n3. Constantly proper end of action on the part of every individual\nconsidered as trustee for the community, of which he is considered\nas a member, the greatest happiness of that same community, in\nso far as it depends upon the interest which forms the bond of\nunion between its members.[24]\n\nBut communities, as is well known, tend to behave in the same\nway to people who are better organised as well as to people who\nare worse organised than the standard of the group. They deal\nwith Socrates or Bruno as severely as with Turpin or Bottomley.\nThus mere interference with ordinary activities is not by itself\na sufficient justification for excluding from the group people\nwho are different and therefore nuisances. The precise nature\nof the difference must be considered, and whether and to what\ndegree it is the group, not the exceptional member, which ought\nto be condemned. The extent to which alteration is practicable\nis also relevant, and the problem in particular cases becomes\nvery intricate.\n\nBut the final court of appeal concerns itself in such cases with\nquestions, not of the wishes of majorities, but of the actual\nrange and degree of satisfaction which different possible systematisations\nof impulse yield. Resentment at interference and gratitude for\nsupport and assistance are to be distinguished from disapproval\nand approval. The esteem and respect accorded to persons with\nthe social[25] virtues well developed is only in a small degree\ndue to the use which we find we can make of them. It is much\nmore a sense that their lives are rich and full.\n\nWhen any desire is denied for the sake of another, the approved\nand accepted activity takes on additional value; it is coveted\nand pursued all the more for what it has cost. Thus the spectacle\nof other people enjoying both activities without difficulty,\nthanks to some not very obvious adjustment, is peculiarly distressing,\nand such people are usually regarded as especially depraved.\nIn different circumstances this view may or may not be justified.\nThe element of sacrifice exacted by any stable system explains\nto a large extent the tenacity with which custom is clung to,\nthe intolerance directed sea innovations, the fanaticism of converts,\nthe hypocrisy of teachers, and many other lamentable phenomena\nof the moral attitudes. However much an individual may privately\nfind his personality varying from hour to hour, he is compelled\nto join in maintaining a public facade of some rigidity and buttressed\nwith every contrivance which can be invented. The Wills of Gods,\nthe Conscience, the Catechism, Taboos, Immediate Intuitions,\nPenal Laws, Public Opinion, Good Form, are all more or less ingenious\nand efficient devices with the same aim\u2014to secure the uniformity\nwhich social life requires. By their means and by Custom, Convention,\nand Superstition, the underlying basis of morality, the effort\nto attain maximum satisfaction through coherent systematisation,\nis a veiled and disguised to an extraordinary degree. Whence\narise great difficulties and many disasters. It is so necessary\nand so difficult to secure a stable and general system of public\nbehaviour that any means whatever are justifiable, failing the\ndiscovery of better. All societies hitherto achieved, however,\ninvolve waste and misery of appalling extent.\n\nAny public code of behaviour must, it is generally agreed, represent\na cruder and more costly systematisation than those attained\nto by many of the individuals who live under the code, a point\nobviously to be remembered in connection with censorship problems.\nCustoms change more slowly than conditions, and every change\nin conditions brings with it new possibilities of systematisation.\nNone of the afflictions of humanity are worse than its obsolete\nmoral principles. Consider the effects of the obsolete virtues\nof nationalism under modern conditions, or the absurdity of the\nreligious attitude to birth control. The present lack of plasticity\nin such things involves a growing danger. Human conditions and\npossibilities have altered more in a hundred years than they\nhad in the previous ten thousand, and the next fifty may overwhelm\nus, unless we can devise a more adaptable morality. The view\nthat what we need in this tempestuous turmoil of change is a\nRock to shelter under or to cling to, pane than an efficient\naeroplane in which to ride it, is comprehensible but mistaken.\n\nTo guard against a possible misunderstanding it may be added\nthat the organisation and systematisation of which I have been\nspeaking in this chapter are not primarily an affair of conscious\nplanning or arrangement, as this is understood, for example,\nby a great business house or by a railway. (Cf. p. 202.) We pass\nas a rule from a chaotic to a better organised state by ways\nwhich we know nothing about. Typically through the influence\nof other minds. Literature and the arts are the chief means by\nwhich these influences are diffused. It should be unnecessary\nto insist upon the degree to which high civilisation, in other\nwords, free, varied and unwasteful life, depends upon them in\na numerous society.\n\n\n[19] E.g., \u201cThe value of the object is its capacity of becoming\nthe object of feeling and desire through actualisation of dispositional\ntendencies by acts of presumption, judgment, and assumption.\u201d\nUrban, _Valuation_, p. 53.\n\n[20] Or, of course, aversions. In what follows we shall take no\nfurther note of aversions. To do so would introduce inessential\ncomplications. The omission in no way affects the argument, since\nfor our present purposes they may be counted in with appetencies.\n\n[21] This view plainly has close connections with Utilitarianism.\nIn fact if Bentham\u2019s editor is to be trusted in his interpretation\nof his master\u2019s doctrine, it would be what Bentham intended to\nteach. \u201cThe term nearest to being synonymous with pleasure is\n_volition_: what it pleases a man to do is simply what he\nwills to do. . . . What a man wills to do, or what he pleases\nto do, may be far from giving him enjoyment; yet shall we say\nthat in doing it, he is not following his own pleasure? .. .\nA native of Japan, when he is offended, stabs himself to prove\nthe intensity of his feelings. It is difficult to prove enjoyment\nin this case: yet the man obeyed his impulses.\u201d John Hill Burton,\n_Jeremy Bentham\u2019s Works_, vol. 1, p. 22.\n\n[22] Cf. W. J. Perry, _The Origin of Magic and Religion_,\np. 15.\n\n[23] Both \u2018enjoyment\u2019 and \u2018satisfaction\u2019 are unsuitable terms\nin this connection. An unfortunate linguistic gap must be recognised.\nThe full exercise of an activity is commonly its own \u2018satisfaction\u2019,\nand, as we shall see later, what pleasure may accompany it is\nderivative and incidental.\n\n\u201cBeatitudo non est virtutis premium, sed ipsa virtus.\u201d\n\n[24] _Works_, Vol. X, p. 560.\n\n[25] Not necessarily \u2018social workers.\u2019 Only personal communication\ncan show who have the virtues here referred to.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII\n\nArt and Morals\n\n Com, no more,\n This is meer moral babble, and direct\n Against the canon laws of our foundation.\u2014_Comus_.\n\n\nFrom this excursus let us return to our proper task, the attempt\nto outline a morality which will change its values as circumstances\nalter, a morality free from occultism, absolutes and arbitrariness,\na morality which will explain, as no morality has yet explained,\nthe place and value of the arts in human affairs. What is good\nor valuable, we have said, is the exercise of impulses and the\nsatisfaction of their appetencies. When we say that anything\nis good we mean that it satisfies, and by a good experience we\nmean one in which the impulses which make it are fulfilled and\nsuccessful, adding as the necessary qualification that their\nexercise and satisfaction shall not interfere in any way with\nmore important impulses. Importance we have seen to be a complicated\nmatter, and which impulses are by an extensive inquiry into what\nactually happens. The problem of morality then, the problem of\nhow we are to obtain the greatest possible value from life, becomes\na problem of organisation, both in the individual life and in\nthe adjustment of individual lives to one another, and is delivered\nfrom all non-psychological ideas, from absolute goods and immediate\nconvictions, which incidentally help greatly to give unnecessary\nstiffness and fixity to obsolescent codes. Without system, needless\nto say, value vanishes, since in a state of chaos important and\ntrivial impulses alike are frustrated.\n\nA minor problem may occur here to the reader. It concerns the\nchoice between a \u2018crowded hour\u2019 and an age without a name, and\nthe place of the time factor in valuation. There are many very\nvaluable states which cannot last very long in the nature of\nthe case, and some of these seem to have disabling consequences.\nBut, to take merely the most interesting instance, if we knew\nmore about the nervous constitution of genius we might discover\nthat the instability from which so many people suffer who are\nat times best able to actualise the possibilities of life is\nmerely a consequence of their plasticity; not in the least a\nprice which they pay for such \u2018high moments,\u2019 but rather a result\nin systems of great delicacy of wear and tear at lower levels\nof adjustment. It is generally those who have the least refined\nviews of value who most readily believe that highly valuable\nhours must be paid for afterwards. Their conception of a \u2018hectic\ntime\u2019 as the summit of human possibilities explains the opinion.\nFor those who find that the most valuable experiences are those\nwhich are also most fruitful of further valuable experiences\nno problem arises. To the query whether they prefer a long life\nto a joyous one, they will reply that they find very satisfactory\na life which is both.\n\nThe most valuable states of mind then are those which involve\nthe widest and most comprehensive co-ordination of activities\nand the least curtailment, conflict, starvation and restriction.\nStates of mind in general are valuable in the degree in which\nthey tend to reduce waste and frustration. We must be careful\nin considering this formulation to remember how varied human\nactivities are and avoid, for example, undue admiration for practical\nefficient persons whose emotional life is suppressed. But, thanks\nto the psycho-analysts, we are hardly likely at the moment to\noverlook the consequences of suppressions.\n\nIt is plain that no one systematisation can claim a supreme position.\nMen are naturally different and in any society specialisation\nis inevitable. There are evidently a great number of good systematisations\nand what is good for one person will not be good for another.\nA sailor, a doctor, a mathematician and a poet can hardly have\nthe same organisation throughout. With different conditions different\nvalues necessarily arise. Doubtless conditions may be, and too\noften are, such that no life of high value is possible. With\na naturalistic morality the reasons for altering them and the\nway to do so both become clearer. But even with our present resources\nand command over nature, it is universally agreed that intelligence\nand goodwill could contrive that no man should be so situated\nas to be deprived of all the generally accessible values. The\nclearing away from moral questions of all ethical lumber and\nsuperstitious interpolations is a step long overdue in this undertaking.\nBut until it has been carried further, so it is often thought,\nto be busied with such apparently \u2018unpractical\u2019 activities as\nart or criticism is to behave too much like a passenger on a\nshort-handed ship. This is true enough doubtless of some who\nso busy themselves. But it is not true that criticism is a luxury\ntrade. The rear-guard of society cannot be extricated until the\nvanguard has gone further. Goodwill and intelligence are still\ntoo little available. The critic, we have said, is as much concerned\nwith the health of the mind as any doctor with the health of\nthe body. To set up as a critic is to set up as a judge of values.\nWhat are the other qualifications required we shall see later.\nFor the arts are inevitably and quite apart from any intentions\nof the artist an appraisal of existence. Matthew Arnold when\nhe said that poetry is a criticism of life was saying something\nso obvious that it is constantly overlooked. The artist is concerned\nwith the record and perpetuation of the experiences which seem\nto him most worth having. For reasons which we shall consider\nin Chapter XXII, he is also the man who is most likely to have\nexperiences of value to record. He is the point at which the\ngrowth of the mind shows itself. His experiences those at least\nwhich give value to his work, represent conciliations of impulses\nwhich in most minds are still confused, intertrammelled and conflicting.\nHis work is the ordering of what in most minds is disordered.\nThat his _failures_ to bring order out of chaos are often\nmore conspicuous than those of other men is due in part at least\nto his greater audacity; it is a penalty of ambition and a consequence\nof his greater plasticity. But when he succeeds, the value of\nwhat he has accomplished is found always in a more perfect organisation\nwhich makes more of the possibilities of response and activity\navailable.\n\nWhat value is and which experiences are most valuable will never\nbe understood so long as we think in terms of those large abstractions,\nthe virtues and the vices. \u201cYou do invert the covenants of her\ntrust,\u201d said Comus, that disreputable advocate of Utilitarianism,\nto the Lady, that enemy of Nature. Instead of recognising that\nvalue lies in the \u2018minute particulars\u2019 of response and attitude,\nwe have tried to find it in conformity to abstract prescriptions\nand general rules of conduct. The artist is an expert in the\n\u2018minute particulars\u2019 and _qua_ artist pays little or no\nattention to generalisations which he finds in actual: practice\nare too crude to discriminate between what is valuable and the\nreverse. For this reason the moralist has always tended to distrust\nor to ignore him. Yet since the fine conduct of life springs\nonly from fine ordering of responses far too subtle to be touched\nby any general ethical maxims, this neglect of art by the moralist\nhas been tantamount to a disqualification. The basis of morality,\nas Shelley insisted, is laid not by preachers but by poets. Bad\ntaste and crude responses are not mere flaws in an otherwise\nadmirable person. They are actually a root evil from which other\ndefects follow. No life can be excellent in which the elementary\nresponses are disorganised and confused.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX\n\nActual and Possible Misapprehensions\n\n Who\n Saith that? It is not written so on high!\u2014_Cain_.\n\n\nEvery true view, perhaps, has its crude analogues, due sometimes\nto a confused perception of the real state of affairs, sometimes\nto faulty statement. Often these clumsy or mistaken offshoots\nare responsible for the difficulty with which the true view gains\nacceptance. Like shadows, reflections, or echoes, they obscure\nand baffle apprehension. Nowhere are they more inconvenient than\nin the problem of the moral function of art. A consideration\nof some instances will help to make clearer what has been said,\nto distinguish the view recommended from its disreputable relatives\nand to remove possible misapprehensions.\n\nAllusion has several times been made to Tolstoy, and nothing\nin the recent history of \u00e6sthetic opinion is so remarkable as\nthe onslaught made by that great artist against all the arts.\nNo better example could be found of how _not_ to introduce\nmoral preoccupations into the judgment of values. Blinded by\nthe light of a retarded conversion, knowing, as an artist, the\nextreme importance of the arts, but forgetting in the fierceness\nof his new convictions all the experience that had in earlier\nyears made up his own creations, he flung himself, a Principle\nin each hand, upon the whole host of European masterpieces and\nleft as he believed hardly a survivor standing.\n\nHe begins by emphasising the enormous output of energy which is devoted\nto Art in civilised countries. He then very rightly asserts that it is\nof great importance to know what this activity is about; and he devotes\nthirty pages to the various definitions which have been attempted of\nArt and Beauty. He concludes, after ransacking the somewhat uncritical\ncompilations of Schasler and Knight, that \u00e6sthetics have been hitherto\nan idle amalgam of reverie and phantasy, from which no definition of\nArt emerges. Partly he traces this result to the use in \u00e6sthetics of\nnotions of beauty; partly to an anxiety in the critics to justify the\nexistent forms of Art. They are, he insists, less concerned to discover\nwhat Art is, than to show that those things which are currently termed\nArt must in fact be Art. To these sections of _What is Art?_ assent may\nbe accorded. He then sets out his own definition. \u201cTo evoke in oneself\na sensation which one has experienced before, and having evoked it in\noneself, to communicate this sensation in such a way that others may\nexperience the same sensation . . . so that other men are infected by\nthese sensations and pass through them; in this does the activity of\nArt consist.\u201d[26] So far excellent; if we translate \u2018sensation\u2019, the\ncurrent \u00e6sthetico-psychological jargon of the art schools in Tolstoy\u2019s\nday, by some more general term such as experience. But this is only a\nfirst stage of the definition; there are additions to be made. Any Art\nwhich is infective, as he uses that word in the quotation above, is\npure Art as opposed to modern or adulterated Art; but in deciding the\nfull value of any work of Art we have to consider the nature of its\ncontents, the nature, that is, of the experiences communicated. The\nvalue of art contents is judged, according to Tolstoy, by the religious\nconsciousness of the age. For Tolstoy the religious consciousness is\nthe higher comprehension of the meaning of life, and this, according to\nhim, is the universal union of men with God and with one another.\n\nWhen Tolstoy applies his criterion to the judgment of particular\nworks of art, he is able to deduce striking results: \u201cChristian Art,\nthat is, the Art of our time, must be catholic in the direct sense\nof that word\u2014that is, universal\u2014and so must unite all men. There are\nbut two kinds of sensations which unite all men\u2014the sensations which\narise from the recognition of man\u2019s filial relation to God and of\nthe brotherhood of men, and the simplest vital sensations which are\naccessible to all men without exception, such as the sensations of joy,\nmeekness of spirit, alacrity, calm, etc. It is only these two kinds\nof sensations that form the subject of the Art of our time, which is\ngood according to its contents.\u201d Tolstoy in fact denied the value of\nall human endeavours except those which tend _directly_ to the union\nof men. It may be suspected that his religious enthusiasm was due\nto his belief that Religion had this tendency. He distinguished, it\nwill be remembered, very sharply between Religion and religions; a\ndistinction with which many besides Tolstoy have consoled themselves.\nBut his essential aim, his single value, was the union of men. All\nother things are of value only in so far as they tend to promote this,\nand art shares the general subordination. Even a joke, for Tolstoy, is\nonly a joke so long as all men may share in it, a truly revolutionary\namendment. The sharing is more important than the merriment. On these\nprinciples he surveys European Art and Literature. With magnificent\ndefiance of accepted values, and the hardness of heart of a supreme\ndoctrinaire, one after another of the unassailables is toppled from\nits eminence. Shakespeare, Dante, Goethe, etc., are rejected; Wagner\nin especial is the object of a critical _tour de force_. In their\nplace are set _A Tale of Two Cities_, _The Chimes_, _Adam Bede_, _Les\nMiserables_ (almost the only thing in French literature of which\nTolstoy could approve), and _Uncle Tom\u2019s Cabin_.[27] All art which does\nnot directly urge the union of men, or whose appeal is suspected to be\nlimited to cultured and aristocratic circles, is condemned. \u201cAll who\nare not hand in hand with me are against me,\u201d thought Tolstoy, under\nthe urgency of his sense of human misery. Any diversion of art from a\nsingle narrow channel seemed to him an irreparable waste. Remembering\nno doubt how deeply he had been affected and influenced in the past\nby the things which he now deplored, he came in the end to assign\nunlimited powers to art when rightly directed. But, if we think of the\nother things which he also invoked to the same end, there is a ring of\ndespair in his final cry: \u201cArt must remove violence, only Art can do\nthis.\u201d\n\nWe may compare with this a famous utterance of another aristocrat,\nequally a supreme artist, equally in rebellion against the whole\nfabric of conventional civilisation, whose \u201cpassion for reforming\nthe world\u201d was not less than Tolstoy\u2019s, but who differed from\nhim in the possession of a wider and more complete sense of values\nand a mind not riven and distorted by a late conversion.\n\n\u201cThe whole objection of the immorality of poetry rests upon a\nmisconception of the manner in which poetry acts to produce the\nmoral improvement of man. Ethical science arranges the elements\nwhich poetry has created, and propounds schemes and proposes\nexamples of civil and domestic life: nor is it for want of admirable\ndoctrines that men hate, and despise, and censure, and deceive\nand subjugate one another.\n\n\u201cBut poetry acts in a diviner manner. It awakens and enlarges\nthe mind itself by rendering it the receptacle of a thousand\nunapprehended combinations of thought. Whatever strengthens and\npurifies the affections, enlarges the imagination, and adds spirit\nto sense, is useful. It exceeds all imagination to conceive what\nwould have been the moral condition of the world if neither Dante,\nPetrarch, Boccaccio, Chaucer, Shakespeare, Calderon, Lord Bacon,\nnor Milton, had ever existed.\u201d\n\nIt is curious how the insertion of particular names here seems\nto weaken the argument. The world, we feel fairly certain, would\nbe on the whole much the same even if there had been no Boccaccio\nand no Lord Bacon. Things would not be very different, some people\nwill think, even if none of these authors had ever bestirred\nthemselves to write. Shakespeare, as so often, would perhaps\nbe counted an exception. But this sense that there are, after\nall, very few poets who individually make much difference is\nnot in the least an objection to Shelley\u2019s main thesis. We could\nbale a vast amount of water out of the sea without making any\napparent difference to it, but this would not prove that it does\nnot consist of water. Even if the removal of the influence of\nall the poets whose names we know made no appreciable difference\nin human affairs, it would still be true that the enlargement\nof the mind, the widening of the sphere of human sensibility,\nis brought about through poetry.\n\n\n\nA too narrow view of values, or a too simple conception of morality\nis usually the cause of these misunderstandings of the arts.\nThe agelong controversy as to whether the business of poetry\nis to please or to instruct shows this well. \u201cPoets wish either\nto instruct or to delight or to combine solid and useful with\nthe agreeable.\u201d \u201cIt is only for the purpose of being useful that\nPoetry ought to be agreeable; pleasure is only a means which\nshe uses for the end of profit.\u201d So thought Boileau and Rapin.\nDryden, modest and penetrating in his fashion, was \u201csatisfied\nif it cause delight: for delight is the chief, if not the only,\nend of poetry: instruction can be admitted but in the second\nplace; for poesy only instructs as it delights.\u201d But he does\nnot further specify the nature of the delight or the instruction,\nan omission in which most critics except Shelley agree. Our view\non the point entirely depends upon this. If we set the sugarcoated-pill\nview aside as beneath serious consideration, there still remains\na problem. A reviewer of the recent performance of the _Cenci_\nwill state it excellently for us.\n\n\u201cIt had been better had Shelley\u2019s _Cenci_ remained for ever\nbanned. It represents three hours of unrelieved, agonising misery.\n. . . What excuse is there for the depicting of horrors such\nas these? There must be some, for a house packed with literary\ncelebrities fiercely applauded. If the function of the theatre\nis to amuse, then in the presentation of the _Cenci_ it\nhas missed its aim. If it is to instruct, what moral can be pointed\nfor the better conduct of our lives by a tragedy such as this?\nIf Art be the answer, then Art may well be sacrificed.\u201d\n\nNo doubt the literary celebrities, with their applause, were\nto blame, in part, for this. Our relic of the Age of Good Sense\nmade a just reaction. He accurately registered the effect to\nwhich bad acting and inept production[28] gave rise. But it is\nwith his argument not with his reaction that we are concerned.\nThe celebrities, if they had not been too busy giving vent (though\nin a mistaken form) to their loyalty to the memory of Shelley,\nand to their sense of triumph over the Censor, might have told\nhim that neither amusement nor instruction is what the judicious\nseek from Tragedy, and referred him to Aristotle. Neither term,\nunless we wrench it right out of its usual setting, is appropriate\nto the greater forms of art. The experiences which they occasion\nare too full, too varied, too whole, too subtly balanced upon\nopposing impulses, whether of pity and terror or of joy and despair,\nto be so easily described. Tragedy\u2014\n\n beneath whose sable roof\n Of boughs as if for festal purpose decked\n With unrejoicing berries\u2014ghostly shapes\n May meet at noontide; Fear and Trembling Hope,\n Silence and Foresight, Death the Skeleton\n And Time the Shadow,\n\nis still the form under which the mind may most clearly and freely\ncontemplate the human situation, its issues unclouded, its possibilities\nrevealed. To this its value is due and the supreme position among\nthe arts which it has occupied in historical times and still\noccupies; what will happen in the future we can only conjecture.\nTragedy is too great an exercise of the spirit to be classed\namong amusements or even delights, or to be regarded as a vehicle\nfor the inculcation of such crude valuations as may be codified\nin a moral. But the fuller discussion of Tragedy we must defer.\n\nThese remarks seemed necessary in order to avoid the impression,\nwhich our theory of value might have given, that the arts are\nmerely concerned with happy solutions and ingenious reconciliations\nof diverse gratifications, \u201ca box where sweets compacted lie.\u201d\nIt is not so. Only a crude psychology, as we shall see, would\nidentify the satisfaction of an impulse with a pleasure. No hedonic\ntheory of value will fit the facts over even a small part of\nthe field, since it must take what is a concomitant merely of\na phase in the process of satisfaction as the mainspring of the\nwhole. Pleasure, however, has its place in the whole account\nof values, and an important place, as we shall see later. But\nit must not be allowed to encroach on ground to which it has\nno right.\n\n\n[26] _What is Art?_ Section V.\n\n[27] _What is Art?_ Section XVI.\n\n[28] \u201cThis story of the Cenci is indeed eminently fearful and\nmonstrous: anything like a dry exhibition of it on the stage\nwould be insupportable. The person who would treat such a subject\nmust increase the ideal, and diminish the actual horror of the\nevents.\u201d From Shelley\u2019s preface. The producers, however, were\nof the contrary opinion.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X\n\nPoetry for Poetry\u2019s Sake\n\n On passe plus facilement d\u2019un extr\u00eame \u00e0 un autre\n que d\u2019une nuance \u00e0 une autre nuance.\n _Attirance de la Mort_.\n\n\nAnother possible misapprehension which cannot be left unmentioned\narises in connection with the doctrine \u2018Art for Art\u2019s sake\u2019,\na doctrine definitely and detrimentally dated; it concerns the\nplace of what are called ulterior effects in the valuing of a\nwork of art. It has been very fashionable to turn up the nose\nat any attempt to apply, as it is said, \u2018external canons\u2019 to\nart. But it may be recalled that of all the great critical doctrines,\nthe \u2018moral\u2019, theory of art (it would be better to call it the\n\u2018Ordinary values\u2019 theory) has the most great minds behind it.\nUntil Whistler came to start the critical movements of the last\nhalf-century, few poets, artists or critics had ever doubted\nthat the value of art experiences was to be judged as other values\nare. Plato, Aristotle, Horace, Dante, Spenser, Milton, the Eighteenth\nCentury, Coleridge, Shelley, Matthew Arnold and Pater, to name\nonly the most prominent, all with varying degrees of refinement,\nheld the same view.[29] The last is a somewhat unexpected adherent.\n\n\u201cGiven the conditions I have tried to explain as constituting\ngood art, then if it be devoted further to the increase of men\u2019s\nhappiness, to the redemption of the oppressed, or to the enlargement\nof our sympathies with each other, or to such presentment of\nnew and old truth about ourselves and our relation to the world\nas may fortify us in our sojourn here . . . it will also be great\nart; if, over and above those qualities which I have summed up\n. . . it has something of the soul of humanity in it, and finds\nits logical, its architectural place, in the great structure\nof human life.\u201d[30] No better brief emotive account of the conditions\nunder which an experience has value could be desired.\n\nAgainst all these weighty opinions, the view\u2014supported largely\nby a distinction between Form and Content, Subject and Handling,\nwhich will be examined elsewhere,[31] and relying upon the doctrine\nof intrinsic, supersensible, ultimate Goods discussed above\u2014that\nthe values of art are unique, or capable of being considered\nin isolation from all others, has held sway for some thirty years\nin many most reputable quarters. The reasons for this attempted\nseverance have already been touched upon; they are of all sorts.\nPartly it may be due to the influence of Whistler and Pater,\nand of those still more influential disciples who spread their\ndoctrines. Partly it may be due to a massed reaction against\nRuskin. Partly again we may suspect the influence, rather suddenly\nencountered, of Continental and German \u00e6sthetics upon the English\nmind. Almost from the beginning of scientific \u00e6sthetics, the\ninsistence on the \u00e6sthetic experience as an experience, peculiar,\ncomplete, and capable of being studied in isolation, has received\nprominence. Often it is no more than an extension into this considering,\nwhenever possible, one thing at a time. When critics in England,\nnot very long ago, heard that there was something connected with\nart and poetry\u2014namely, the \u00e6sthetic experience\u2014which could be\nconsidered and examined in isolation by the methods of introspection,\nthey not unnaturally leapt to the conclusion that its value also\ncould be isolated and described without reference to other things.\nIn some hands the further conclusions drawn were too queer to\noutlive their hour of fashion. They amounted often to the postulation\nof a \u2018specific thrill\u2019 yielded by works of art and nothing else,\nunlike and unconnected with all other experiences. \u201cNo queerer,\u201d\nit was said, \u201cthan anything else in this incredibly queer universe.\u201d[32]\nBut the queerness of the universe is of a different and a more\ninteresting sort. It may be a curiosity shop but it nowhere seems\nto be a chaos.\n\nFor our present purposes we need only consider the view as it\nis put forward by its ablest exponent, a critic who by his own\nexplanations of this formula goes very far towards meeting the\nobjection we urge.\n\n\u201cWhat then does the formula \u2018Poetry for Poetry\u2019s sake\u2019 tell us\nabout this experience? It says, as I understand it, these things.\nFirst, this experience is an end in itself, is worth having on\nifs own account, has an intrinsic value. Next, its _poetic_\nvalue is this intrinsic worth alone. Poetry may have also have\nan ulterior value as a means to culture or religion; because\nit conveys instruction or softens the passions, or furthers a\ngood cause; because it brings the poet fame, or money, or a quiet\nconscience. So much the better: let it be valued for these reasons\ntoo. But its ulterior worth neither is nor can directly determine\nits poetic worth as a satisfying imaginative experience; and\nthis is to be judged entirely from within. . . . The consideration\nof ulterior ends whether by the poet in the act of composing\nor by the reader in the act of experiencing, tends to lower poetic\nvalue. It does so because it tends to change the nature of poetry\nby taking it out of its own atmosphere. For its nature is to\nbe not a part, nor yet a copy of the real world (as we commonly\nunderstand that phrase) but to be a world by itself, independent,\ncomplete, autonomous[33].\u201d\n\nThere seem four points well worth close consideration here. The\nfirst is that the things mentioned as possible ulterior values\nin Dr Bradley\u2019s list\u2014culture, religion, instruction, softening\nof the passions, furtherance of good causes, the poet\u2019s fame,\nor money, or quiet conscience\u2014these things are plainly upon quite\ndifferent levels. He says of all of them that they cannot possibly\ndetermine the poetic worth of an \u00e6sthetic experience; that whether\nor no any poetic experience is poetically valuable cannot depend\nupon any of these ulterior values. But it is certain that some\nof these stand in a quite different relation to the poetic experience\nthan do others. Culture, religion, instruction in some special\nsenses, softening of the passions, and the furtherance of good\ncauses may be directly concerned in our judgments of the _poetic_\nvalues of experiences. Otherwise, as we shall see, the word \u2018poetic\u2019\nbecomes a useless sound. On the other hand, the poet\u2019s fame,\nhis reward, or his conscience, seem plainly to be irrelevant.\nThat is the first point.\n\nThe second point is that what Dr Bradley says as to the imaginative\nexperience\u2014that it is to be judged entirely from within\u2014is misleading.\nIn most cases we do not judge it from within. Our judgment as\nto its value is no part of it. In rare instances such a judgment\nmay be part of it, but this is exceptional. As a rule we have\nto come out of it in order to judge it, and we judge it by memory\nor by other residual effects which we learn to be good indices\nto its value. If by judging it in the experience we mean merely\nwhile these residual effects are fresh, we may agree. In so judging\nit, however, it\u2019s \u201cplace in the great structure of human life\u201d\ncannot possibly be ignored. The value which it has is dependent\nupon this, and we cannot judge that value without taking this\nplace, and with it innumerable ulterior worths, into account.\nIt is not that we shall evaluate it wrongly if we neglect them,\nbut that evaluation is just this taking account of everything,\nand of the way things hang together.\n\nThe third point arises with regard to Dr Bradley\u2019s third position,\nthat the consideration of ulterior ends, whether by the poet\nin the act of composing, or by the reader in the act of experiencing,\ntends to lower poetic value. Here all depends upon _which are\nthe ulterior ends in question_, and what the kind of poetry.\nIt will not be denied that for some kinds of poetry the _intrusion_\nof certain ulterior ends may, and often does, lower their value;\nbut there seem plainly to be other kinds of poetry in which its\nvalue as poetry definitely and directly depends upon the ulterior\nends involved. Consider the Psalms, Isaiah, the New Testament,\nDante, the _Pilgrim\u2019s Progress_, Rabelais, any really universal\nsatire, Swift, Voltaire, Byron.\n\nIn all these cases the consideration of ulterior ends has been\ncertainly essential to the act of composing. That needs no arguing;\nbut, equally, this consideration of the ulterior ends involved\nis inevitable to the reader.\n\nDr Bradley puts this third position forward in a tentative form;\nhe says that the ulterior _tends_ to lower poetic value,\nan important reservation, but it would be better to distinguish\ntwo kinds of poetry, one to which his doctrine applies and one\nto which it does not. As illustrations of the cases in which\nhis doctrine does apply, _The Ancient Mariner_ and _Hartleap\nWell_ may be mentioned. Here in both cases the experiences\nare of a kind into which no ulterior ends enter in any important\ndegree. Thus when Coleridge and Wordsworth introduce moral considerations,\nthe effect is undeniably one of intrusion. As Mrs Meynell comically\nremarks, \u201c_The Ancient Mariner_ offends upon a deliberate\nplan. It denies the natural function of observation when it invents\nsanctions for the protection of a wild bird\u2019s life, and for the\npunishment of its slaughter. Coleridge intends to enforce a lesson\nby telling us that 200 mariners died of thirst because they had\u2014with\nthe superstition pardonable in their state of education\u2014supposed\nan albatross to be the bringer of foggy weather, and had approved\nits slaughter, as almost all men implicitly approve the daily\nslaughter of innocent beast and bird.\u201d But this charge against\nColeridge is only reasonable if we make of this ulterior end,\nthis \u2018lesson\u2019 against cruelty to animals, a vital part of the\npoem. Mrs Meynell, we may think, takes Coleridge\u2019s moral too\nseriously. It may be this possibility which Coleridge had in\nmind when he said, long afterwards, that _The Ancient Mariner_\ndid not contain enough of the moral. As the poem stands, it is\nof a kind into which ulterior ends do not enter. If we are to\ntake this alien element, this lesson, into account in our judgment,\nwe shall have deliberately to misread the poem, with Mrs Meynell.\nThe same considerations apply to _Hartleap Well_; and so\nfar as Dr Bradley is merely enforcing this point, we may agree;\nbut he fails to notice\u2014it is only fair to say that few critics\nseem ever to notice it\u2014that poetry is of more than one kind,\nand that the different kinds are to be judged by different principles.\nThere is a kind of poetry into the judgment of which ulterior\nends directly and essentially enter; a kind part of whose value\nis directly derivable from the value of the ends with which it\nis associated. There are other kinds, into which ulterior ends\ndo not enter in any degree, and there are yet other kinds whose\nvalue may be lowered by the intrusion of ends relatively trivial\nin value. Dr Bradley is misled by the usual delusion that there\nis in this respect only one kind of poetry, into saying far more\nthan the facts of poetic experience will justify.\n\nThe fourth point is of more general importance perhaps than these\nthree. It is in fact the real point of disagreement between the\nview we are upholding and the doctrine which Dr Bradley, together\nwith the vast majority of modern critics, wishes to maintain.\nIt is stated in the concluding sentence of the paragraph which\nI have quoted. He says of poetry that \u201cits nature is to be, not\na part nor yet a copy of the real world, as we commonly understand\nthat phrase, but to be a world by itself, independent, complete,\nautonomous. To possess it fully, you must enter that world, conform\nto its laws, and ignore, for the time being, the beliefs, aims,\nand particular conditions which belong to you in the other world\nof reality.\u201d This doctrine insists: upon a severance between\npoetry and what, in opposition, may be called life; a complete\nseverance, allowing however, as Dr Bradley goes on to insist\u2014an\n\u2018underground\u2019 connection. But this \u2018underground\u2019 connection is\nall-important. Whatever there is in the poetic experience has\ncome through it. The world of poetry has in no sense any different\nreality from the rest of the world and it has no special laws\nand no other-worldly peculiarities. It is made up of experiences\nof exactly the same kinds as those that come to us in other ways.\nEvery poem however is a strictly limited piece of experience,\na piece which breaks up more or less easily if alien elements\nintrude. It is more highly and more delicately organised than\nordinary experiences of the street or of the hillside; it is\nfragile. Further it is communicable. It may be experienced by\nmany different minds with only slight variations. That this should\nbe possible is one of the conditions of its organisation. It\ndiffers from many other experiences, whose value is very similar,\nin this very communicability. For these reasons when we experience\nit, or attempt to, we must preserve it from contamination, from\nthe irruptions of personal particularities. We must keep the\npoem undisturbed by these or we fail to read it and have some\nother experience instead. For these reasons we establish a severance,\nwe draw a boundary between the poem and what is not the poem\nin our experience. But this is no severance between unlike things\nbut between different systems of the same activities. The gulf\nbetween them is no greater than that between the impulses which\ndirect the pen and those which conduct the pipe of a man who\nis smoking and writing at once, and the \u2018disassociation\u2019 or severance\nof the poetic experience is merely a freeing of it from extraneous\ningredients and influences. The myth of a \u2018transmutation\u2019 or\n\u2018poetisation\u2019 of experience and that other myth of the \u2018contemplative\u2019\nor \u2018\u00e6sthetic\u2019 attitude, are in part due to talking about Poetry\nand the \u2018poetic\u2019 instead of thinking about the concrete experiences\nwhich are poems.\n\nThe separation of poetic experience from its place in life and\nits ulterior worths, involves a definite lop-sidedness, narrowness,\nand incompleteness in those who preach it sincerely. No one,\nof course, would bring such charges against the author of _Shakespearean\nTragedy_; his is that welcome and not unfamiliar case of the\ncritic whose practice is a refutation of his principles. When\ngenuinely held the view leads to an attempted splitting up of\nthe experiencing reader into a number of distinct faculties or\ndepartments which have no real existence. It is impossible to\ndivide a reader into so many men\u2014an \u00e6sthetic man, a moral man,\na practical man, a political man, an intellectual man, and so\non. It cannot be done. In any genuine experience all these elements\ninevitably enter. But if it could be done, as many critics pretend,\nthe result would be fatal to the wholeness and sanction of the\ncritical judgment. We cannot e.g. read Shelley adequately while\nbelieving that all his views are moonshine\u2014read _Prometheus\nUnbound_ while holding that \u2018the perfectibility of man is\nan undesirable ideal\u2019 and that \u2018hangmen are excellent things.\u2019\nTo say that there is a purely \u00e6sthetic or poetic approach to,\nlet us say, the _Sermon on the Mount_, by which no consideration\nof the intention or ulterior end of the poem enters, would appear\nto be merely mental timidity, the shrinking remark of a person\nwho finds essential literature too much for him. Into an adequate\nreading of the greater kinds of poetry everything not private\nand peculiar to the individual reader must come in. The reader\nmust be required to wear no blinkers, to overlook nothing which\nis relevant, to shut off no part of himself from participation.\nIf he attempts to assume the peculiar attitude of disregarding\nall but some hypothetically-named \u00e6sthetic elements, he joins\nHenry James\u2019 Osmond in his tower, he joins Blake\u2019s Kings and\nPriests in their High Castles and Spires.\n\n\n[29] It is true that in mechanics one might draw up a formidable\nlist of names and say \u201cOpposed to all these appeared a certain\nEinstein\u201d, but the cases are not parallel. A scientific advance\nis different from a change of fashion, and no new facts nor any\nnew hypothesis\u2014no Michelson-Morley experiment, nor any widened\npurview\u2014led up to the separate value theory of art. Although\nhistorians of \u00e6sthetics are sometimes pleased to present their\nfacts as though they represented a progress from cruder to more\nrefined opinion, from ignorance to wisdom, there is no sound\nbasis for the procedure. Aristotle was at least as clearly and\nfully aware of the relevant facts and as adequate in his explanations\nas any later inquirers. \u00c6sthetics in fact has hardly yet reached\nthe scientific stage, in which succeeding investigators can start\nwhere their predecessors left off.\n\n[30] _An Essay on Style_. The final paragraph.\n\n[31] See Chapters XVI, XVIII and XXXI.\n\n[32] Clive Bell, _Art_, p. 49.\n\n[33] A. C. Bradley, _Oxford Lectures on Poetry_, p. 5.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XI\n\nA Sketch for a Psychology\n\n \u201cWot\u2019s wot?\u201d repeated one of the buccaneers in a deep growl. \u201cAh,\n he\u2019d be a lucky one as knowed that!\u201d\u2014_Treasure Island_.\n\n\nM. Jules Romains recently observed[34] that psychology hitherto\nhas merely contrived to say laboriously and obscurely, and with\nless precision, what we all know without its aid already. This\nis regrettably difficult to deny; any particular remark of a\npsychologist, if true, is unlikely to be startling. But at certain\npoints new light has none the less crept in. Incoherences and\nflaws have been found in the common-sense picture, adumbration\nrather, of the mind; connections between bits of our behaviour,\n which common-sense had missed, have been noted; and, still more\nimportant, a general outline of the kind of thing a mind is has\nbegun to take shape. The next age but two, if an oncoming Age\nof Relativity is to be followed as Mr Haldane supposes[35] by\nan Age of Biology, will be introduced by a recognition on the\npart of many minds of their own nature, a recognition which is\ncertain to change their behaviour and their outlook considerably.\nWe are still far removed from such an age. None the less enough\nis known for an analysis of the mental events which make up the\nreading of a poem to be attempted. And such an analysis is a\nprimary necessity for criticism. The psychological distinctions\nwhich have hitherto served the critic are too few and his use\nof them in most cases too unsystematic, too vague, and too uncertain,\nfor his insight to yield its full advantages.\n\nThe view put forward here is in many respects heterodox, a disadvantage\nin a sketch. But so many difficulties attend any exposition of\npsychology, however orthodox and however full, that the dangers\nof misunderstanding are outweighed by the advantages of a fresh\npoint of view. It is the general outline and in particular the\ninsistence upon an account of knowledge in terms merely of the\ncausation of our thoughts which is contrary to received opinion.\nThe detail of the analysis of poetic experience, the account\nof imagery, of emotion, of pleasure, of incipient action and\nso forth, although, so far as I am aware, no similar analysis\nhas before been explicitly set out, may be taken as comparatively\northodox.\n\nFor our immediate purpose, for a clearer understanding of values\nand for the avoidance of unnecessary confusions in criticism,\nit is necessary to break away from the set of ideas by which\npopular and academic psychology alike attempt to describe the\nmind. We naturally tend to conceive it as a thing of a peculiar\nspiritual kind, fairly: persistent though variable, endowed with\nattributes, three in number, its capacities namely for knowing,\nwilling and feeling, three irreducible modes of being aware of\nor concerned with objects. A violent shock to this entity comes\nwhen we are forced by a closer examination of the facts to conceive\nit as doing all these three unconsciously as well as consciously.\nAn unconscious mind is a fairly evident fiction, useful though\nit may be, and goings on in the nervous system are readily accepted\nas a satisfactory substitute. From this to the recognition of\nthe conscious mind as a similar fiction is no great step, although\none which many people find difficult. Some of this difficulty\nis due to habit. It wears off as we notice how many of the things\nwhich we believed true of the fiction can be stated in terms\nof the less fictitious substitute. But much of the difficulty\nis emotive, non-intellectual, more specifically religious, in\norigin.[36] It is due to desire, to fear, or to exaltation as\nthe case may be, to emotion masquerading as thought, and is a\ndifficulty not so easily removed.\n\nThat the mind is the nervous system, or rather a part of its\nactivity, has long been evident, although the prevalence among\npsychologists of persons with philosophic antecedents has delayed\nthe recognition of the fact in an extraordinary fashion. With\nevery advance of neurology\u2014and a decided advance here was perhaps\nthe only good legacy left by the War[37]\u2014the evidence becomes\nmore overwhelming. It is true that as our knowledge of the nervous\nsystem stands at present much of the detail of the identification\nis impenetrably obscure, and the account which we give must frankly\nbe admitted to be only a degree less fictitious than one in terms\nof spiritual happenings. But the kind of account which is likely\nto be substantiated by future research has become clear, largely\nthrough the work of Behaviourists and Psycho-analysts, the assumptions\nand results of both needing to be corrected however in ways which\nthe recent experimental and theoretical investigations of the\n\u2018_Gestalt_\u2019 School are indicating.\n\nThe view that we are our bodies, more especially our nervous\nsystems, more especially still the higher or more central co-ordinating\nparts of it, and that the mind is a system of impulses should\nnot be described as Materialism. It might equally well be called\nIdealism. Neither term in this connection has any scientific,\nany strictly symbolic meaning or reference. Neither stands for\nany separable, observable group of things, or character in things.\nEach is primarily an emotive term used to incite or support certain\nemotional attitudes. Like all terms used in the vain attempt\n(vain because the question is nonsensical) to say what things\nare, instead of to say how they behave, they state nothing. Like\nall such terms they change in different hands from banners to\nbludgeons, being each for some people an emotive agent round\nwhich attitudes, aspirations, values are rallied, and for other\npeople a weapon of offence by which persons supposed adverse\nto these attitudes, aspirations and values may, it is hoped,\nbe discomfited. That the Materialist and the Idealist believe\nthemselves to be holding views which are incompatible with one\nanother is but an instance of a very widespread confusion between\nscientific statement and emotive appeal, with which we shall\nin later chapters be much concerned. The Mind-Body problem is\nstrictly speaking no problem; it is an _imbroglio_ due to\nfailure to settle a real problem, namely, as to when we are making\na statement and when merely inciting an attitude. A problem simpler\nhere than in many cases, since the alleged statement is of an\nimpossible form[38], but complicated on both sides of the controversy\nby misunderstanding of the attitudes which the other side is\nconcerned to maintain. For if mental events are recognised as\nidentical with certain neural events, neither the attitudes which\nensue towards them nor the attitudes they themselves will warrantably\ntake up, are changed so much as either Idealists or Materialists\nhave commonly supposed. To call anything mental or spiritual,\nas opposed to material, or to call anything material as opposed\nto mental, is only to point out a difference between the two\nkinds. The differences which can actually be detected between\na mental event, such as a toothache, and a non-mental event,\nsuch as a sunspot, remain when we have identified the mental\nevent with a neural change. So recognised, it loses none of its\nobservable peculiarities, only certain alleged unstatable and\nineffable attributes are removed. It remains unlike any event\nwhich is not mental; it is as unparalleled as before. It retains\nits privileges as the most interesting of all events, and our\nrelations to one another and to the world remain essentially\nas they were before the recognition. The extreme ecstasies of\nthe mystic, like the attitudes of the engineer towards a successful\ncontrivance, remain just as much and just as little appropriate\nwith regard to the humblest or the proudest of our acts. Thus\nthe identification of the mind with a part of the working of\nthe nervous system, need involve, theology apart, no disturbance\nof anyone\u2019s attitude to the world, his fellow-men, or to himself.\nTheology, however, is still more implicit in current attitudes\nthan traditional sceptics suspect.\n\n\n\nThe nervous system is the means by which stimuli from the environment,\nor from within the body, result in appropriate behaviour. All\nmental events occur in the course of processes of adaptation,\nsomewhere between a stimulus and a response. Thus every mental\nevent has an origin in stimulation, a character, and consequences,\nin action or adjustment for action. Its character is sometimes\naccessible to introspection. What it feels like, in those cases\nin which it feels or is felt at all, is consciousness, but in\nmany cases nothing is felt, the mental event is unconscious.\nWhy some events are conscious but not others is at present a\nmystery; no one has yet succeeded in bringing the various hints\nwhich neurology may offer into connection with one another. In\nsome important respects conscious and unconscious mental events\nmust differ, but what these are no one can as yet safely conjecture.\nOn the other hand there are many respects in which they are similar,\nand these are the respects which are at present most open to\ninvestigation.\n\nThe process in the course of which a mental event may occur,\na process apparently beginning in a stimulus and ending in an\nact, is what we have called an impulse. In actual experience\nsingle impulses of course never occur. Even the simplest human\nreflexes are very intricate bundles of mutually dependent impulses,\nand in any actual human behaviour the number of simultaneous\nand connected impulses occurring is beyond estimation. The simple\nimpulse in fact is a limit, and the only impulses psychology\nis concerned with are complex. It is often convenient to speak\nas though simple impulses were in question, as when we speak\nof an impulse of hunger, or an impulse to laugh, but we must\nnot forget how intricate all our activities are.\n\nTo take the stimulus as a starting-point is in some ways misleading.\nOf the possible stimuli which we might at any moment receive,\nonly a few actually take effect. Which are received and which\nimpulses ensue depends upon which of our interests is active,\nupon the general set, that is, of our activities. This is conditioned\nin a large degree by the state, of satisfaction or unrest, of\nthe recurrent and persistent needs of the body. When hungry and\nwhen replete we respond differently to the stimulus of a smell\nof cooking. A change in the wind unnoticed by the passengers\ncauses the captain to reduce sail. Social needs in this respect\nare often as important as individual. Thus some people walking\nin a Gallery with friends before whom they wish to shine will\nactually receive far more stimulus from the pictures than they\nwould if by themselves.\n\nA stimulus then must not be conceived as an alien intruder which\nthrusts itself upon us and, after worming a devious way through\nour organism as through a piece of cheese, emerges at the other\nend as an act. Stimuli are only received if they serve some need\nof the organism and the form which the response to them takes\ndepends only in part upon the nature of the stimulus, and much\nmore upon what the organism \u2018wants\u2019, i.e. the state of equilibrium\nof its multifarious activities.\n\nThus experience has two sources which in different cases have\nvery different importance. So far as we are thinking about or\nreferring to certain definite things our behaviour in all probability\nwill only be appropriate (i.e. our thoughts true) in so far as\nit is determined by the nature of the present and past stimuli\nwe have received from those things and things like them. So far\nas we are satisfying our needs and desires a much less strict\nconnection between stimulus and response is sufficient. A baby\nhowls at first in much the same way, whatever the cause of his\nunrest, and older persons behave not unlike him. Any occasion\nmay be sufficient for taking exercise, or for a quarrel, for\nfalling in love or having a drink. To this partial independence\nof behaviour (from stimulus) is due the sometimes distressing\nfact that views, opinions and beliefs vary so much with our differing\nmoods. Such variation shows that the view, belief or opinion\nis not a purely intellectual product, is not due to thinking\nin the narrower sense, of response that is governed by stimuli,\npresent or past, but is an attitude adopted to satisfy some desire,\ntemporary or lasting. Thought in the strictest sense varies only\nwith evidence: but attitudes and feelings change for all manner\nof reasons.\n\nThe threefold division between the causes, character and consequences\nof a mental event, conscious or unconscious, corresponds, with\ncertain qualifications, to the usual division in traditional\npsychology of thought (or cognition), feeling, and will (or conation).\nTo be cognisant of anything, to know it, is to be influenced\nby it; to desire, to seek, to will anything is to act towards\nit. In between these two are the conscious accompaniments, if\nany, of the whole process. These last, the conscious characters\nof the mental event, include evidently both sensations and feelings.\n(Cf. Chapter XVL, pp. 125-128.)\n\nThe correspondence is not by any means simple. Many things are included\nunder knowing, for example, which on this reconstruction of psychology\nwould have to be counted as willing.[39] Expectation, usually described\nas a cognitive attitude, becomes a peculiar form of action, getting\nready, namely, to receive certain kinds of stimuli rather than others.\nThe opposite case is equally common. Hunger, a typical desire on\nthe usual account, would become knowledge, giving us, when genuine\nhunger, obscure awareness of a lack of nourishment, when habit-hunger,\nawareness of a certain phase in a cyclic visceral process. These\nillustrations bring out clearly what is everywhere recognised, that the\ncustomary cognition-feeling-conation classification of mental goings on\nis not a pigeon-holing of exclusive processes. Every mental event has,\nin varying degrees, all three characteristics. Thus expectation as a\npreparation for certain stimuli may lower the threshold for them, and\nsometimes makes their reception more and sometimes less discriminating;\nhunger also is characteristically accompanied by a search for food.\n\nThe advantage of substituting the causation, the character and\nthe consequences of a mental event as its fundamental aspects\nin place of its knowing, feeling, and willing aspects is that\ninstead of a trio of incomprehensible ultimates we have a set\nof aspects which not only mental events but all events share.\nWe have, of course, to introduce qualifications. Stimuli, as\nwe have mentioned above, are not the only causes of mental events.\nThe nervous system is specialised to receive impressions through\nthe organs of sense, but its state at any moment is also determined\nby a host of other factors. The condition of the blood and the\nposition of the head are typical instances. Only that part of\nthe cause of a mental event which takes effect through incoming\n(sensory) impulses or through effects of past sensory impulses\ncan be said to be thereby known. The reservation no doubt involves\ncomplications. But any plausible account of what knowledge is\nand how it happens is bound to be complicated.\n\nSimilarly, not all the effects of a mental event are to be counted\nas what that event wills or seeks after; apoplectic strokes,\nfor example, can be ruled out. Only those movements which the\nnervous system is specialised to incite, which take place through\nmotor impulses, should be included.\n\nOn all other accounts the relation between an awareness and what\nit is aware of is a mystery. We can name the relation as we please,\napprehension, presentation, cognition or knowledge, but there\nwe have to leave the matter. On this account we make use of the\nfact that an awareness, say of a variety of black marks on this\npage, is caused in a certain peculiar way, namely through impressions\non a part of the brain (the retina) and various complicated connected\ngoings on in other parts of the brain. To say that the mental\n(neural) event so caused is aware of the black marks is to say\nthat it is caused by them, and here \u2018aware of\u2019 = \u2018caused by\u2019.\nThe two statements are merely alternative formulations.\n\nIn extending this account to more complicated situations where\nwe know or, less ambiguously, _refer to_ things which are\npast or future we have to make use of the fact that impressions\nare commonly _signs_, have effects which depend not on themselves\nalone but upon the other impressions which have co-operated with\nthem in the past.\n\nA sign[40] is something which has once been a member of a context\nor configuration that worked in the mind as a whole. When it\nreappears its effects are as though the rest of the context were\npresent. In analysing complex events of referring we have to\nbreak them up artificially into the simpler sign-situations out\nof which they arise; not forgetting meanwhile how interdependent\nthe parts of any interpretation of a complex sign are.\n\nThe detail of this procedure is most easily studied in connection\nwith the use of words. We shall deal with it therefore in Chapter\nXVI, where the reading of a poem is discussed. Here only the\ngeneral principle matters that to know anything is to be influenced\nby it, directly when we sense it, indirectly when the effects\nof past conjunctions of impressions come into play. More will\nbe added later, in connection with the process of reading, about\nthe receptive, the knowledge aspect of mental events. The other\ntwo aspects need less explanation. They are also more generally\nimportant for the understanding of poetic, musical and other\nexperiences. For a theory of knowledge is needed only at one\npoint, the point at which we wish to decide whether a poem, for\nexample, is true, or reveals reality, and if so in what sense;\nadmittedly a very important question. Whereas a theory of feeling,\nof emotion, of attitudes and desires, of the affective-volitional\naspect of mental activity, is required at all points of our analysis.\n\n\n[34] _Eyeless Sight_, p. 22.\n\n[35] _Dedalus, or Science and the Future_, by J. B. S. Haldane.\n\n[36] Compare Chapter XXXIV where the ways in which emotive factors\ninterfere with thought are considered.\n\n[37] Cf. Pi\u00e9ron, _Thought and the Brain_, Chapter I.\n\n[38] Many apparent questions which begin with the words \u2018What\u2019\nand \u2018Why\u2019 are not questions at all, but requests for emotive\nSatisfaction.\n\n[39] \u2018Willing\u2019 is a bad word; I would use conation throughout\nwere it not so likely to increase unnecessarily the difficulty\nwhich this chapter will unavoidably present to readers who are\nnot familiar with psychological jargon. The essential thing is\nto think of willing (desiring, striving towards, trying) as an\nunconscious as much as a conscious process.\n\n[40] This topic is discussed at length in _The Meaning of Meaning_.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XII\n\nPleasure\n\n The poor benefit of a bewitching minute.\u2014_The Revenger\u2019s Tragedy_.\n\n\nSensation, imagery, feeling, emotion, together with pleasure,\nunpleasure and pain are names for the conscious characteristics\nof impulses: How they may best be sorted out is a problem whose\ndifficulty is much aggravated by the shortcomings of language\nat this point. We speak, for instance, of pleasures and pains\nin the same fashion, as though they were of the same order, but,\nstrictly, although pains as single self-sufficing modifications\nof consciousness are easily enough obtainable, pleasures by themselves\ndo not seem to occur. Pleasure seems to be a way in which something\nhappens, rather than an independent happening which can occur\nby itself in a mind. We have, not pleasures, but experiences\nof one kind or another, visual, auditory, organic, motor, and\nso forth, which are pleasant. Similarly we have experiences which\nare unpleasant. If, however, we call them painful we give rise\nto an ambiguity. We may be saying that they are unpleasant or\nwe may be saying that they are accompanied by pains, which is\na different matter. The use of the term pleasure, as though like\npain it was itself a complete experience, instead of being something\nwhich attaches to or follows along with or after other experiences,\nhas led to a number of confusions; especially in those critical\ntheses, to which objection has already been taken in Chapter\nIX, which identify value with pleasure.\n\nThe twenty or more distinct kinds of sensations, into which modern\npsychology has elaborated the old five senses, can be observed\nto differ very widely in the degree to which they are susceptible\nof and accompanied by pleasantness and unpleasantness. The higher\nsenses, sight and hearing, in most persons seem to yield sensations\nwhich vary much less from neutrality or indifference than the\nothers. We must be careful to understand this difference correctly\nhowever. An arrangement of colours and shapes, a sequence of\nnotes or a musical phrase may, of course, in suitable people,\nbe as intensely toned, pleasantly or unpleasantly, as any organic\nor taste sensations, for example. But even this is not usual.\nThe right experiment is to compare a single colour, say, or a\nsingle note, with such a sensation as a uniform touch or temperature\ngives rise to, a bath for example, or with a simple uniform taste\nor smell, or with hunger, or nausea. Fair comparison is difficult,\nequivalent levels of simplicity and uniformity being impossible\nto discover, but few will doubt that the degree of pleasure-unpleasure\naroused by tastes, for example, far exceeds that which auditory\nor visual sensations excite by themselves. We must of course\nbe careful here to avoid confusing the intrinsic pleasure-unpleasure\nof the sensations with that which arises through memory, through\nthe effects of other sensations, pleasant or unpleasant, which\nmay have accompanied them in the past, and through expectations\nagreeable or disagreeable.\n\nTo speak of the intrinsic pleasure-unpleasure of a sensation\nis perhaps misleading. The pleasantness of a sensation as we\nknow is a highly variable thing. It may alter completely while\nthe strictly sensory characteristics of the sensation remain\nas before. The difference in the same smell of liquor, before\nand after an alcoholic excess is a striking example. A sound\nwhich is pleasant for a while may become very unpleasant if it\ncontinues and does not lapse from consciousness. And yet indisputably\nit may remain _qua_ sensation the same. A sound-sensation\nmay remain unchanged in tone, volume and intensity yet vary widely\nin pleasure-unpleasure. This difference is important. It is one\nof the chief reasons which have caused feeling (pleasure-unpleasure)\nto be distinguished from sensation as altogether of a different\nnature. Tone, volume and intensity are features in the sound\nclosely dependent upon the stimulus, pleasantness is dependent\nnot on external stimulus but upon factors, very obscure at present,\nin us. All here is conjecture. The close connection of stimulus\nwith sensation we know because it happens to be comparatively\naccessible to experiment. And introspection of sensations of\nexternal origin is for that reason much more easy than introspection\nof most visceral or organic sensations. We can practise it freely\nand repeat it and so control our results. To a lesser extent\nthose sensations of internal origin which we can in part consciously\ncontrol, those due to voluntary movements, share this double\naccessibility. But all the rest of the multifarious conscious\ngoings on in the nervous system remain obscure. One broad fact,\nhowever, is important. The effects in the body of almost all\nstimuli of whatever nature are extraordinarily numerous and varied.\n\u201cYou cannot show the observer a wall-paper pattern without by\nthat very fact disturbing his respiration and circulation.\u201d[41]\nAnd no man knows what other disturbances do not join in. The\nwhole body resounds in what would seem to be a fairly systematic\nway. Whether the outpouring of this tide of disturbance makes\nup a part of, gives a tone to consciousness, or whether only\nthe incoming reports of the results can be conscious is a question\nupon which no conclusive evidence would seem to be yet available.\nThe incoming reports of some at least of these disturbances certainly\ncan become conscious. A lump in the throat, a yearning of the\nbowels, horripilation, breathlessness, these are their coarser\nand more obvious forms. Usually, they are less salient and fuse\nwith the whole mass of internal sensations to form the _c\u0153nesthesia_,\nthe whole bodily consciousness, tinging it, altering its general\ncharacter in some one of perhaps a thousand different ways.\n\nIt has been much disputed whether pleasure-unpleasure is a quality\nof general bodily or organic consciousness, of some part of it\nperhaps, or whether it is something quite different from any\nquality of any sensation or set of sensations. As we have seen,\nit is not a quality of an auditory sensation in the sense in\nwhich its loudness, for instance, is a quality. There seem to\nbe similar objections to making it a quality of any sensation\nof any kind. A sensation is what an impulse at a certain stage\nin its development feels like, and its sensory qualities are\ncharacters[42] of the impulse at that stage. The pleasure-unpleasure\nattaching to the impulse may be no character of the impulse itself,\nbut of its fate, its success or failure in restoring equilibrium\nto the system to which it belongs.\n\nThis is perhaps as good a guess at what pleasure and unpleasure\nare as can yet be made, pleasure being successful activity of\nsome kind, not necessarily of a biologically useful kind, and\nunpleasure being frustrated, chaotic, mal-successful activity.\nWe shall consider this theory again at a later stage (cf. Chapter\nXXIV). The point to be made here is that pleasure and unpleasure\nare complicated matters arising in the course of activities which\nare directed to other ends. The old controversies as to whether\npleasure is the goal of all striving or whether avoidance of\nunpleasure the starting-point, are thus escaped. As Ribot pointed\nout[43] the exclusive quest of pleasure for itself, _plaisir-passion_,\nis a morbid form of activity and self-destructive. Pleasure on\nthis view is originally an _effect_ signifying that certain\npositive or negative tendencies have instinctively attained their\naim and are satisfied. Later through experience it becomes a\ncause. Instructed by experience man and animal alike place themselves\nin circumstances which will arouse desire and so through satisfaction\nlead to pleasure. The gourmet, the libertine, the \u00e6sthete, the\nmystic do so alike. But when the pleasure which is the result\nof satisfying the tendency becomes the end pursued rather than\nthe satisfying of the tendency itself, then an \u2018_inversion_\nof the psychological mechanism\u2019 comes about. In the one case\nthe activity is propagated from below upwards, in the other from\nabove downwards, from the brain to the organic functions. The\nresult is often an exhaustion of the tendency, \u2018disillusionment\u2019\nand the _blas\u00e9_, world-wearied attitude.\n\nThe evil results, as Ribot remarks, are largely confined to those\nindividuals in whom the quest for pleasure has the force of an\nobsession. But on the view of pleasure which we have indicated\nabove, it is clear that all those doctrines, very common in critical\nliterature, which set up pleasure as the goal of activity, are\nmistaken. Every activity has its own specific goal. Pleasure very\nprobably ensues in most cases when this goal is reached, but that\nis a different matter. To read a poem for the sake of the pleasure\nwhich will ensue if it is successfully read is to approach it in an\ninadequate attitude. Obviously it is the poem in which we should be\ninterested, not in a by-product of having managed successfully to read\nit. The orientation of attention is wrong if we put the pleasure in\nthe forefront. Such a mistake is perhaps not common among instructed\npersons, but to judge by many remarks which appear in reviews and\ndramatic notices the percentage of instructed persons among reviewers\nand theatre-goers does not seem high. This error, a legacy in part\nfrom the criticism of an age which had a still poorer psychological\nvocabulary[44] than Our own, is one reason why Tragedy, for example,\nis so often misapproached. It is no less absurd to suppose that a\ncompetent reader sits down to read for the sake of pleasure, than to\nsuppose that a mathematician sets out to solve an equation with a view\nto the pleasure its solution will afford him. The pleasure in both\ncases may, of course, be very great. But the pleasure, however great\nit may be, is no more the aim of the activity in the course of which\nit arises, than, for example, the noise made by a motor-cycle\u2014useful\nthough it is as an indication of the way the machine is running\u2014is the\nreason in the normal case for its having been started.\n\nThis very common mistake noted, the significance of pleasure\nand unpleasure may be insisted upon without misgiving. They are\nour most delicate signs of how our activities are thriving. But\nsince even the most intense delight may indicate only a local\nsuccess and the activity be generally detrimental, they are signs\nwhich need a very wary interpretation.\n\n\n[41] Titchener, _Text-book of Psychology_, p. 248.\n\n[42] Into conjectures as to what these are, it seems as yet not\nprofitable to enter.\n\n[43] _Probl\u00e8mes de Psychologie affective_, pp. 141-144.\n\n[44] It is probable that Wordsworth and certain that Coleridge\nif writing to-day would use quite other terms in place of pleasure\nfor describing poetic values.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIII\n\nEmotion and the C\u0153nesthesia\n\n They are the silent griefs that cut the heart-strings.\n _The Broken Heart_.\n\n\nIn alluding to the c\u0153nesthesia we came very near to giving an\naccount of emotion as an ingredient of consciousness. Stimulating\nsituations give rise to widespread ordered repercussions throughout\nthe body, felt as clearly marked colourings of consciousness.\nThese patterns in organic response are fear, grief, joy, anger\nand the other emotional states. They arise for the most part\nwhen permanent or periodical tendencies of the individual are\nsuddenly either facilitated or frustrated. Thus they depend far\nless upon the nature of the external stimulus than upon the general\ninternal circumstances of the individual\u2019s life at the time the\nstimulus occurs. These emotional states, with pleasure and unpleasure,\nare customarily distinguished under the head of feeling[45] from\nsensations, which are, as we have seen, very closely dependent\nfor their character upon their stimulus. Thus sensations are\nranked together as cognitive elements, concerned, that is, with\nour knowledge of things rather than with our attitude or behaviour\ntowards them, or our emotion about them. Pleasure, however, and\nemotion have, on our view, also a cognitive aspect. They give\nus knowledge; in the case of pleasure, of how our activities\nare going on, successfully or otherwise; in the case of emotion,\nknowledge primarily of our attitudes. But emotion may give us\nfurther knowledge. It is a remarkable fact that persons with\nexceptional colour sense apparently judge most accurately whether\ntwo colours are the same, for example, or whether they have or\nhave not some definite harmonic relation to one another, not\nby attentive optical comparison or examination, but by the general\nemotional or organic reaction which the colours evoke when simply\nglanced at. This is an indirect way of becoming aware of the\nspecific nature of the external world, but none the less a very\nvaluable way. A similar method is probably involved in those\napparently immediate judgments of the moral character of persons\nmet with for the first time which many people make so readily\nand successfully. They may be quite unable to mention any definite\nfeature of the person upon which their judgment could be based.\nIt is none the less often extraordinarily just and discriminating.\nThe remarkable sensitiveness to its mother\u2019s expression which\nthe infant shows is a striking example. The part played by this\nkind of judgment in all \u00e6sthetic appreciation need not be insisted\nupon. It is notable that artists are often pre-eminently adepts\nat such judgments. The topic is usually discussed under the wide\nand vague heading of intuition; a rubric which completely obscures\nand befogs the issues.\n\nFor such judgments are not a simpler and more direct way of taking\ncognisance of things, but a more indirect and more complex way.\nIt is not thereby shown to be a less primitive process. On the\ncontrary, simplified ways of thinking are commonly advanced products.\nThe \u2018intuitive\u2019 person uses his c\u0153nesthesia as a chemist uses\nhis reagents or a physiologist his galvanometer. As far as the\nsensations which the colour stimuli excite can be optically discriminated,\nno difference is perceptible. But an actual yet sensorily imperceptible\ndifference becomes apparent through the difference in organic\nreaction. The process is merely one of adding further and more\ndelicate signs to the situation, it is analogous to attaching\na recording lever to a barograph.\n\nThe differences between sensitive or \u2018intuitive\u2019 and more \u2018rational\u2019\nand obtuse individuals may be of two kinds. It may be that the\nsensitive person\u2019s organic response is more delicate. This is\na difficult matter to decide. It is certain, however, that the\nchief difference (a derivative difference very likely) lies in\nthe fact that the obtuse person has not learned to _interpret_\nthe changes in his general bodily consciousness in any systematic\nfashion. The changes may occur and occur systematically, but\nthey mean nothing definite to him.\n\nThis kind of intervention of organic sensation in perception\nplays a part in all the arts. Much neglected, it is probably\nof very great importance. What here needs to be noticed is that\nit is not a mode of gaining knowledge which differs in any essential\nway from other modes. No unique and peculiar relation of \u2018feeling\u2019\ntowards things needs to be introduced to explain it, any more\nthan a unique and peculiar mode of \u2018cognitively apprehending\u2019\nthem needs to be introduced to explain ordinary knowing. In both\ninstances their causes, which have to be assumed in any case,\nwill suffice. When we sense something our sensation is caused\nby what we sense. When we refer to something absent, a present\nsensation similar to sensations which in the past have been coincident\nwith it, is thereby a sign for it, and so on, through more and\nmore intricate mnemic sign-situations. Here a present colour\nsensation gives rise to an organic response which has in the\npast accompanied a definite colour; the response becomes then\na sign of that colour which the sensitive and discriminating\nperson trusts, although he is optically unable to make sure whether\nthat colour is present or merely one very like it. Other cases\ndiffer from this in complexity but not in principle. If it is\nobjected that this account of referring or thinking in terms\nof causes gives us at best but a very indirect way of knowing,\nthe reply is that the prevalence of error is itself a strong\nargument against a too direct theory of knowledge.\n\nIn popular parlance the term \u2018emotion\u2019 stands for those happenings\nin minds which accompany such exhibitions of unusual excitement\nas weeping, shouting, blushing, trembling, and so on. But in\nthe usage of most critics it has taken an extended sense, thereby\nsuffering quite needlessly in its usefulness. For them it stands\nfor any noteworthy \u2018goings on\u2019 in the mind almost regardless\nof their nature. The true and profound emotions, as spoken of\nby critics, are often lacking in all the characteristics which\ngovern the more refined linguistic usage of common people, and,\nas it happens, of psychologists also, for what may perhaps be\nregarded now as the standard usage in psychology, sets out from\nthe very same bodily changes accompanying experience as were\nnoted above.\n\nTwo main features characterise every emotional experience. One\nof these is a diffused reaction in the organs of the body brought\nabout through the sympathetic systems. The other is a tendency\nto action of some definite kind or group of kinds. These extensive\nchanges in the visceral and vascular systems, characteristically\nin respiration and in glandular secretion, commonly take place\nin response to situations which call some instinctive tendency\ninto play. As a result of all these changes a tide of sensations\nof internal bodily origin comes into consciousness. It is generally\nagreed that these sensations make up at least the main part of\nthe peculiar consciousness of an emotion. Whether they are necessary\nto it or not is disputed. It may perhaps be suggested that insufficient\nattention has been paid in the theory of emotion to images of\nsuch sensations. The fact that fear, for example, may be felt\nin the absence of any detectable bodily changes of the kind described\n(a disputed fact) may be explained by supposing images of these\nsensations to be taking their place.\n\nThese sensations, or images of them, are then a main ingredient\nof an emotional experience and account for its peculiar \u2018colour\u2019\nor tone, for the voluminousness and massiveness as well as for\nthe extreme acuteness of emotions. But of equal or greater importance\nare the changes in consciousness due to reactions in the nervous\nsystems which control movement, governing muscular response to\nthe stimulating situation. These range, in the case of fear,\nfrom the awakening of a simple tendency, an impulse to run away\nor hide under the table, to such elaborate readjustments as we\nmake when we prepare to counter a threat against some favourite\nopinion. As a rule a process of extraordinary complexity takes\nplace between perceiving the situation and finding a mode of\nmeeting it. This complicated process contributes the rest of\nits peculiar flavour to an emotional experience.\n\n\n\nA more detailed discussion from the same angle of the points\nraised in this and the surrounding chapters will be found in\n_The Meaning of Psychology_ (1926) by C. K. Ogden, where\nthe author\u2019s view of mental activity is elaborated.\n\n[45] The fashion in which the term \u2018feeling\u2019 shifts about in psychology\nis notorious as a source of confusion. It would be convenient\nif it could be kept for pleasure-unpleasure, and used no longer\nas a synonym for \u2018emotion\u2019, since emotions can much more easily\nbe regarded as built up from organic sensations.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIV\n\nMemory\n\n Within the surface of Time\u2019s fleeting river\n Its wrinkled image lies, as then it lay\n Immovably unquiet, and for ever\n It trembles, but it cannot pass away!\n Shelley, _Ode to Liberty_.\n\n\nSo far we have alluded only casually to memory, to that apparent\nrevival of past experience to which the richness and complexity\nof experience is due. Every stimulus which is ever received leaves\nbehind it, so it is said, an imprint, a trace capable of being\nrevived later and of contributing its quota to consciousness\nand to behaviour. To these effects of past experience the systematic,\nthe organised character of our behaviour is due; the fact that\nthey intervene is the explanation of our ability to learn by\nexperience. It is a way peculiar to living tissue by which the\npast influences our present behaviour across, as it might appear,\na gulf of time.\n\nHow we should conceive this influence is perhaps the most puzzling\npoint in psychology. The old theory of a kind of Somerset House\nof past impressions has given place to an account in terms of\nfacilitations of neural paths, lowered resistances in synapses,\nand so forth. It was natural that as the broad outlines of neural\nactivity came to be known, psychologists should attempt to make\nuse of them. But on close examination it is clear that their\ninterpretations were far too crude. Fixed \u2018paths\u2019, one for every\nitem of experience which has ever taken place, and others for\nevery kind of connection into which the items come, however multitudinous\nwe make them, no longer explain what can be observed in behaviour\nand experience. As Von Kries and, more recently, Koffka have\ninsisted, the fact, for example, that we _recognise_ things\nin cases where it is certain that quite different paths must\nbe involved, is fatal to the scheme. And mere multiplication\nof the entities invoked leads to no solution. Semon even goes\nso far as to say that when we listen to a song for the hundredth\ntime we hear not only the singer but a chorus of nine and ninety\nmnemic voices. This corollary by itself is almost a refutation\nof his theory.\n\nWe have to escape from the crude assumption that the only way\nin which what is past can be repeated is by records being kept.\nThe old associationists supposed the records to be writ small\ninside separate cells. The more modern view was that they were\nscored large through a deepening of the channels of conduction.\nNeither view is adequate.\n\nImagine an energy system of prodigious complexity and extreme\ndelicacy of organisation which has an indefinitely large number\nof stable poises. Imagine it thrown from one poise to another\nwith great facility, each poise being the resultant of all the\nenergies of the system. Suppose now that the _partial_ return\nof a situation which has formerly caused it to assume a stable\npoise, throws it into an unstable condition, from which it most\neasily returns to equilibrium by reassuming the former poise.\nSuch a system would exhibit the phenomena of memory; but it would\nkeep no records though appearing to do so. The appearance would\nbe due merely to the extreme accuracy and sensitiveness of the\nsystem and the delicacy of its balances. Its state on the later\noccasion would appear to be a _revival_ of its state on\nthe former, but this would not be the case any more than a cumulus\ncloud this evening is a revival of those which decorated the\nheavens last year.\n\nThis imaginary construction can be made more concrete by imagining\na solid with a large number of facets upon any one of which it\ncan rest. If we try to balance it upon one of its coigns or ridges\nit settles down upon the nearest facet. In the case of the neural\nsystem we are trying to suggest each stable poise has been determined\nby a definite set, or better, context of conditions. Membership\nof this context is what corresponds to nearness to a facet. The\npartial return of the context causes the system to behave as\nthough conditions were present which are not, and this is what\nis essential in memory.\n\nThat this suggestion in the form here presented is unsatisfactory\nand incomplete is evident. It is wildly conjectural no doubt,\nbut so are the Archival and Pathway Theories. Yet it does avoid\nthe chief deficiencies of those theories, it does suggest why\nonly some conjunctions of experiences become \u2018associated\u2019, those\nnamely which yield a stable poise. And it suggests why a thing\nshould be recognised as the same though appearing in countless\ndifferent aspects; every time it appears different conditions\noccur which, none the less, lead to one and the same stable poise,\nas the polyhedron we imagined may settle down on one and the\nsame facet from all the surrounding ridges.\n\nOne of the collateral advantages of such a view is that it removes\nsome of the temptations to revert to animism from which psychologists,\nand especially literary psychologists, suffer. Dissatisfaction\nwith current hypotheses as to the mechanism of reflex arcs is\na main cause for the scientifically desperate belief in the soul.\nAnd apart from this, the special emotive factors which disturb\njudgment on this point are less obtrusive when this account is\nsubstituted for the usual story of the conditioned reflex, that\nsacrilegious contrivance of the mechanists.\n\nThere is no kind of mental activity in which memory does not\nintervene. We are most familiar with it in the case of images,\nthose fugitive elusive copies of sensations with which psychology\nhas been hitherto so much, perhaps too much, concerned. Visual\nimages are the best known of them, but it is important to recognise\nthat every kind of sensation may have its corresponding image.\nVisceral, kin\u00e6sthetic, thermal images can with a little practice\nbe produced, even by people who have never noticed their occurrence.\nBut individual differences as regards imagery are enormous, more\nin the degree to which images become conscious, however, than\nin their actual presence or absence on the needful occasion.\nThose people who, by their own report, are devoid of images,\nnone the less behave in a way which makes it certain that the\nsame processes are at work in them as in producers of the most\nflamboyant images.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XV\n\nAttitudes\n\n My Sences want their outward motion\n Which now within\n Reason doth win,\n Redoubled by her secret notion.\u2014John Hoskins.\n\n\nThe interventions of memory are not confined to sensation and\nemotion. They are of equal importance in our active behaviour.\nThe acquisition of any muscular accomplishment, dancing or billiards,\nfor example, shows this clearly. What we have already done in\nthe past controls what we shall do in the future. If the perception\nof an object and the recognition that it is a tree, for example,\ninvolve a poise in the sensory system concerned, a certain completeness\nor \u2018closure,\u2019 to use the term employed by Kohler, so an act,\nas opposed to a random movement, involves a similar poise in\na motor system. But sensory and motor systems are not independent;\nthey work together; every perception probably includes a response\nin the form of incipient action. We constantly overlook the extent\nto which all the while we are making preliminary adjustments,\ngetting ready to act in one way or another. Reading Captain Slocum\u2019s\naccount of the centipede which bit him on the head when alone\nin the middle of the Atlantic, the writer has been caused to\nleap right out of his chair by a leaf which fell upon his face\nfrom a tree. Only occasionally does some such accident show how\nextensive are the motor adjustments made in what appear to be\nthe most unmuscular occupations.\n\nThis incipient activity stands to overt action much as an image\nstands to a sensation. But such \u2018imaginal\u2019 activity is, by its\nvery nature, extraordinarily hard to detect or to experiment\nupon. Psychology has only dealt with fringes of the mind hitherto\nand the most accessible fringe is on the side of sensation. We\nhave therefore to build up our conjectures as to the rest of\nmental happenings by analogy with the perhaps not entirely representative\nspecimens which sensation supplies. This limitation has led the\nmajority of psychologists to see in imaginal movement no more\nthan images of the _sensations_ from muscle, joint, and\ntendon, which would arise if the movement were actually made.\n\nIt is certain that before any action takes place a preliminary\norganisation must occur which ensures that the parts do not get\nin one another\u2019s way. It appears to the writer that these preliminaries\nin his case make up part of consciousness, but there is a heavy\nweight of authority against him. The point is no doubt exceptionally\nhard to determine.\n\nIn any case, whether the consciousness of activity is due to\nsensations and images of movements alone, or whether the outgoing\npart of the impulse and its preparatory organisation help to\nmake up consciousness, there is no doubt about the importance\nof incipient and imaginal movement in experience. The work done\nby Lipps, Groos and others on _einf\u00fchlung_, or empathy,\nhowever we may prefer to restate their results, shows that when\nwe perceive spatial or musical form we commonly accompany our\nperception with closely connected motor activity. We cannot leave\nthis activity out of our account of what happens in the experiences\nof the arts, although we may think that those who have built\nupon this fact what they have put forward as a complete \u00e6sthetic\u2014Vernon\nLee, for example\u2014have been far from clear as to what questions\nthey were answering.\n\nThe extent to which any activity is conscious seems to depend\nvery largely upon how complex and how novel it is. The primitive\nand in a sense natural outcome of stimulus is action; the more\nsimple the situation with which the mind is engaged, the closer\nis the connection between the stimulus and some overt response\nin action, and in general the less rich and full is the consciousness\nattendant. A man walking over uneven ground, for example, makes\nwithout reflection or emotion a continuous adjustment of his\nsteps to his footing; but let the ground become precipitous and,\nunless he is used to such places, both reflection and emotion\nwill appear. The increased complexity of the situation and the\ngreater delicacy and appropriateness of the movements required\nfor convenience and safety, call forth far more complicated goings\non in the mind. Besides his perception of the nature of the ground,\nthe thought may occur that a false move would be perilous and\ndifficult to retrieve. This, when accompanied by emotion, is\ncalled a \u2018realisation\u2019 of his situation. The adjustment to one\nanother of varied impulses\u2014to go forward carefully, to lie down\nand grasp something with the hands, to go back, and so forth\u2014and\ntheir co-ordination into useful behaviour alters the whole character\nof his experience.\n\nMost behaviour is a reconciliation between the various acts which\nwould satisfy the different impulses which combine to produce\nit; and the richness and interest of the feel of it in consciousness\ndepends upon the variety of the impulses engaged. Any familiar\nactivity, when set in different conditions so that the impulses\nwhich make it up have to adjust themselves to fresh streams of\nimpulses due to the new conditions, is likely to take on increased\nrichness and fullness in consciousness.\n\nThis general fact is of great importance for the arts, particularly\nfor poetry, painting and sculpture, the representative or mimetic\narts. For in these a totally new setting for what may be familiar\nelements is essentially involved. Instead of seeing a tree we\nsee something in a picture which may have similar effects upon\nus but is _not_ a tree. The tree impulses which are aroused\nhave to adjust themselves to their new setting of other impulses\ndue to our awareness that it is a _picture_ which we are\nlooking at. Thus an opportunity arises for those impulses to\ndefine themselves in a way in which they ordinarily do not.\n\nThis, of course, is only the most obvious and simple instance\nof the way in which, thanks to the unusual circumstances in which\nthings depicted, or in literature described, come before us,\nthe experiences that result are modified. To take another obvious\nexample, the description or the theatrical presentation of a\nmurder has a different effect upon us from that which would be\nproduced by most actual murders if they took place before us.\nThese considerations, of vast importance in the discussion of\nartistic form, will occupy us later (pp. 145, 237). Here it is\nsufficient to point out that these differences between ordinary\nexperiences and those due to works of art are only special cases\nof the general difference between experiences made up of a less\nand of a greater number of impulses which have to be brought\ninto co-ordination with one another. The bearing of this point\nupon the problem of the \u00e6sthetic mode with its detachment, impersonality,\netc., discussed in the second chapter, will be apparent. (Compare\nChapter XXXII, p. 249.)\n\nThe result of the co-ordination of a great number of impulses\nof different kinds is very often that no _overt_ action\ntakes place. There is a danger here of supposing that no action\nwhatever results or that there is something incomplete or imperfect\nabout such a state of affairs. But imaginal action and incipient\naction which does not go so far as actual muscular movement are\nmore important than Overt action in the well-developed human\nbeing. Indeed the difference between the intelligent or refined,\nand the stupid or crass person is a difference in the extent\nto which overt action can be replaced by incipient and imaginal\naction. An intelligent man can \u2018see how a thing works\u2019 when a\nless intelligent man has to \u2018find out by trying\u2019. Similarly with\nsuch responses as are aroused by a work of art. The difference\nbetween \u2018understanding\u2019 it and failing to do so is, in most cases,\na difference between being able to make the required responses\nin an imaginal or incipient degree, adjusting them to one another\nat that stage, and being unable to produce them or adjust them\nexcept overtly and at their fullest development. Though the kinds\nof activity involved are different, the analogy with the case\nof the mathematician is not misleading. The fact that he will\nnot make half so many marks on paper as a schoolboy does not\nshow that he is any less active. His activity takes place at\nan earlier stage in which his responses are merely incipient\nor imaginal. In a similar manner the absence of any overt movements\nor external signs of emotion in an experienced reader of poetry,\nor concert-goer, compared to the evident disturbances which are\nsometimes to be seen in the novice, is no indication of any lack\nof internal activity. The response required in many cases by\nworks of art is of a kind which can only be obtained in an incipient\nor imaginal stage. Practical considerations often prevent their\nbeing worked out in overt form, and this is, as a rule, not in\nthe least to be regretted. For these responses are commonly of\nthe nature of solutions to problems, not of intellectual research,\nbut of emotional accommodation and adjustment, and can usually\nbe best achieved while the different impulses which have to be\nreconciled are still in an incipient or imaginal stage, and before\nthe matter has become further complicated by the irrelevant accidents\nwhich attend overt responses.\n\nThese imaginal and incipient activities or tendencies to action,\nI shall call attitudes. When we realise how many and how different\nmay be the tendencies awakened by a situation, and what scope\nthere is for conflict, suppression and interplay\u2014all contributing\nsomething to our experience\u2014it will not appear surprising that\nthe classification and analysis of attitudes is not yet far advanced.\nA thousand tendencies to actions, which do not overtly take place,\nmay well occur in complicated adjustments. For these what evidence\nthere is must be indirect. In fact, the only attitudes which\nare capable of clear and explicit analysis are those in which\nsome simple mode of observable behaviour gives the clue to what\nhas been taking place, and even here only a part of the reaction\nis open to this kind of examination.\n\nAmong the experiences which are by the nature of the case hidden\nfrom observation are found almost all those with which criticism\nis concerned. The outward aspect and behaviour of a man reading\n_The Prioresses\u2019 Tale_ and _The Miller\u2019s Tale_ may well be\nindistinguishable. But this should not lead us to overlook how\ngreat a part in the whole experience is taken by attitudes. Many\nexperiences which, if examined by introspection for their actual\ncontent of sensation and imagery, differ very little, are totally\ndiverse in the kind and degree of implicit activity present. This\naspect of experiences as filled with incipient promptings, lightly\nstimulated tendencies to acts of one kind or another, faint preliminary\npreparations for doing this or that, has been constantly overlooked\nin criticism. Yet it is in terms of attitudes, the resolution,\ninter-inanimation, and balancing of impulses\u2014Aristotle\u2019s definition of\nTragedy[46] is an instance\u2014that all the most valuable effects of poetry\nmust be described.\n\n\n[46] \u201cTragedy is an imitation of an action... effecting through\nPity and Terror the correction and refinement (_\u03ba\u03ac\u03b8\u03b1\u03c1\u03c2\u03b9\u03c2_)\nof such passions.\u201d _Poetics_, VI. Cf. p. 247, _infra_.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVI\n\nThe Analysis of a Poem\n\n Toutes choses sont dites d\u00e9j\u00e0, mais comme personne n\u2019\u00e9coute\n il faut toujours recommencer.\u2014Andr\u00e9 Gide.\n\n\nThe qualifications of a good critic are three. He must be an\nadept at experiencing, without eccentricities, the state of mind\nrelevant to the work of art he is judging. Secondly, he must\nbe able to distinguish experiences from one another as regards\ntheir less superficial features. Thirdly, he must be a sound\njudge of values.\n\nUpon all these matters psychology, even in its present conjectural\nstate, has a direct bearing. The critic is, throughout, judging\nof experiences, of states of mind; but too often he is needlessly\nignorant of the general psychological form of the experiences\nwith which he is concerned. He has no clear ideas as to the elements\npresent or as to their relative importance. Thus, an outline\nor schema of the mental events which make up the experience of\n\u2018looking at\u2019 a picture or \u2018reading\u2019 a poem, can be of great assistance.\nAt the very least an understanding of the probable structures\nof these experiences can remove certain misconceptions which\ntend to make the opinions of individuals of less service to other\nindividuals than need be.\n\nTwo instances will show this. There are certain broad features\nin which all agree a poem of Swinburne is unlike a poem of Hardy.\nThe use of words by the two poets is different. Their methods\nare dissimilar, and the proper approach for a reader differs\ncorrespondingly. An attempt to read them in the same way is unfair\nto one of the poets, or to both, and leads inevitably to defects\nin criticism which a little reflection would remove. It is absurd\nto read Pope as though he were Shelley, but the essential differences\ncannot be clearly marked out unless such an outline of the general\nform of a poetic experience, as is here attempted, has been provided.\nThe psychological means employed by these poets are demonstrably\ndifferent. Whether the effects are also dissimilar is a further\nquestion for which the same kind of analysis is equally required.\n\nThis separation inside the poetic experience of certain parts\nwhich are means from certain other parts which are the ends upon\nwhich the poetic value of the experience depends, leads up to\nour other instance. It is unquestionable that the actual experiences,\nwhich even good critics undergo when reading, as we say, _the\nsame poem_, differ very widely. In spite of certain conventions,\nwhich endeavour to conceal these inevitable discrepancies for\nsocial purposes, there can be no doubt that the experiences of\nreaders in connection with particular poems are rarely similar.\nThis is unavoidable. Some differences are, however, much more\nimportant than others. Provided the ends, in which the value\nof the poem lies, are attained, differences in the means need\nnot prevent critics from agreement or from mutual service. Those\ndiscrepancies alone are fatal which affect the fundamental features\nof experiences, the features upon which their _value_ depends.\nBut enough is now known of the ways in which minds work for superficial\nand fundamental parts of experiences to be distinguished. One\nof the greatest living critics praises the line:\n\n The fringed curtain of thine eyes advance,\n\nfor the \u2018ravishing beauty\u2019 of the visual images excited. This\ncommon mistake of exaggerating personal accidents in the means\nby which a poem attains its end into the chief value of the poem\nis due to excessive trust in the commonplaces[47] of psychology.\n\n[Illustration: Arcadia, Night, a Cloud, Pan, and the Moon]\n\nIn the analysis of the experience of reading a poem, a diagram,\nor hieroglyph, is convenient, provided that its limitations are\nclearly recognised. The spatial relations of the parts of the\ndiagram, for instance, are not intended to stand for spatial\nrelations between parts of what is represented; it is not a picture\nof the nervous system. Nor are temporal relations intended. Spatial\nmetaphors, whether drawn as diagrams or merely imagined, are\ndangers only to the unwary. The essential service which pictures\ncan give in abstract matters, namely, the simultaneous and compact\nrepresentation of states of affairs which otherwise tend to remain\nindistinct and confused, is worth the slight risk of misunderstanding\nwhich they entail.\n\nWe may begin then with a diagrammatic representation of the events\nwhich take place when we read a poem. Other literary experiences\nwill only differ from this in their greater simplicity.\n\nThe eye is depicted as reading a succession of printed words.\nAs a result there follows a stream of reaction in which six distinct\nkinds of events may be distinguished.\n\n I The visual sensations of the printed words.\n II Images very closely associated with these sensations.\n III Images relatively free.\n IV References to, or \u2018thinkings of,\u2019 various things.\n V Emotions.\n VI Affective-volitional attitudes.\n\nEach of these kinds of occurrences requires some brief description\nand explanation.\n\nUpon the visual sensations of the printed words all the rest\ndepends (in the case of a reader not previously acquainted with\nthe poem); but with most readers they have in themselves no great\nimportance. The individual shapes of the letters, their size\nand spacing, have only a minor effect upon the whole reaction.\nNo doubt readers differ greatly in this respect; with some, familiarity\nplays a great part. They find it unpleasant and disturbing to\nread a poem in any but the edition in which they first became\nacquainted with it. But the majority of readers are less exigent.\nProvided that the print is clear and legible, and allows the\nhabitual eye-movements of reading to be easily performed, the\nfull response arises equally well from widely differing sensations.\nThose for whom this is true have, in the present state of economic\norganisation, a decided advantage over the more fastidious. This\ndoes not show that good printing is a negligible consideration;\nand the primary place of calligraphy in the Chinese arts is an\nindication to the contrary. It shows merely that printing belongs\nto another branch of the arts. In the poetic experience words\ntake effect through their associated images, and through what\nwe are, as a rule, content to call their meaning. What meaning\nis and how it enters into the experience we shall consider.\n\n_Tied Images_.\u2014Visual sensations of words do not commonly\noccur by themselves. They have certain regular companions so\nclosely tied to them as to be only with difficulty disconnected.\nThe chief of these are the auditory image\u2014the sound of the words\nin the mind\u2019s ear\u2014and the image of articulation\u2014the feel in the\nlips, mouth, and throat, of what the words would be like to speak.\n\nAuditory images of words are among the most obvious of mental\nhappenings. Any line of verse or prose slowly read, will, for\nmost people, sound mutely in the imagination somewhat as it would\nif read aloud. But the degree of correspondence between the image-sounds,\nand the actual sounds that the reader would produce, varies enormously.\nMany people are able to imagine word-sounds with greater delicacy\nand discrimination than they can utter them. But the reverse\ncase is also found. What importance then is to be attached to\nclear, rich and delicate sound imagery in silent reading? How\nfar must people who differ in their capacity to produce such\nimages differ in their total reactions to poems? And what are\nthe advantages of reading aloud? Here we reach one of the practical\nproblems of criticism for which this analysis is required. A\ndiscussion is best postponed until the whole analysis has been\ngiven. The principal confusion which prevents a clear understanding\nof the point at issue does, however, concern images and may be\ndealt with here. It is of great importance in connection with\nthe topic of the following section.\n\nThe sensory qualities of images, their vivacity, clearness, fullness\nof detail and so on, do not bear any constant relation to their\neffects. Images differing in these respects may have closely\nsimilar consequences. Too much importance has always been attached\nto the sensory qualities of images. What gives an image efficacy\nis less its vividness as an image than its character as a mental\nevent peculiarly connected with sensation. Lissette way which\nno one yet knows how to explain, a relict of sensation and our\nintellectual and emotional response to it depends far more upon\nits being, through this fact, a representative of a sensation,\nthan upon its sensory resemblance to one. An image may lose almost\nall its sensory nature to the point of becoming scarcely an image\nat all, a mere skeleton, and yet represent a sensation quite\nas adequately as if it were flaring with hallucinatory vividity.\nIn other words, what matters is not the sensory _resemblance_\nof an image to the sensation which is its prototype, but some\nother relation, at present hidden from us in the jungles of neurology.\n(Cf. Chapter XIV.)\n\nCare then should be taken to avoid the natural tendency to suppose\nthat the more clear and vivid an image the greater will be its\nefficacy. There are trustworthy people who, according to their\naccounts, never experience any imagery at all. If certain views\ncommonly expressed about the arts are true, by which vivid imagery\nis an all-important part of the experience, then these people\nare incapable of art experiences, a conclusion which is contrary\nto the facts. The views in question are overlooking the fact\nthat _something_ takes the place of vivid images in these\npeople, and that, provided the image-substitute is efficacious,\ntheir lack of mimetic imagery is of no consequence. The efficacy\nrequired must, of course, include control over emotional as well\nas intellectual reactions. Needless perhaps to add that with\npersons of the image-producing types an increase in delicacy\nand vivacity in their imagery will probably be accompanied by\nincreased subtlety in effects. Thus it is not surprising that\ncertain great poets and critics have been remarkable for the\nvigour of their imagery, and dependent upon it. No one would\ndeny the usefulness of imagery to some people; the mistake is\nto suppose that it is indispensable to all.\n\nArticulatory imagery is less noticeable; yet the quality of silent\nspeech is perhaps even more dependent upon these images than\nupon sound-images. Collocations of syllables which are awkward\nor unpleasant to utter are rarely delightful to the ear. As a\nrule the two sets of images are so intimately connected that\nit is difficult to decide which is the offender. In \u2018Heaven,\nwhich man\u2019s generation draws,\u2019 the sound doubtless is as harsh\nas the movements required are cramping to the lips.\n\nThe extent to which interference with one set of images will\nchange the other may be well seen by a simple experiment. Most\npeople, if they attempt a silent recitation while opening the\nmouth to its fullest stretch or holding the tongue firmly between\nthe teeth, will notice curious transformations in the auditory\nimages. How the experiment should be interpreted is uncertain,\nbut it is of use in making the presence of both kinds of verbal\nimagery evident to those who may have overlooked them hitherto.\nImages of articulation should not, however, be confused with\nthose minimal actual movements which for some people (for all,\nas behaviourists maintain) accompany the silent rehearsing of\nwords.\n\nThese two forms of tied imagery might also be called verbal images,\nand supply the elements of what is called the \u2018formal structure\u2019\nof poetry. They differ from those to which we now proceed in\nbeing images of words, not of things words stand for, and in\ntheir very close connection with the visual sensations of printed\nwords.\n\n_Free Imagery_.\u2014Free images, or rather one form of these,\nvisual images, pictures in the mind\u2019s eye, occupy a prominent\nplace in the literature of criticism, to the neglect somewhat\nof other forms of imagery, since, as was remarked in a preceding\nchapter, for every possible kind of sensation there is a corresponding\npossible image.\n\nThe assumption, natural before investigation, that all attentive\nand sensitive readers will experience the same images, vitiates\nmost of the historical discussions from that of Longinus to that\nof Lessing. Even in the present day, when there is no excuse\nfor such ignorance, the mistake still thrives, and an altogether\ntoo crude, too hasty, and too superficial form of criticism is\nallowed to pass unchallenged. It cannot be too clearly recognised\nthat individuals differ not only in the type of imagery which\nthey employ, but still more in the particular images which they\nproduce. In their whole reactions to a poem, or to a single line\nof it, their free images are the point at which two readings\nare most likely to differ, and the fact that they differ may\nvery well be quite immaterial. Fifty different readers will experience\nnot one common picture but fifty different pictures. If the value\nof the poem derived from the value _qua_ picture of the\nvisual image excited then criticism might well despair. Those\nwho would stress this part of the poetic reaction can have but\ncrude views on pictures.\n\nBut if the value of the visual image in the experience is not\npictorial, if the image is not to be judged as a picture, how\nis it to be judged? It is improbable that the many critics, some\nof them peculiarly well qualified in the visual arts, who have\ninsisted upon the importance of imagery, have been entirely wasting\ntheir time. It ought to be possible to give an account of the\nplace of free imagery in the whole poetic experience which will\nexplain this insistence. What is required will be found if we\nturn our attention from the sensory qualities of the imagery\nto the more fundamental qualities upon which its efficacy in\nmodifying the rest of the experience depends. It has been urged\nabove that images which are different in their sensory qualities\nmay have the same effects. If this were not the case the absence\nof glaring differences between people of different image-types\nwould be astonishing. But since images may represent sensations\nwithout resembling them, and represent them in the sense of replacing\nthem, as far as effects in directing thought and arousing emotion\ngo, differences in their mimetic capacity become of minor importance.\nAs we have seen, it is natural for those whose imagery is vivid,\nto suppose that vivacity and clearness go together with power\nover thought and feeling. It is the power of an image over these\nthat is as a rule being praised when an intelligent and sensitive\ncritic appears merely to be praising the picture floating before\nhis mind\u2019s eye. To judge the image as a picture is judged, would,\nas we have seen, be absurd; and what is sought in poetry by those\npainters and others whose interest in the world is primarily\nvisual is not pictures but records of observation, or stimuli\nof emotion.\n\nThus, provided the images (or image-substitutes for the imageless)\nhave the due effects, deficiencies in their sensory aspect do\nnot matter. But the proviso is important. In all forms of imagery\nsensory deficiencies are for many people signs and accompaniments\nof defective efficacy, and the habit of reading so as to allow\nthe fullest development to imagery in its sensory aspect is likely\nto encourage the full development of this more essential feature,\nits efficacy, if the freaks and accidents of the sensory side\nare not taken too seriously.\n\nSome exceptions to this general recommendation will occur to\nthe reader. Instances in plenty may be found in which a full\ndevelopment of the sensory aspect of images is damaging to their\neffects. Meredith is a master of this peculiar kind of imagery:\u2014\n\n Thus piteously Love closed what he begat\n The union of this ever diverse pair!\n These two were rapid falcons in a snare,\n Condemned to do the flitting of the bat.\n\nThe emotional as well as the intellectual effects of the various\nimages here suggested are much impaired if we produce them vividly\nand distinctly.\n\n_Impulses, and References_.\u2014We have now to consider those\nmore fundamental effects upon which stress has been laid above\nas the true places of the values of the experience. It will be\nwell at this point to reconsult the diagram. The vertical lines\nwhich run capriciously downwards from the visual sensations of\nthe words, through their tied imagery and onward to the bottom\nof the diagram, are intended to represent, schematically, streams\nof impulses flowing through in the mind.\n\nThey start in the visual sensations, but the depiction of the\ntied imagery is intended to show how much of their further course\nis due to it. The placing of the free imagery in the third division\nis intended to suggest that while some free images may arise\nfrom visual words alone, they take their character in a large\npart as a consequence of the tied imagery. Thus the great importance\nof the tied imagery, of the formal elements, is emphasised in\nthe diagram.\n\nThese impulses are the weft of the experience, the warp being\nthe pre-existing systematic structure of the mind, that organised\nsystem of possible impulses. The metaphor is of course inexact,\nsince weft and warp here are not independent. Where these impulses\nrun, and how they develop, depends entirely upon the condition\nof the mind, and this depends upon the impulses which have previously\nbeen active in it. It will be seen then that impulses\u2014their\ndirection, their strength, how they modify one another\u2014are the\nessential and fundamental things in any experience. All else,\nwhether intellectual or emotional, arises as a consequence of\ntheir activity. The thin trickle of stimulation which comes in\nthrough the eye finds an immense hierarchy of systems of tendencies\npoised in the most delicate stability. It is strong enough and\nrightly enough directed to disturb some of these without assistance.\nThe literal sense of a word can be grasped on the prompting of\nthe mere sight of it, without hearing it or mentally pronouncing\nit. But the effects of this stimulation are immensely increased\nand widened when it is reinforced by fresh stimulation from tied\nimages, and it is through these that most of the emotional effects\nare produced. As the agitation proceeds new reinforcement comes\nwith every fresh system which is excited. Thus, the paradoxical\nfact that so trifling an irritation as the sight of marks on\npaper is able to arouse the whole energies of the mind becomes\nexplicable.\n\nTo turn now to references, the only mental happenings which are\nas closely connected with visual words as their tied images are\nthose mysterious events which are usually called thoughts. Thus\nthe arrow symbol in the hieroglyph should perhaps properly be\nplaced near the visual impression of the word. The mere sight\nof any familiar word is normally followed by a thought of whatever\nthe word may stand for. This thought is sometimes said to be\nthe \u2018meaning\u2019, the literal or prose \u2018meaning\u2019 of the word. It\nis wise, however, to avoid the use of \u2018meaning\u2019 as a symbol altogether.\nThe terms \u2018thought\u2019 and \u2018idea\u2019 are less subtle in their ambiguities,\nand when defined may perhaps be used without confusion.\n\nWhat is essential in thought is its direction or reference to things.\nWhat is this direction or reference? How does a thought come to be \u2018of\u2019\none thing rather than another? What is the link between a thought and\nwhat it is \u2018of\u2019? The outline of one answer to these questions has been\nsuggested in Chapter XI. A further account must here be attempted.\nWithout a fairly clear, although, of course, incomplete view, it is\nimpossible to avoid confusion and obscurity in discussing such topics\nas truth in art, the intellect-_versus_-emotion _imbroglio_, the scope\nof science, the nature of religion and many others with which criticism\nmust deal.\n\nThe facts upon which speculations as to the relations between\nthoughts and the things which they are \u2018of\u2019 have been based,\nhave as a rule been taken from introspection. But the facts which\nintrospection yields are notoriously uncertain, and the special\nposition of the observer may well preclude success. Introspection\nis competent, in some cases, to discover the relations between\nevents which take place within the mind, but cannot by itself\ngive information as to the relations of these events with the\nexternal world, and it is precisely this which we are inquiring\ninto when we ask, What connection is there between a thought\nand that which it is a thought of? For an answer to this question\nwe must look further.\n\nThere is no doubt that causal relations hold between events in\nthe mind and events outside it. Sometimes these relations are\nfairly simple. The striking of a clock is the cause of our thinking\nof its striking. In such a case the external thing is linked\nwith the thought \u2018of\u2019 it in a fairly direct fashion, and the\nview here taken is that to be a thought \u2018of\u2019 the striking is\nto be merely a thought caused in this fashion by the striking.\nA thought of the striking is nothing else and nothing more than\na thought caused by it.\n\nBut most thoughts are \u2018of\u2019 things which are not present and not\nproducing direct effects in the mind. This is so when we read.\nWhat is directly affecting the mind is words on paper, but the\nthoughts aroused are not thoughts \u2018of\u2019 the words, but of other\nthings which the words _stand for_. How, then, can a causal\ntheory of thinking explain the relation between these remote\nthings and the thoughts which are \u2018of\u2019 them? To answer this we\nmust look at the way in which we learn what words stand for.\nWithout a process of learning we should only think of the words.\n\nThe process of learning to use words is not difficult to analyse.\nOn a number of occasions the word is heard in connection with\nobjects of a certain kind. Later the word is heard in the absence\nof any such object. In accordance with one of the few fundamental\nlaws known about mental process, something then happens in the\nmind which is like what would happen if such an object were actually\npresent and engaging the attention. The word has become a _sign_\nof an object of that kind. The word which formerly was a part\nof the cause of a certain effect in the mind is now followed\nby a similar effect in the absence of the rest of the previous\ncause, namely, an object of the kind in question. This kind of\ncausation appears to be peculiar to living tissue. The relation\nnow between the thought and what it is \u2018of\u2019 is more indirect,\nthe thought is \u2018of\u2019 something which formerly was part cause,\ntogether with the sign, of similar thoughts. It is \u2018of\u2019 the missing\npart of the sign, or more strictly \u2018of\u2019 anything which would\ncomplete the sign as a cause.\n\nThoughts by this account are general, they are of anything _like_\nsuch and such things, except when the object thought of and the\nthought are connected by direct causal relations, as, for instance,\nwhen we think of a word we are hearing. Only when these direct\nrelations hold can we succeed in thinking simply of \u2018That\u2019. We\nhave to think instead of \u2018something of a kind\u2019. By various means,\nhowever, we can contrive that there shall only be one thing of\nthe kind, and so the need for particularity in our thoughts is\nsatisfied. The commonest way in which we do this is by thoughts\nwhich make the kind spatial and temporal. A thought of \u2018mosquito\u2019\nbecomes a thought of \u2018mosquito there now\u2019 by combining a thought\nof \u2018thing of mosquito kind\u2019 with a thought of \u2018thing of there\nkind\u2019 and a thought of \u2018thing of now kind\u2019. The awkwardness of\nthese phrases, it may be mentioned, is irrelevant. Combined thoughts\nof this sort, we may notice, are capable of truth and falsity,\nwhereas a simple thought\u2014of \u2018whatever is now\u2019 for instance\u2014can\nonly be true. Whether a thought is true or false depends simply\nupon whether there is anything of the kind referred to, and there\nmust be something now. It is by no means certain that there must\nbe anything there always. And most probably no mosquito is where\nwe thought it was then.\n\nThe natural generality and vagueness of all reference which is\nnot made specific by the aid of space and time is of great importance\nfor the understanding of the senses in which poetry may be said\nto be true. (Cf. Chapter XXXV.)\n\nIn the reading of poetry the thought due simply to the words,\ntheir _sense_ it may be called, comes first; but other thoughts\nare not of less importance. These may be due to the auditory\nverbal imagery, and we have onomatop\u0153ia,[48] but this is rarely\nindependent of the sense. More important are the further thoughts\ncaused by the sense, the network of interpretation and conjecture\nwhich arises therefrom, with its opportunities for aberrations\nand misunderstanding. Poems, however, differ fundamentally in\nthe extent to which such further interpretation is necessary.\nThe mere sense without any further reflection is very often sufficient\nthought, in Swinburne, for instance, for the full response\u2014\n\n There glowing ghosts of flowers\n Draw down, draw nigh;\n And wings of swift spent hours\n Take flight and fly;\n She sees by formless gleams\n She hears across cold streams\n Dead mouths of many dreams that sing and sigh.\n\nLittle beyond vague thoughts of the things the words stand for\nis here required. They do not have to be brought into intelligible\nconnection with one another. On the other hand, Hardy would rarely\nreach his full effect through sound and sense alone\u2014\n\n \u2018Who\u2019s in the next room?\u2014who?\n I seemed to see\n Somebody in the dawning passing through\n Unknown to me.\u2019\n \u2018Nay: you saw nought. He passed invisibly\u2019.\n\nBetween these and even more extreme cases, every degree of variation\nin the relative importance of sound, sense, and further interpretation,\nbetween form and content in short, can be found. A temptation\nto which few do not succumb is to suppose that there is some\n\u2018proper relation\u2019 for these different parts of the experience,\nso that a poem whose parts are in this relation must thereby\nbe a greater or better poem than another whose parts are differently\ndisposed. This is another instance of the commonest of critical\nmistakes, the confusion of means with ends, of technique with\nvalue. There is no more a \u2018proper place\u2019 for sound or for sense\nin poetry than there is one and only one \u2018proper shape\u2019 for an\nanimal. A dog is not a defective kind of cat, nor is Swinburne\na defective kind of Hardy. But this sort of criticism is extraordinarily\nprevalent. The objection to Swinburne on the ground of a lack\nof thought is a popular specimen.\n\n\n\nWithin certain types, needless to say, some structures are more\nlikely to be successful than others. Given some definite kind\nof effect as the goal, or some definite structure already being\nused, a good deal can of course be said as to the most probable\nmeans, or as to what may or may not be added. Lyric cannot dispense\nwith tied imagery, it is clear, nor can we neglect the character\nof this imagery in reading it. A prose composition has to be\nlonger than a lyric to produce an equal definiteness of developed\neffect. Poems in which there is much turmoil of emotion are likely\nto be strongly rhythmical and to be in metre, as we shall see\nwhen we come to discuss rhythm and metre. Drama can hardly dispense\nwith a great deal of conjecture and further interpretation which\nin most forms of the novel is replaced by analysis and explanation,\nand in narrative poetry is commonly omitted altogether; and so\non.\n\nBut no general prescription that in great poetry there _must_\nalways be this or that,\u2014deep thought, superb sound or vivid imagery\u2014is\nmore than a piece of ignorant dogmatism. Poetry may be almost\ndevoid even of mere sense, let alone thought, or _almost_\nwithout sensory (or formal) structure, and yet reach the point\nthan which no poem goes further. The second case, however, is\nvery rare. Almost always, what seems structureless proves to\nhave still a loose and tenuous (it may be an intermittent) structure.\nBut we can for example shift the words about very often in Walt\nWhitman without loss, even when he is almost at his best.\n\nIt is difficult to represent diagrammatically what takes place\nin thought in any satisfactory fashion. The impulse coming in\nfrom the visual stimulus of the printed word must be imagined\nas reaching some system in the brain in which effects take place\nnot due merely to this present stimulus, but also to past occasions\non which it has been combined with other stimulations. These\neffects are thoughts; and they in their groupings act as signs\nfor yet other thoughts. The little arrows are intended to symbolise\nthese references to things outside the mind.\n\n_Emotions, and Attitudes._\n\nFeeling or emotion is not, we have insisted above, another and\na rival mode of apprehending nature. So far as a feeling or an\nemotion does refer to anything, it refers in the way described,\nthrough its origin. Feelings, in fact, are commonly signs, and\nthe differences between those who \u2018see\u2019 things by intuition,\nor \u2018feel\u2019 them, and those who reason them out, is commonly only\na difference between users of signs and users of symbols. Both\nsigns and symbols are means by which our past experience assists\nour present responses. The advantages of symbols, due to the\nease with which they are controlled and communicated, their public\nnature, as it were, are obvious. Their disadvantages as compared\nwith such relatively private signs as emotions or organic sensations\nare perhaps less evident. Words, when used symbolically or scientifically,\nnot figuratively and emotively, are only capable of directing\nthought to a comparatively few features of the more common situations.\nBut feeling is sometimes a more subtle way of referring, more\ndangerous also, because more difficult to corroborate and to\ncontrol, and more liable to confusion. There is no inherent superiority,\nhowever, in feeling as opposed to thought, there is merely a\ndifference in applicability; nor is there any opposition or clash\nbetween them except for those who are mistaken either in their\nthinking or in their feeling, or in both. How such mistakes arise\nwill be discussed in Chapter XXXIV.\n\nAs regards emotions and attitudes little need be added to what has\nalready been said. Emotions are primarily signs of attitudes and owe\ntheir great prominence in the theory of art to this. For it is the\nattitudes evoked which are the all-important part of any experience.\nUpon the texture and form of the attitudes involved its value depends.\nIt is not the intensity of the conscious experience, its thrill, its\npleasure or its poignancy which gives it value, but the organisation\nof its impulses for freedom and fullness of life. There are plenty of\necstatic instants which are valueless; the character of consciousness\nat any moment is no certain sign of the excellence of the impulses from\nwhich it arises. It is the most convenient sign that is available,\nbut it is very ambiguous and may be very misleading. A more reliable\nbut less accessible set of signs can be found in the readiness for\nthis or that kind of behaviour in which we find ourselves after the\nexperience. Too great insistence upon the quality of the momentary\n_consciousness_ which the arts occasion has in recent times been a\nprevalent critical blunder. The Epilogue to Pater\u2019s _Renaissance_ is\nthe _locus classicus_. The after-effects, the permanent modifications\nin the structure of the mind, which works of art can produce, have been\noverlooked. No one is ever quite the same again after any experience,\nhis possibilities have altered in some degree. And among all the agents\nby which \u201cthe widening of the sphere of human sensibility\u201d may be\nbrought about, the arts are the most powerful, since it is through them\nthat men may most co-operate and in these experiences that the mind\nmost easily and with least interference organises itself.\n\n\n[47] The description of images belongs to the first steps in psychology,\nand it is often possible to judge the rank and standing of a\npsychologist by the degree of importance which he attaches to\ntheir peculiarities. On theoretical grounds it seems probable\nthat they are luxury products (cf. _The Meaning of Meaning_,\npp. 148-151) peculiarly connected with the reproduction of emotion.\nFor a discussion of some experimental investigations into their\nutility, Spearman, _The Nature of Intelligence_, Ch. XII,\nmay be consulted.\n\n[48] Two kinds of onomatop\u0153ia should be distinguished. In one\nthe sound of the words (actual or imaginal) is like some natural\nsound (the buzzing of bees, galloping horses, and so forth).\nIn the other it is not like any such sound but such as merely\nto call up free auditory images of the sounds in question. The\nsecond case is by far the more common.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVII\n\nRhythm and Metre\n\n . . . when it approaches with a divine hopping.\n _The Joyful Wisdom_.\n\n\nRhythm and its specialised form, metre, depend upon repetition,\nand expectancy. Equally where what is expected recurs and where\nit fails, all rhythmical and metrical effects spring from anticipation.\nAs a rule this anticipation is unconscious. Sequences of syllables\nboth as sounds and as images of speech-movements leave the mind\nready for certain further sequences rather than for others. Our\nmomentary organisation is adapted to one range of possible stimuli\nrather than to another. Just as the eye reading print unconsciously\nexpects the spelling to be as usual, and the fount of type to\nremain the same, so the mind after reading a line or two of verse,\nor half a sentence of prose, prepares itself ahead for any one\nof a number of possible sequences, at the same time negatively\nincapacitating itself for others. The effect produced by what\nactually follows depends very closely upon this unconscious preparation\nand consists largely of the further twist which it gives to expectancy.\nIt is in terms of the variation in these twists that rhythm is\nto be described. Both prose and verse vary immensely in the extent\nto which they excite this \u2018getting ready\u2019 process, and in the\nnarrowness of the anticipation which is formed, Prose on the\nwhole, with the rare exceptions of a Landor, a De Quincey, or\na Ruskin, is accompanied by a very much vaguer and more indeterminate\nexpectancy than verse. In such prose as this page, for example,\nlittle more than a preparedness for further words not all exactly\nalike in sound and with abstract polysyllables preponderating\nis all that arises. In short, the sensory or formal effect of\nwords has very little play in the literature of analysis and\nexposition. But as\u2019 soon as prose becomes more emotive than scientific,\nthe formal side becomes prominent.\n\nLet us take Landor\u2019s description[49] of a lioness suckling her\nyoung\u2014\n\n On perceiving the countryman, she drew up her feet gently,\n and squared her mouth, and rounded her eyes, slumberous with\n content; and they looked, he said, like sea-grottoes, obscurely\n green, interminably deep, at once awakening fear and stilling\n and suppressing it.\n\nAfter \u2018obscurely green\u2019 would it be possible (quite apart from\nsense) to have \u2018deeply dark\u2019 or \u2018impenetrably gloomy\u2019? Why, apart\nfrom sense, can so few of the syllables be changed in vowel sound,\nin emphasis, in duration or otherwise, without disaster to the\ntotal effect? As with all such questions about sensory form and\nits effects, only an incomplete answer can be given. The expectancy\ncaused by what has gone before, a thing which must be thought\nof as a very complex tide of neural settings, lowering the threshold\nfor some kinds of stimuli and raising it for others, and the\ncharacter of the stimulus which does actually come, both play\ntheir part.\n\nEven the most highly organised lyrical or \u2018polyphonic\u2019 prose raises as\nit advances only a very ambiguous expectation. Until the final words\nof the passage, there are always a great number of different sequences\nwhich would equally well fit in, which would satisfy the expectancy\nso far as that is merely due to _habit_, to the routine of _sensory\nstimulation_. What is expected in fact is not this sound or that sound,\nnot even this kind of sound or that kind of sound, but some one of a\ncertain thousand kinds of sounds. It is much more a negative thing than\na positive. As in the case of many social conventions it is easier to\nsay what disqualifies than to say what is required.\n\nInto this very indeterminate expectancy the new element comes\nwith its own range of possible effects. There is, of course,\nno such thing as _the_ effect of a word or a sound. There\nis no one effect which belongs to it. Words have no intrinsic\nliterary characters. None are either ugly or beautiful, intrinsically\ndispleasing or delightful. Every word has instead a range of\npossible effects, varying with the conditions into which it is\nreceived. All that we can say as to the sorting out of words,\nwhether into the \u2018combed\u2019 and \u2018slippery\u2019, the \u2018shaggy\u2019 and \u2018rumpled\u2019\nas with Dante, or in any other manner, is that some, through\nlong use, have narrower ranges than others and require more extraordinary\nconditions if they are to change their \u2018character\u2019. What effect\nthe word has is a compromise between some one of its possible\neffects and the special conditions into which it comes. Thus\nin Shakespeare hardly any word ever looks odd until we consider\nit; whereas even in Keats the \u2018cold mushrooms\u2019 in the _Satyrs\u2019\nSong_ give the mind a shock of astonishment, an astonishment\nwhich is full of delight, but none the less is a shock.\n\nBut with this example we have broken down the limitation to the\nmere sound, to the strictly formal or sensory aspect of word\nsequences, and in fact the limitation is useless. For the effect\nof a word as sound cannot be separated from its contemporaneous\nother effects. They become inextricably mingled at once.\n\nThe sound gets its character by compromise with what is going\non already. The preceding agitation of the mind selects from\na range of possible characters which the word might present,\nthat one which best suits with what is happening. There are no\ngloomy and no gay vowels or syllables, and the army of critics\nwho have attempted to analyse the effects of passages into vowel\nand consonantal collocations have, in fact, been merely amusing\nthemselves. The way in which the sound of a word is taken varies\nwith the emotion already in being. But, further, it varies with\nthe sense. For the anticipation of the sound due to habit, to\nthe routine of sensation, is merely a part of the general expectancy.\nGrammatical regularities, the necessity for completing the thought,\nthe reader\u2019s state of conjecture as to what is being said, his\napprehension in dramatic literature of the action, of the intention,\nsituation, state of mind generally, of the speaker, all these\nand many other things intervene. The way the sound is taken is\nmuch less determined by the sound itself than by the conditions\ninto which it enters. All these anticipations form a very closely\nwoven network and the word which can satisfy them all simultaneously\nmay well seem triumphant. But we should not attribute to the\nsound alone virtues which involve so many other factors. To say\nthis is not in the least to belittle the importance of the sound;\nin most cases it is the key to the effects of poetry. This texture\nof expectations, satisfactions, disappointments, surprisals,\nwhich the sequence of syllables brings about, is rhythm. And\nthe sound of words comes to its full power only through rhythm.\nEvidently there can be no surprise and no disappointment unless\nthere is expectation and most rhythms perhaps are made up as\nmuch of disappointments and postponements and surprises and betrayals\nas of simple, straightforward satisfactions. Hence the rapidity\nwith which too simple rhythms, those which are too easily \u2018seen\nthrough\u2019, grow cloying or insipid unless hypnoidal states intervene,\nas with much primitive music and dancing and often with metre.\n\nThe same definition of rhythm may be extended to the plastic\narts and to architecture. Temporal sequence is not strictly necessary\nfor rhythm, though in the vast majority of cases it is involved.\nThe attention usually passes successively from one complex to\nanother, the expectations, the readiness to perceive this rather\nthan that, aroused by the one being either satisfied or surprised\nby the other. Surprise plays an equally important part here;\nand the difference in detail between a surprising and delightful\nvariation and one which merely irritates and breaks down the\nrhythm, as we say, is here, as elsewhere, a matter of the combination\nand resolution of impulses too subtle for our present means of\ninvestigation. All depends upon whether what comes can be an\ningredient in the further response, or whether the mind must,\nas it were, start anew; in more ordinary language, upon whether\nthere is any \u2018connection\u2019 between the parts of the whole.\n\nBut the rhythmic elements in a picture or a building may be not\nsuccessive but simultaneous. A quick reader who sees a word as\na whole commonly overlooks misprints because the general form\nof the word is such that he is only able at that instant to perceive\none particular letter in a particular place and so overlooks\nwhat is discrepant. The parts of a visual field exert what amounts\nto a simultaneous influence over one another. More strictly what\nis discrepant does not get through to more central regions. Similarly,\nwith those far more intricate wholes, made up of all kinds of\nimagery and incipient action of which works of art consist. The\nparts of a growing response mutually modify one another and this\nis all that is required for rhythm to be possible.\n\n\n\nWe may turn now to that more complex and, more specialised form\nof temporal rhythmic sequence which is known as metre. This is\nthe means by which words may be made to influence one another\nto the greatest possible extent. In metrical reading the narrowness\nand definiteness of expectancy, as much unconscious as ever in\nmost cases, is very greatly increased, reaching in some cases,\nif rime also is used, almost exact precision. Furthermore, what\nis anticipated becomes through the regularity of the time intervals\nin metre virtually dated. This is no mere matter of more or less\nperfect correspondence with the beating of some internal metronome.\nThe whole conception of metre as _\u2018uniformity_ in variety\u2019,\na kind of mental drill in which words, those erratic and varied\nthings, do their best to behave as though they were all the same,\nwith certain concessions, licences and equivalences allowed,\nshould nowadays be obsolete. It is a survivor which is still\nable to do a great deal of harm to the uninitiated, however,\nand although it has been knocked on the head vigorously enough\nby Professor Saintsbury and others, it is as difficult to kill\nas Punch. Most treatises on the subject, with their talk of feet\nand of stresses, unfortunately tend to encourage it, however\nlittle this may be the aim of the authors.\n\nAs with rhythm so with metre, we must not think of it as in the\nwords themselves or in the thumping of the drum. It is not _in_\nthe stimulation, it is in our response. Metre adds to all the\nvariously fated expectancies which make up rhythm a definite\ntemporal pattern and its effect is not due to our perceiving\na pattern in something outside us, but to our becoming patterned\nourselves. With every beat of the metre a tide of anticipation\nin us turns and swings, setting up as it does so extraordinarily\nextensive sympathetic reverberations. We shall never understand\nmetre so long as we ask, \u2018Why does: temporal pattern so excite\nus\u2019? and fail to realise that the pattern itself is a vast cyclic\nagitation spreading all over the body, a tide of excitement pouring\nthrough the channels of the mind.\n\nThe notion that there is any virtue in regularity or in variety,\nor in any other formal feature, apart from its effects upon us,\nmust be discarded before any metrical problem can be understood.\nThe regularity to which metre tends acts through the definiteness\nof the anticipations which are thereby aroused. It is through\nthese that it gets such a hold upon the mind. Once again, here\ntoo, the failure of our expectations is often more important\nthan success. Verse in which we constantly get exactly what we\nare ready for and no more, instead of something which we can\nand must take up and incorporate as another stage in a total\ndeveloping response is merely toilsome and tedious. In prose,\nthe influence of past words extends only a little way ahead.\nIn verse, especially when stanza-form and rime co-operate to\ngive a larger unit than the line, it may extend far ahead. It\nis this knitting together of the parts of the poem which explains\nthe mnemonic power of verse, the first of the suggestions as\nto the origin of metre to be found in the Fourteenth Chapter\nof _Biographia Literaria_, that lumber-room of neglected\nwisdom which contains more hints towards a theory of poetry than\nall the rest ever written upon the subject.\n\nWe do great violence to the facts if we suppose the expectations\nexcited as we read verse to be concerned only with the stress,\nemphasis, length, foot structure and so forth of the syllables\nwhich follow. Even in this respect the custom of marking syllables\nin two degrees only, long and short, light and full, etc., is\ninadequate, although doubtless forced upon metrists by practical\nconsiderations. The mind in the poetic experience responds to\nsubtler niceties than these. When not in that experience but\ncoldly considering their several qualities as sounds by the ear\nalone, it may well find two degrees all that are necessary. In\nChapter XIII we saw an analogous situation arising in the case\nof the discrimination of colours. The obvious comparison with\nthe difference between what even musical notation can record\nin music and the player\u2019s interpretation can usefully be made\nhere.\n\nA more serious omission is the neglect by the majority of metrists\nof the pitch relations of syllables. The reading of poetry is\nof course not a monotonous and subdued form of singing. There\nis no question of definite pitches at which the syllables must\nbe taken, nor perhaps of definite harmonic relations between\ndifferent sounds. But that a rise and fall of pitch is involved\nin metre and is as much part of the poet\u2019s technique as any other\nfeature of verse, as much under his control also, is indisputable.\nAnyone who is not clear upon this point may compare as a striking\ninstance Milton\u2019s _Hymn on the Morning of Christ\u2019s Nativity_\nwith Collins\u2019 _Ode to Simplicity_ and both with the second\nChorus of _Hellas_ discussed in Chapter XXVIII. Due allowances\nmade for the natural peculiarities of different readers, the\nscheme of pitch relations, in their contexts, of\n\n That on the bitter cross\n Must redeem our loss;\n\nand of\n\n But com\u2019st a decent maid,\n In Attic robe array\u2019\u0256,\n\nare clearly different. There is nothing arbitrary or out of the\npoet\u2019s control in this, as there is nothing arbitrary or out\nof his control in the way in which an adequate reader will stress\nparticular syllables. He brings both about by the same means,\nthe modification of the reader\u2019s impulses by what has gone before.\nIt is true that some words resist emphasis far more than perhaps\nany resist change of pitch, yet this difference is merely one\nof degree. It is as natural to lower the pitch in reading the\nword \u2018loss\u2019 as it is to emphasise it as compared with \u2018our\u2019 in\nthe same context.\n\nHere again we see how impossible it is to consider rhythm or\nmetre as though it were purely an affair of the sensory aspect\nof syllables and could be dissociated from their sense and from\nthe emotional effects which come about through their sense. One\nprinciple may, however, be hazarded. As in the case of painting\nthe more direct means are preferable to the less direct (see\nChapter XVIII), so in poetry. What can be done by sound should\nnot be done otherwise or in violation of the natural effects\nof sound. Violations of the natural emphases and tones of speech\nbrought about for the sake of the further effects due to thought\nand feeling are perilous, though, on occasion, they may be valuable\ndevices. The use of italics in _Cain_ to straighten out\nthe blank verse is as glaring an instance as any. But more liberties\nare justified in dramatic writing than elsewhere, and poetry\nis full of exceptions to such principles.[50] We must not forget\nthat Milton did not disdain to use special spelling, \u2018mee\u2019, for\nexample, in place of \u2018me\u2019, in order to suggest additional emphasis\nwhen he feared that the reader might be careless.\n\nSo far we have been concerned with metre only as a specialised\nform of rhythm, giving an increased interconnection between words\nthrough an increased control of anticipation. But it has other,\nin some cases even more important powers. Its use as an hypnotic\nagent is probably very ancient. Coleridge once again drops his\nincidental remark, just beside yet extremely close to the point.\n\u201cIt tends to increase the vivacity and susceptibility both of\nthe general feelings and of the attention. This effect it produces\nby the continued excitement of surprise, and by the quick reciprocations\nof curiosity still gratified and still re-excited, which are\ntoo slight indeed to be at any moment objects of distinct consciousness,\nyet become considerable in their aggregate influence. As a medicated\natmosphere, or as wine during animated conversation, they act\npowerfully, though themselves unnoticed.\u201d (_Biographia Literaria_,\nChap. XVIII.) Mr Yeats, when he speaks of the function of metre\nbeing to \u201clull the mind into a waking trance\u201d is describing the\nsame effect, however strange his conception of this trance may\nbe.\n\nThat certain metres, or rather that a certain handling of metre\nshould produce in a slight degree a hypnoidal state is not surprising.\nBut it does so not as Coleridge suggests, through the surprise\nelement in metrical effects, but through the absence of surprise,\nthrough the lulling effects more than through the awakening.\nMany of the most characteristic symptoms of incipient hypnosis\nare present in a slight degree. Among these susceptibility and\nvivacity of emotion, suggestibility, limitations of the field\nof attention, marked differences in the incidence of belief-feelings\nclosely analogous to those which alcohol and nitrous oxide can\ninduce, and some degree of hyper\u00e6sthesia (increased power of\ndiscriminating sensations) may be noted. We need not boggle at\nthe word \u2018hypnosis\u2019. It is sufficient to say, borrowing a phrase\nfrom M. Jules Romains, that there is a change in the regime of\nconsciousness, which is directly due to the metre, and that to\nthis regime the above-mentioned characteristics attach. As regards\nthe hyper\u00e6sthesia, there may be several ways of interpreting\nwhat can be observed. All that matters here is that syllables,\nwhich in prose or in _vers libres_ sound thin, tinny and\nflat, often gain an astonishing sonority and fullness even in\nverse which seems to possess no very subtle metrical structure.\n\nMetre has another mode of action not hitherto mentioned. There\ncan be little doubt that historically it has been closely associated\nwith dancing, and that the connections of the two still hold.\nThis is true at least of some \u2018measures\u2019. Either motor images,\nimages of the sensations of dancing, or, more probably, imaginal\nand incipient movements follow the syllables and make up their\n\u2018movement\u2019. A place for these accompaniments should be found\nin the diagram in Chapter XVI. Once the metre has begun to \u2018catch\non\u2019 they are almost as closely bound up with the sequence of\nthe words as the tied \u2018verbal\u2019 images themselves.\n\nThe extension of this \u2018movement\u2019 of the verse from dance forms\nto more general movements is natural and inevitable. That there\nis a very close connection between the sense and the metrical\nmovement of\n\n And now the numerous tramplings quiver lightly\n Along a huge cloud\u2019s ridge; and now with sprightly\n Wheel downward come they into fresher skies,\n\ncannot be doubted whatever we may think of the rime.\n\nIt is not less clear in\n\n Where beyond the extreme sea wall, and between the\n remote sea gates,\n Waste water washes, and tall ships founder, and deep\n death waits,\n\nor in\n\n Ran on embattell\u2019d Armies clad in Iron,\n\nthan it is in\n\n We sweetly curtsied each to each\n And deftly danced a saraband.\n\nNor is it always the case that the movement takes its cue from\nthe sense. It is often a commentary on the sense and sometimes\nmay qualify it, as when the resistless strength of Coriolanus\nin battle is given an appearance of dreadful ease by the leisureliness\nof the description,\n\n Death, that dark spirit, in\u2019s nervy arm doth lie\n Which being advanc\u2019d declines, and then men die.\n\nMovement in poetry deserves at least as much study as onomatop\u0153ia.\n\nThis account, of course, by no means covers all the ways by which\nmetre takes effect in poetry. The fact that we appropriately\nuse such words as \u2018lulling\u2019, \u2018stirring\u2019, \u2018solemn\u2019, \u2018pensive\u2019,\n\u2018gay\u2019 in describing metres is an indication of their power more\ndirectly to control emotion. But the more general effects are\nmore important. Through its very appearance of artificiality\nmetre produces in the highest degree the \u2018frame\u2019 effect, isolating\nthe poetic experience from the accidents and irrelevancies of\neveryday existence. We have seen in Chapter X how necessary this\nisolation is and how easily it may be mistaken for a difference\nin kind. Much which in prose would be too personal or too insistent,\nwhich might awaken irrelevant conjectures or might \u2018overstep\nitself\u2019 is managed without disaster in verse. There are, it is\ntrue, equivalent resources in prose\u2014irony, for example, very\nfrequently has this effect\u2014but their scope is far more limited.\nMetre for the most difficult and most delicate utterances is\nthe all but inevitable means.\n\n\n[49] _Works_, II, 171.\n\n[50] It is worth remarking that any application of critical principles\nmust be indirect. They are not any the less useful because this\nis so. Misunderstanding on this point has often led artists to\naccuse critics of wishing to make art a matter of rules, and\ntheir objection to any such attempt is entirely justified.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVIII\n\nOn Looking at a Picture\n\n Hived in our bosoms like the bag o\u2019 the bee,\n Think\u2019st thou the honey with those objects grew?\n _Don Juan_.\n\n\nThe diagram and account given of the processes which make up\nthe reading of a poem may be easily modified to represent what\nhappens when we look at a picture, a statue or building, or listen\nto a piece of music. The necessary changes are fairly obvious,\nand it will only be necessary here to indicate them briefly.\nNeedless to say the importance to the whole response of different\nkinds of elements varies enormously from art to art; so much\nso as to explain without difficulty the opinion so often held\nby persons interested primarily in one of the arts\u2014that the others\n(or some of them) are entirely different in nature. Thus painters\noften aver that poetry is so different, so indirect, so second-hand\nin the way in which it produces its results, as hardly to deserve\nthe name of an art at all. But, as we shall see, the differences\nbetween separate arts are sometimes no greater than differences\nto be found in each of them; and close analogies can be discovered\nby careful analysis between all of them. These analogies indeed\nare among the most interesting features which such scrutiny as\nwe are here attempting can make clear. For an understanding of\nthe problems of one art is often of great service in avoiding\nmisconceptions in another. The place of representation in painting,\nfor example, is greatly elucidated by a sound comprehension of\nthe place of reference or thought in poetry, just as a crude\nview on this latter point is likely to involve unfortunate mistakes\nupon the first. Similarly a too narrow view of music which would\nlimit it to an affair merely of the appreciation of the pitch\nand time relations of notes may be corrected most easily by a\ncomparison with the phenomena of colour in the plastic arts.\nComparison of the arts is, in fact, far the best means by which\nan understanding of the methods and resources of any one of them\ncan be attained. We must be careful of course not to compare\nthe wrong features of two arts and not to find merely fanciful\nor insecurely grounded analogies. The dangers both of too close\nassimilation and too wide separation of the structures of different\narts are well illustrated in criticism, both before and since\nthe days of Lessing. Only a thorough psychological analysis will\nallow them to be avoided, and those whose experience leads them\nto doubt whether analogies are of service, may be asked whether\ntheir objection is not directed merely to attempts to compare\ndifferent arts without a sufficient analysis. With such an analysis,\ncomparison and the elaboration of analogies involve no attempt\nto make one art legislate for another, no attempt to blur their\ndifferences or to destroy their autonomy.\n\nIn analysing the experiences of the visual arts the first essential\nis to avoid the word \u2018see\u2019, a term which is treacherous in its\nambiguity. If we say that we see a picture we may mean either\nthat we see the pigment-covered surface, or that we see the image\non the retina cast by this surface, or that we see certain planes\nor volumes in what is called the \u2018picture-space\u2019. These senses\nare completely distinct. In the first case we are speaking of\nthe source of the stimulus, in the second of the immediate effect\nof the stimulus on the retina, in the third we are referring\nto a complex response made up of perceivings and imaginings due\nto the intervention of mental structures left behind by past\nexperience, and excited by the stimulus. The first case we may\nleave out of account as a matter of purely technical interest.\nThe degree of similarity holding between the second and third,\nbetween the first effect of the stimulus and the whole visual\nresponse, will of course vary greatly in different cases. A perfectly\nflat, meticulously detailed depiction of conventionally conceived\nobjects, such as is so often praised in the Academy for its \u2018finish\u2019,\nmay be very nearly the same from its first impression on the\nretina to the last effort which vision can make upon it. At the\nother extreme a C\u00e9zanne, for example, which to the eye of a person\nquite unfamiliar with such a manner of painting may at first\nseem only a field or area of varied light, may, as the response\ndevelops, through repeated glances, become first an assemblage\nof blots and patches of colour, and then, as these recede and\nadvance, tilt and spread relatively to one another and become\narticulated, a system of volumes. Finally, as the distances and\nstresses of their volumes become more definitely imagined, it\nbecomes an organisation of the entire \u2018picture-space\u2019 into a\nthree-dimensional whole with the characters of the solid masses\nwhich appear in it, their weights, textures, tensions and what\nnot, very definitely, as it seems, given. With familiarity the\nresponse is of course shortened. Its final visual stage is reached\nmuch sooner, and the stages outlined above become, through this\ntelescoping, too fleeting to be noticed. None the less the great\ndifference between the first retinal impression and the complete\n_visual_ response remains. The retinal impression, the sign,\nthat is, for the response, contains actually but a small part\nof the whole final product, an all-important part it is true,\nthe seed in fact from which the whole response grows.\n\nThe additions made in the course of the response are of several\nkinds. They may, perhaps, for our present purposes be spoken\nof without misunderstanding as images, or image-substitutes (see\nChapter XVI). The eye, as is well known, is peculiar among our\nsense organs in that the receptor, the retina, is a part of the\nbrain, instead of being a separate thing connected with the brain\nmore or less remotely by a peripheral nerve. Moreover there are\ncertain connections leading from other parts of the brain outwards\nto the retina as well as connections leading inwards. Thus there\nis some ground for supposing that through these outgoing connections\nactual retinal effects may accompany some visual images, which\nwould thereby become much more like actual sensations than is\nthe case with the other senses. However this may be, the process\nwhereby an impression which, if interpreted in one way (e.g.\nby a person measuring the pigmented areas of a canvas), is correctly\ncounted as a sign of a flat coloured surface, becomes, when differently\ninterpreted, an intricately divided three-dimensional space\u2014this\nprocess is one of the intervention of images of several kinds.\n\nThe order of these interventions probably varies from case to\ncase. Perhaps the most important of the images which come in\nto give depth, volume, solidity to the partly imagined and partly\nperceived \u2018picture-space\u2019 are those which are relicts of eye\nmovements, kin\u00e6sthetic images of the convergence of the eyes\nand accommodation of the lenses according to the distance of\nthe object contemplated. When, as it seems, we look past an object\nin a picture to some more distant object, seeming in so doing\nto change the focus of our eyes, we do not as a rule actually\nmake any change. But certainly we feel as though we were focussing\ndifferently and as though the convergence were different. This\nfelt difference which mainly gives the sense of greater distance\nis due to kin\u00e6sthetic imagery. Correspondingly the parts of the\n\u2018picture-space\u2019 upon which we seem to be focussing, upon which\nwe _are_ imaginally focussing, become definite and distinct,\nand parts much nearer or much more distant become to some extent\nblurred and diffused. This effect is probably due to visual images,\nsimulating the sensations which would normally ensue were we\nactually making a change of focus. The degree to which these\nlast effects occur appears to differ very greatly from one person\nto another. Insufficient attention to the great variation in\nthe means by which these images are involved by the painting\nis responsible for much bad criticism. Thus artists can commonly\nbe found who are quite unable, when looking at paintings: in\nwhich the means employed are unlike their own, to apprehend forms\nover which less specialised persons find no difficulty. In general\nmost visitors to Galleries pay too little attention to the fact\nthat few pictures can be instantaneously apprehended, that even\nten minutes\u2019 study is quite inadequate in the case of unfamiliar\nkinds of work, and that the capacity for \u2018seeing\u2019 pictures (in\nsense three), an indispensable but merely an initial step to\nappreciating them, is something which has to be acquired. It\nis naturally of great assistance if many works by the same painter\nor of the same School can be seen together, for then the essential\nmethods employed become clearer. In a general collection it is\ndifficult not to look at too great a variety of pictures, and\na confusion results, perhaps unnoticed, which is a serious obstacle\nto the coherent building up of any one picture. The fashion in\nwhich most Old Masters are hidden away under grime and glass\nand the efforts which are necessary in order to reconstruct them\nare additional obstacles. The neglect of these obvious facts\nis the chief explanation of the low level of appreciation and\ncriticism from which the art of painting at present suffers.\n\nFollowing upon the visual images are a swarm of others varying\nfrom picture to picture: tactile images giving the appearance\nof texture to surfaces, muscular images giving hardness, stiffness,\nsoftness, flexibility and so on to the volumes imagined\u2014the lightness\nand insubstantiality of muslin, the solidity and fixity of rock\nbeing matters of the intervention of images due originally to\nthe sensations we have received in the past from these materials.\nThis muscular imagery is of course called up in differing ways\nin different cases. Primarily it is due to the imitation by the\nartist of subtleties in the light given off by the materials,\nor characteristic peculiarities in their form, but there are,\nas we shall see, more indirect but also less stable, less reliable\nand less efficacious ways by which they may be evoked. The same\napplies to the other images, thermal, olfactory, auditory and\nthe rest, which may be involved in particular cases. There is\na direct and an indirect way in which they can be evoked. They\nmay spring up at the visual appeal or they may only respond at\na later stage as a result of roundabout trains of thinking. Thus\na silk scarf may _look_ soft and light; or we may imagine\nit as light, it _looking_ all the while iron-hard and heavy,\nbecause we know that it is a scarf and that scarves are soft\nand light. The two methods are very different. The second is\na reversal of the natural order of perception and for this reason\nthe condemnation so often heard from painters, of the literary\nor \u2018detective\u2019 approach to pictures, of which this would be a\nrepresentative specimen, is well merited. We must, however, distinguish\ncases in which there is this reversal from those in which it\ndoes not occur, those namely in which by a process of inference\nwe arrive at conclusions about the represented objects which\ncould not possibly be directly given. But this question may be\ndeferred until we come to discuss representation.\n\nHitherto in considering the growth of the three-dimensional imagined\npicture-space we have not explicitly mentioned the part played\nby colour nor the equally important effect of this growth in\nmodifying the original colours of the first retinal impression.\nBut not only may colour be the chief factor determining form,\ni.e. the three-dimensional organisation of space, but it is itself\nmost vitally modified by form.\n\nColours as signs, that is to say even at the most optical and\nleast elaborated stage, have certain very marked spatial characters\nof their own. Red, for example, seems to advance towards the\neye and to swell out of its boundaries, while blue seems to retreat\nand to withdraw into itself[51]. Degree of saturation may also\ngive recession in obvious and in more recondite ways. Pure colours\nin the foreground and greyed colours in the background are a\nsimple example. Similarly opposition of colours is one of the\nmain means by which the stresses and strains of volumes may be\nsuggested.\n\nThese characters of colours, especially when they reinforce and\nco-operate with one another, may be made to play a very important\npart in determining the way in which the picture-space is constructed\nwhen we look at a picture.\n\nEqually important are the less direct effects upon our picture-space\nimagining of the emotional or organic responses which we make\nto different colours. Individuals vary greatly in the extent\nto which they notice and can reflectively distinguish these responses,\nand probably also in the degree to which they actually make different\nresponses. To persons sensitive in this respect, the colours\nexcite each a distinct, well-marked emotion (and attitude) capable\nof being clearly differentiated from others. The sad poverty\nand vagueness of the colour vocabulary, however, misleads many\npeople with regard to these. Each of the \u2018puces\u2019, \u2018mauves\u2019, \u2018magentas\u2019\netc. has to cover numbers of distinguishable colours, often with\nstrikingly different effects upon us. Thus people who are content\nto say that pink is their favourite colour, or that green always\nsuits them, are either quite undiscriminating in their attitude\ntowards colour or little attentive to the actual effects produced\nupon them. A similar obtuseness or insincerity is evidenced when\nit is maintained, as is often done, that pink and green do not\ngo together. Some pinks and some greens do not, but some do,\nand the test of a colourist is just his ability to feel which\nare which. Few if any, in fact, of the colour relations with\nwhich the painter is concerned can be stated with the aid of\nsuch general terms\u2014\u2018red\u2019, \u2018brown\u2019, \u2018yellow\u2019, \u2018grey\u2019, \u2018primrose\u2019,\netc.\u2014as are at present available. Each of these stands for a\nnumber of different colours whose relations to a given colour\nwill commonly be different.\n\nTaking \u2018colour\u2019 in this sense to stand for specific colours,\nnot for classes or ranges of varying hues, sets of colours, where\nin certain spatial proportions and in certain relations of saturation,\nbrightness and luminosity relatively to one another, excite responses\nof emotion and attitude with marked individual characteristics.\nColours, in fact, have harmonic relations, although the physical\nlaws governing these relations are at present unknown, and the\nrelations themselves only imperfectly ascertained. For every\ncolour another can be found such that the combined response to\nthe two will be of a recognisable kind, whose peculiarities are\ndue probably to the compatibility with one another of the impulses\nset up by each. This compatibility varies in a number of ways.\nThe result is that for every colour a set of other colours is\ndiscoverable such that the response to each of them is compatible\nwith the response to the tonic colour in a definite way.[52] A\nsensitive colourist feels these compatibilities as giving to\nthese combinations of colours a definite character, which no\nother combinations possess. Similarly relations of incompatibility\nbetween colours can also be felt such that their combination\nyields no ordered response but merely a clash and confusion of\nresponses. Colours which just fail to be complementary are a\ntypical example. Similarly the primary colours in combination\nare offensive; should this precise kind of offensiveness be part\nof the artist\u2019s purpose, he will, of course, make use of them.\n\nThe fact that roses, sunsets, and so forth are so often found\nto present harmonious combinations of colour may appear a little\npuzzling by this account. But the vast range of close gradations,\nwhich a rose petal, for example, presents, supplies the explanation.\nOut of all these the eye picks that gradation which best accords\nwith the other colours chosen. There is usually some set of colours\nin some harmonious relation to one another to be selected out\nof the multitudinous gradations which natural objects in most\nlightings present; and there are evident reasons why the eye\nof a sensitive person should, when it can, pick out those gradations\nwhich best accord. The great range of different possible selections\nis, however, of importance. It explains the fact that we see\nsuch different colours for instance when gloomy and when gay,\nand thus how the actual selection made by an artist may reveal\nthe kind and direction of the impulses which are active in him\nat the moment of selection.\n\nNeedless to say in the absence of a clear nomenclature and standardisation\nof colours the task of describing and recording colour relations\nis of great difficulty, but the unanimity of competent, that\nis, sensitive persons as to which colours are related in specific\nways to which, is too great to be disregarded. It is as great\nas the unanimity among musicians as to the harmonic relations\nof notes to one another. The great differences between the two\ncases are not likely to be overlooked. The presence of physical\nlaws in many cases connecting notes harmonically related and\nthe absence of similar known physical laws connecting colours\nis a glaring difference. But it should not be forgotten that\nthese physical laws are, as it were, an extra-musical piece of\nknowledge. What matters to the musician is not the physical connections\nbetween notes but the compatibilities and incompatibilities in\nthe responses of emotion and attitude which they excite. The\nmusical relations between the notes would be the same even though\nthe physical relations between the stimuli which arouse them\nwere quite different.\n\nNaturally enough the analogy with the harmonic relations of music\nhas been the chief guide to those who have systematically investigated\ncolour relations. Whatever may be the precise limits to which\nit may profitably be carried, for anyone who wishes to form a\ngeneral conception of the emotional effects of colours in combination\nit is of very great value.\n\nColour is of course primarily the cause and controlling factor\nof emotional response to painting, but, as we have said, it may,\nand commonly does, help to determine form. Parts of a picture\nwhich are through their colour out of all emotional connection\nwith the rest of the picture, tend, other things being equal,\nto fall out of the picture altogether, appearing as patches accidentally\nadhering to the surface or as gaps through which something else\nirrelevant is seen. This is the extreme instance, but the influence\nof colour upon form through the emotional relations of colours\nto one another is all-pervading Sometimes colour strengthens\nand solidifies the structure, sometimes it fights against it,\nsometimes it turns into a commentary, as it were, the colour\nresponse modifying the form response and _vice versa_. The\ngreat complexity of the colour and form interactions needs no\ninsistence. They are so various that no rule can possibly be\nlaid down as to a _right_ relation for all cases. All depends\nupon what the whole response which the painter is seeking to\nrecord may be. As with attempts to define a universal proper\nrelation of rhythm to thought in poetry (e.g. the assertion that\nrhythm should echo or correspond to thought, etc.), so with general\nremarks as to how form and colour should be related. All depends\nupon the purpose, the total response to which both form and colour\nare merely means. Mistakes between means and ends, glorifying\nparticular techniques into inexplicable virtues are at least\nas common in the criticism of painting as with any other of the\narts.\n\nOne other aspect of the picture-space needs consideration. It\nis not necessarily a fixed and static construction, but may in\nseveral ways contain elements of movement. Some of these may\nbe eye movements, or kin\u00e6sthetic images of eye movements. As\nthe eye wanders imaginally from point to point the relations\nbetween the parts of the picture-space change; thus an effect\nof movement is induced. Equally important are the fusions of\nsuccessive visual images which may be suggested by drawing. As\nwe watch, for example, an arm being flexed, the eye receives\na series of successive and changing retinal impressions. Certain\ncombinations of these, which represent not the position and form\nof the arm at any instant, but a compromise or fusion of different\npositions and forms, have an easily explicable capacity to represent\nthe whole series, and thus to represent movement. The use of\nsuch fused images in drawing may easily be mistaken for distortion,\nbut when properly interpreted it may yield normal forms in movement.\nMany other means by which movement is given in Painting might\nbe mentioned. One means by which colour, may suggest it, for\nexample, is well indicated in the following description by Signac\nof _Muley-abd-er Rahman entour\u00e9 de sa garde_: \u201cla tumulte\nest traduit par l\u2019accord presque dissonant du grand parasol vert\nsur le bleu du ciel, surexcit\u00e9 d\u00e9j\u00e0 par l\u2019orang\u00e9 des murailles[53]\u201d.\nIt need hardly be pointed out that the response made to the picture-space\nvaries enormously according to whether the forms in it are seen\nas in rest or in movement.\n\n\n\nSo far we have merely discussed what may be described as the\nsensory elements in the picture, and the responses in emotion\nand attitude due to these elements. But in most painting there\nare further elements essentially involved. It has been asserted\nthat all further elements are irrelevant, at least to appreciation;\nand as a reaction to common views that seem to overlook the sensory\nelements altogether the doctrine is comprehensible and perhaps\nnot without value. For too many people do look at pictures primarily\nwith intent to discover what they are \u2018of\u2019, what they represent,\nwithout allowing the most important thing in the picture, its\nsensory stimulation through colour and form, to take effect.\nBut the reaction goes too far when it denies the relevance of\nthe representative elements in all cases. It may be freely granted\nthat there are great pictures in which nothing is represented,\nand great pictures in which what is represented is trivial and\nmay be disregarded. It is equally certain that there are great\npictures in which the contribution to the whole response made\nthrough representation is not less than that made more directly\nthrough form and colour. To those who can accept the general\npsychological standpoint already outlined, or indeed any modern\naccount of the working of the mind, the assertion that there\nis no reason why representative and formal factors in an experience\nshould conflict, but much reason why they should co-operate,\nwill need no discussion. The psychology of \u2018unique \u00e6sthetic emotions\u2019\nand \u2018pure art values\u2019 upon which the contrary view relies is\nmerely a caprice of the fancy.\n\nThe place of representation in the work o different masters varies\nenormously and it is not true that the value of their works varies\ncorrespondingly. From Raphael and Picasso at one extreme to Rembrandt,\nGoya and Hogarth at the other, Rubens, Delacroix and Giotto occupying\nan intermediate position, all degrees of participation between\nnon-representative form and represented subject in the building\nup of the whole response can be found. We may perhaps hazard,\nfor reasons indicated already, as a principle admitting of exception,\nthat what can be done by sensory means should not be done indirectly\nthrough representation. But to say more than this is to give\nyet another instance of the commonest of critical mistakes: the\nexaltation of a method into an end.\n\nRepresentation in painting corresponds to thought in poetry.\nThe same battles over the Intellect-Emotion _imbroglio_\nrage in both fields. The views recently so fashionable that representation\nhas no place in art and that treatment not subject is what matters\nin poetry spring ultimately from the same mistakes as to the\nrelation of thinking to feeling, from an inadequate psychology\nwhich would set up one as inimical to the other. Reinforced as\nthey are by the illusion, supported by language, that Beauty\nis a quality of things, not a character of our response to them,\nand thus that all beautiful things as sharing this Beauty must\nbe alike, the confusion which such views promote is a main cause\nof the difficulty which is felt so widely in appreciating both\nthe arts and poetry. They give an air of an esoteric mystery\nto what is, if it can be done at all, the simplest and most natural\nof proceedings.\n\nThe fundamental features of the experiences of reading poetry\nand of appreciating pictures, the features upon which their value\ndepends, are alike. The means by which they are brought about\nare unlike, but closely analogous critical and technical problems\narise, as we have seen, for each. The misapprehensions to which\nthought is liable recur in all the fields in which it is exercised,\nand the fact that it is sometimes more easy to detect a mistake\nin one field than in another is a strong argument for comparing\nsuch closely allied subjects.\n\n\n[51] This character of blue is the basis of the doctrine of Reynolds,\nthat blue is unsuitable in foregrounds, which led Gainsborough,\naccording to the well-known story, to paint The Blue Boy.\n\n[52] This account of harmony also applies to music. Few modern\nauthorities are content to regard harmony as an affair merely\nof the physical relationships of notes.\n\n[53] _D\u2019Eug\u00e8ne Delacroix au N\u00e9o-Impressionisme_, p. 39.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIX\n\nSculpture and the Construction of Form\n\n Thus men forgot\n That All Deities reside in the Human breast.\n _The Marriage of Heaven and Hell_.\n\n\nThe initial signs from which the work of art is built up psychologically\nin the case of sculpture differ in several respects from the\ninitial signs of painting. There are of course forms of sculpture\nfor which the difference is slight. Some bas-reliefs, for example,\ncan be considered as essentially drawings, and sculpture placed\nas a decorative detail in architecture so that it can only be\nviewed from one angle has necessarily to be interpreted in much\nthe same manner. Similarly some primitive sculpture in which\nonly one aspect is represented may be considered as covered by\nwhat has been said about painting, although the fact that the\nrelief and the relation of volumes is more completely given and\nless supplied by imaginative effort is of some consequence. Further,\nthe changes, slight though they may be, which accompany slight\nmovements of the contemplator have their effect. His total attitude\nis altered in a way which may or may not be important according\nto circumstances.\n\nWith sculpture in which a number (four for example) of aspects\nare fully treated without any attempt to fill in the intermediate\nconnecting aspects, the whole state of affairs is changed, since\nthere arises the interpretative task of uniting these aspects\ninto a whole.\n\nThis connection of a number of aspects into a whole may be made\nin varying ways. The signs may receive a _visual_ interpretation\nand the form be mainly built up of visual images combined in\nsequences or fused. This, however, is an unsatisfactory method.\nIt tends to leave out or blur too many of the possible responses\nto the statue and there is usually something unstable about such\nsyntheses. The form so constructed is insubstantial and incomplete.\nThus those sculptors whose work primarily asks for such a visual\ninterpretation are commonly felt to be lacking in what is called\na \u2018sense of form\u2019. The reasons for this are to be found in the\nnature of visual imagery and in the necessarily limited character\nof our purely visual awareness of space.\n\nBut the connection may be made, not through visual combination,\nbut through combination of the various muscular images whereby\nwe feel, or imaginatively construct the tensions, weights, stresses,\netc. of physical objects. Each sequence of visual impressions\nas we look at the statue from varying standpoints calls up a\ngroup of these muscular images, and these images are capable\nof much more subtle and stable combinations than the corresponding\nvisual images. Thus two visual images which are incompatible\nwith one another may be each accompanied by muscular images (feelings\nof stress, tension, etc.) which are perfectly compatible and\nunite to form a coherent whole free from conflict. By this means\nwe may realise the solidity of forms far more perfectly than\nif we rely upon visual resources alone, and since it is mainly\nthrough the character of the statue as a solid that the sculptor\nworks, this muscular interpretation has, as a rule, obvious and\noverwhelming advantages.\n\nNone the less a place remains for sculpture whose primary interpretation\nis in visual terms. Looking at any of the more recent work of\nEpstein, for example, a feeling of quick and active intelligence\non the part of the contemplator arises, and this sense of his\nown activity is the source of much that follows in his response.\nBy contrast a work of Rodin seems to be not so much exciting\nactivity in him as active itself. The correlation of visual aspects,\nin other words, is a conscious process compared with the automatic\ncorrelation of muscular image responses. The first we seem to\nbe doing ourselves, the second seems to be something which belongs\nto the statue. This difference as we have described it is of\ncourse a technical difference and by itself involves nothing\nas to the value of the different works concerned. A similar difference\nmay be found in the apprehension of form in painting.\n\nThese two modes are not as separate as our account would suggest;\nneither occurs in purity. Their interaction is further complicated\nthrough the highly representational character of most sculpture,\nand through the interlinking of different interpretations due\nto the congruences and incompatibilities of the emotional responses\nto which they give rise.\n\nWith sculpture perhaps more than with any other of the plastic\narts we are in danger of overlooking the work of the contemplator\u2019s\nimagination in filling out and interpreting the sign. What we\ntransport from Egypt to London is merely a set of signs, from\nwhich a suitable interpreter setting about it rightly can produce\na certain state of mind. It is this state of mind which matters\nand which gives its value to the statue. But so obscure to ordinary\nintrospection are the processes of the interpretation that we\ntend to think that none occur. That we interpret a picture or\na poem is obvious upon very little reflection. That we interpret\na mass of marble is less obvious. The historical accident that\nspeculation upon Beauty largely developed in connection with\nsculpture is responsible in great degree for the fixity of the\nopinion that Beauty is something inherent in physical objects,\nnot a character of some of our responses to objects.\n\nFrom certain visual signs, then, the contemplator constructs,\nmuscularly as well as visually, the spatial form of the statue.\nWe have seen that the picture-space is a construction, similarly\nthe statue-space is a construction, and the proportions and relations\nof the volumes which in this statue-space make up the statue\nare by no means necessarily the same as those of the mass of\nmarble from which we receive our signs. In other words, the scientific\nexamination of the statue and the imaginative contemplation of\nit do not yield the same spatial results. Thus the process of\nmeasuring[54] statues with a view to discovering a numerical formula\nfor Beauty is little likely to be fruitful. And the work of those,\nsuch as Havard Thomas, who have attempted to use this method,\nshow the features which we should expect. Their merits derive\nfrom factors outside the range of the theory. The psychological\nprocesses involved in the construction of space are too subtle,\nand the differences between the actual configuration of the marble\nand the configuration of the statue in the statue-space are brought\nabout in too many ways for any correlation to be established.\n\nAmong the factors which intervene in the building up of the imaginative\nform the most obvious are the lighting, and the material.\n\nWith change of lighting, change of form follows at once through\nchange in the visual signs, and since stone is often a translucent\nnot an opaque material, lighting is by no means such a simple\nmatter as is sometimes supposed. More is involved than the avoidance\nof distracting cast shadows and the disposal of the brightest\nillumination upon the right portions of the statue. The general\naim should obviously be to reproduce the lighting for which the\nsculptor designed his work, an aim which requires very sensitive\nand full appreciation for its success. An aim, moreover, which\nin the case of works transported from North to South and _vice\nversa_ is sometimes impossible of realisation.\n\nThe interpretation of form is an extraordinarily complex affair.\nThe consequences of the asymmetricality of space as we construct\nit must be noted. Up and down have distinct characters which\ndiffer from those of right and left, which differ again from\nthose of away and towards us. A measured vertical distance does\nnot seem to us the same as an equal horizontal distance. Nor\ndoes a equal distance away from us seem equal to either. These\neffects are modified again, sometimes reinforced, sometimes reduced,\nby effects due to quite a different source, to the relative ease\nor difficulty with which the eye follows certain lines. The greater\nand less compatibility of certain eye movements with others is\nthe cause of much of what is confusedly called Rhythm in the\nplastic arts. After certain lines we expect others, and the success\nor failure of our expectation modifies our response. Unexpectedness,\nof course, is an obvious technical resource for the artist. The\nintervention here of the representational factor cannot be overlooked.\nAn eye movement which encounters difficulty for any of a number\nof possible reasons, among which so-called rhythmical factors\ndeserve special notice, is interpreted as standing for a greater\ndistance than an equal but more easy movement. This is only a\nrough rule, for yet other psychological factors may come in to\nnullify or even reverse the effect; for example, an explicit\nrecognition of the difficulty. Yet another determining condition\nin our estimation of intervals of space is the uniformity of\ntheir filling. Thus a line one inch long hatched across will\ngenerally seem longer than an equal line unhatched, and a modulated\nsurface seem larger than a smooth one.\n\nThese instances of the psychological factors which help to make\nthe imaginatively constructed statue-space different from the\nactual space occupied by the marble will be enough to show how\nintricate is the interpretation by which we take even the first\nstep towards the appreciation of a statue. Our full response\nof attitude and emotion is entirely dependent upon how we perform\nthe initial operations. It is of course impossible to make these\ninterpretations separately, consciously and deliberately. Neural\narrangements over which we have little or no direct control perform\nthem for us. Thanks to their complexity the resultant effect,\nthe imagined form of the statue, will vary greatly from individual\nto individual and in the same individual from time to time. It\nmight be thought therefore that the hope that a statue will be\na vehicle of the same experience for many different individuals\nis vain. Certain simplifications, however, save the situation.\n\nForm, we have seen, is, through our selection among the possible\nsigns present, within certain limits what we like to make it.\nAs it varies, so do our further or deeper responses of feeling\nand attitude vary. But just as there are congruences and compatibilities\namong the responses we make, in the case of colour, which tend,\ngiven certain colours, to make us pick out of a range of possible\ncolours one which will give us a congruent (or harmonious) response,\nso it is with form. Out of the multitude of different forms which\nwe might construct by stressing certain of the signs rather than\nothers, the fixing even temporarily of a part of the form tends\nto bias us towards so interpreting the rest as to yield responses\naccordant with those already active. Hence a great reduction\nof the disparity of the interpretations which arise, hence also\nthe danger of an initial misapprehension which perverts the rest\nof the interpretation.\n\n\n\nThis Chapter, like the last, is intended as an indication, merely,\nof the ways in which a psychological analysis may assist the\ncritic and help to remove misconceptions. The usual practice\nof alluding to Form as though it were a simple unanalysable virtue\nof objects\u2014a procedure most discouraging to those who like to\nknow what they are doing, and thus very detrimental to general\nappreciation\u2014will lapse when a better understanding of the situation\nbecomes general. None the less there are certain very puzzling\nfacts as to the effects of forms when apprehended which in part\nexplain this way of talking. These are perhaps best considered\nin connection with Music, the most purely formal of the arts.\n\n\n[54] This remark applies equally strongly to the attempts which\nare from time to time made to find formul\u00e6 for the proportions\nof buildings. No one with an adequate idea of the complexity\nof the factors which determine our responses is likely to attach\ngreat importance to these investigations, interesting though\nthey are. The interpretation of the results is not within sight\nof even the most optimistic of psychologists.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XX\n\nThe _Impasse_ of Musical Theory\n\n Will twenty chapters render plain\n Those lonely lights that still remain\n Just breaking over land and main?\n\n\nFor fairly obvious reasons the psychology of Music is often regarded\nas more backward than that of the other arts, and the _impasse_\nwhich has here been reached more baffling and more exasperating.\nBut such advance as has been possible in the theory of the other\narts has been mainly concerned with them as representational\nor as serviceable. For poetry, for painting, for architecture\nthere still remain problems as perplexing as any which can be\nraised about music. For example, what is the difference between\ngood and bad blank verse in its formal aspect, between delightful\nand distressing alliteration, between euphony and cacophony,\nbetween metrical triumph and metrical failure? Or in the case\nof Painting, why do certain forms excite such marked responses\nof emotion and attitude and others, so very like them geometrically,\nexcite none or produce merely confusion? Why have colours their\nspecific responses and how is it that their combinations have\nsuch subtle and yet definite effects? Or what is the reason that\nspaces and volumes in Architecture affect us as they do? These\nquestions are at present as much without answers as any that\nwe can raise about Music; but the fact that in these arts other\nquestions arise which can in part be answered, whereas in Music\nquestions about the effects of form overwhelmingly preponderate,\nhas in part obscured the situation.\n\nOther effects are of course also involved; in programme music\nsomething analogous to representation in painting; in opera and\nmuch other music, dramatic action; and so forth. But these effects,\nalthough often contributing to the total value, are plainly subordinate\nin music to its more direct influence as sound alone. The difficulties\nwhich they raise have such close analogies in painting and poetry\nthat a separate discussion may be omitted. The problem of \u2018pure\nform\u2019 arises, however, with peculiar insistence in music.\n\nMore than forty years ago Gurney summed up the state of musical\ntheory as follows: \u201cWhen we come to actual forms, and to the\nstartling differences of merit which the very simplest known\nto us present, the musical faculty defies all explanation of\nits action and its judgements. The only conceivable explanation\nindeed would be an analogy, and we know not where to look for\nit[55]\u201d. And the work done since has added remarkably little.\nAs he so admirably insisted, even though we confine ourselves\nto the responses of one individual, all general explanations\nof the musical effect apply equally to the ineffective, to the\ndistressing and the delightful, to the admirable and the atrocious\nalike. But the same is true of all attempts to explain the effects\nupon us of any forms which neither represent something nor are\nin obvious ways serviceable. Whether they are forms seen or heard,\nwhether they are made up of notes or of movements, of intervals\nof time or of images of speech, the same is true of them all.\n\nWhatever effects cannot be traced to some practical use we might\nmake of them (as we use a plate to eat from or a house to live\nin), or to some interference with or threat against the ways\nin which we might act, or to some object practically interesting\nto us, which they represent\u2014all such effects are necessarily\nvery difficult to explain.\n\nThere is nothing in the least mysterious, however, about the\ndifficulty of explaining them. The facts required happen to be\nbeyond our present powers of observation. They belong to a branch\nof psychology for which we have as yet no methods of investigation.\nIt seems likely that we shall have to wait a long while, and\nthat very great advances must first be made in neurology before\nthese problems can profitably be attacked. But however regrettable\nthis may be, there is no justification whatever for the invention\nof unique faculties and ultimate, analysable, indefinable entities.\nTo say that a thing is unanalysable may be to assert either that\nit is simple or that we do not know yet how to analyse it. Musical\neffects, like the effects of forms in general, are inexplicable\nin the second sense only. To pretend that they are inexplicable\nin the first sense is mere mystery-mongering. To take two parallel\ncases, trade booms and fine weather were until recently inexplicable,\nand are doubtless still in many respects difficult to account\nfor. But no one would pretend that these blessings require us\nto assume unique _sui generis_ tendencies in economic or\nmeteorological affairs.\n\nBut the practice of describing the \u2018musical faculty\u2019 and the\nformal effects of the arts in general as _sui generis_ has\nanother cause in addition to intellectual bewilderment. Many\npeople think that to say that a mental activity is unique, or\n_sui generis_, in some way gives it a more exalted standing\nthan if it were recognised as merely too complicated or too inaccessible\nto experiment to be at present explained. In part this is a relic\nof the old opinion that explanation is itself derogatory, an\nopinion which only those who are, in this respect, uneducated,\nstill entertain. Partly also this preference for \u2018unique\u2019 things\nis due to confusion with the sense in which St Paul\u2019s may be\nsaid to be unique. But the experience of \u2018seeing stars\u2019 after\na bang on the nose is just as \u2018unique\u2019 as any act of musical\nappreciation and shares any exalted quality which such uniqueness\nmay be supposed to confer.\n\nEvery element in a form, whether it be a musical form or any other,\nis capable of exciting a very intricate and widespread response.\nUsually the response is of a minimal order and escapes introspection.\nThus a single note or a uniform colour has for most people hardly any\nobservable effect beyond its sensory characteristics. When it occurs\nalong with other elements the form which they together make up may have\nstriking consequences in emotion and attitude. If we regard this as an\naffair of mere summation of effects it may seem impossible that the\neffect of the form can be the result of the effects of the elements,\nand thus it is natural and easy to invent ultimate properties of\n\u2018forms\u2019 by way of pseudo-explanation. But a little more psychological\ninsight makes these inventions appear quite unnecessary. The effects\nof happenings in the mind rarely add themselves up. Our more intense\nexperiences are not built up of less intense experiences as a wall is\nbuilt up of bricks. The metaphor of addition is utterly misleading.\nThat of the resolution of forces would be better, but even this does\nnot adequately represent the behaviour of the mind. The separate\nresponses which each element in isolation would tend to excite are so\nconnected with one another that their combination is, for our present\nknowledge, incalculable in its effects. Two stimuli which, when\nseparated by one interval of time or space, would merely cancel one\nanother, with another interval produce an effect which is far beyond\nanything which either alone could produce. And the combined response\nwhen they are suitably arranged may be of quite another kind than that\nof either. We may, if we like, think of the effects of impulses at\nvarious intervals of time upon a pendulum, but this metaphor is, as\nwe have suggested, insufficient. It is over simple. The intricacies\nof chemical reactions come nearer to being what we need. The great\nquantities of latent energy which may be released by quite slight\nchanges in conditions suggest better what happens when stimuli are\ncombined. But even this metaphor incompletely represents the complexity\nof the interactions in the nervous system. It is only by conjecture\nthat its working can as yet be divined. What is certain is chat it is\nthe most complex and the most sensitive thing of which we know.\n\nThe unpredicable and miraculous differences, then, in the total\nresponses which slight changes in the arrangement of stimuli\nproduce, can be fully accounted for in terms of the sensitiveness\nof the nervous system; and the mysteries of \u2018forms\u2019 are merely\na consequence of our present ignorance of the detail of its action.\nWe have spoken above of the \u2018elements\u2019 of a form, but in fact\nwe do not yet know which these are. Any musical sound, for example,\nis plainly complex, though how complex it is from the point of\nview of its musical effects is still very uncertain. It has pitch,\nit has _timbre_, the characters which change as it is played\nupon one kind of instrument or another, the characters which\nare sometimes called its colour. Its effects also vary with its\nloudness and with its volume. It may be far more complex still.\nIts relations again to other musical sounds may be of at least\nthree kinds: pitch relations, harmonic relations and temporal\nrelations, complicated, all of them, in the utmost degree by\nRhythm. Possibly other relations still are involved. There would\nbe no advantage here in entering into the detail of the analysis\nof these qualities and relations. The one point of importance\nfor our present purpose is the immense scope for the resolution,\ninterinanimation, conflict and equilibrium of impulses opened\nup by this extraordinary complexity of musical sounds and of\ntheir possible arrangement. It is not in the least surprising\nthat so few invariable correspondences between stimuli and total\nresponses have as yet been discovered.\n\nThe same state of affairs recurs wherever forms by themselves,\ndissociated from all practical uses and from all representation\nproduce immediate effects upon the mind. In painting, in sculpture,\nin architecture and in poetry, we need equally to be on our guard\nagainst those who would attribute peculiar, unique and mystic\nvirtues to forms in themselves. In every case their effect is\ndue to the interplay (not the addition) of the effects which\ntheir elements excite. Especially we do well to beware of empty\nspeculations upon \u2018necessary and inevitable relations\u2019 as the\nsource of the effect. Of course in a given case a certain relation,\na certain arrangement, may be necessary, in the sense that the\nelements if differently disposed would have a quite different\ncombined effect. But this is not the sense in which necessity\nis usually claimed. It is necessity, in the metaphysical sense,\nsome here utterly obscure kind of \u2018logical necessity\u2019 which is\nthe favourite toy of a number of art critics. To those who have\nsome familiarity both with Logic and with Psychology the regular\nappearance of the term \u2018logical\u2019 in describing these relations\nis the clearest indication that nothing definite or adequately\nconsidered is being said. The fact that, given certain elements\narranged in a certain way, a certain further element can usually\nbe introduced in one way and one way only _if a certain total\neffect is to be produced_, does, it is true, give a certain\n\u2018inevitability\u2019 to the artist\u2019s work. But what the effect is\nand whether the effect is worth while have still to be considered,\nand this inevitability has nothing to do with _a priori_\nrightness and is a matter simply of cause and effect. The salt\nrequired to make a soup palatable is \u2018logically necessitated\u2019\nin this sense as much as any relation in a picture. The value\nlies not in the apprehension, conscious or subconscious, of the\nrightness of the relations, but in the total mental effect which,\nsince they are right (i.e. since they work), they produce.\n\n\n[55] _The Power of Sound_, p. 176.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXI\n\nA Theory of Communication\n\n For surely once, they feel, we were\n Parts of a single continent.\n _Matthew Arnold._\n\n\nArtificial mysteries are as prevalent in unreflecting and even\nin elaborately excogitated opinion upon communication as elsewhere.\nOn the one hand are some who define communication as the actual\ntransference of experiences in the strictest possible sense of\ntransference\u2014the sense in which a penny can be transferred from\none pocket to another\u2014and are led to most fantastic hypotheses.\nBlake seems sometimes to have believed that one single, the same,\nidentical state of mind, imagined as a being or power, can occupy\nnow one mind, now another, or many minds at once. Other thinkers,\nin less picturesque manners, have fallen back upon no less transcendental\nconsiderations as necessities in the explanation of communication.\nWe must suppose, it is alleged, that human minds are wider than\nwe ordinarily believe, that parts of one mind may pass over to\nbecome parts of another, that minds interpenetrate and intermingle,\nor even that particular minds are merely an illusory appearance\nand the underlying reality one mind whose facets or aspects are\nmany. In this way it is easy to enter the maze. Probably some\nwanderings in it are unavoidable for all speculative persons\nat some period of their mental development. The only escape from\nit is by the original entrance.\n\nFor communication defined as strict transference of or participation\nin identical experiences does not occur. This is not a heart-breaking\nconclusion. No general theory, in fact, as to the nature or conditions\nof experiences can affect their value. For value is prior to\nall explanations. If actual transference and participation did\noccur we should of course be compelled to adopt a transcendental\ntheory. It does not occur[56] and no arguments which assume it\nhave the least weight.\n\nAll that occurs is that, under certain conditions, separate minds\nhave closely similar experiences. Those who are unable to accept\nthis view reject it not on grounds of evidence, not through the\nways in which the world influences them, but on grounds of desire,\ndue to the influence of the contrary opinion on their attitudes\nto their fellows. At moments anyone may wish it otherwise; severance\nseems a deprivation; caught in a moment of maladjustment we feel\nthat our essential insularity is a blight and a defect, and to\naccept the facts and upon them to found a new and more perfect\nadjustment is for all sensitive people in some situations difficult.\nBut the true belief does not, and perhaps no true belief can,\nreally deprive anyone of any values. Sad cases of bad systematisations\nthere doubtless are, for which no readjustment is possible. A\nfalse belief may become an indispensable condition for the most\nimportant activities of individuals who without it break down\ninto confusion. So it is with many religious beliefs; and in\nsaying that the removal of such beliefs need involve no loss,\nand may involve great gains in values, we do not say that there\nare not certain individuals whose values will be destroyed in\nthe process. We say only that adaptable people will find that\nmost of their values can be retained after rejecting their errors,\nthat compensations and equivalents for their losses are available,\nand that whole sets of fresh values become open to them through\ntheir better adjustment to the actual world in which they live.\nThis is the justification for the opinion which has so often\nbeen held, that knowledge is the greatest of all goods. The opinion\nappears to be warranted. Knowledge _is_, we are slowly finding\nout, an indispensable condition for the attainment of the widest,\nmost stable, and most important values.\n\nWe start then from the natural isolation and severance of minds.\nTheir experiences at the best, under the most favourable circumstances,\ncan be but similar. Communication, we shall say, takes place\nwhen one mind so acts upon its environment that another mind\nis influenced, and in that other mind an experience occurs which\nis like the experience in the first mind, and is caused in part\nby that experience. Communication is evidently a complicated\naffair, and capable of degrees at least in two respects. The\ntwo experiences may be more or less similar, and the second may\nbe more or less dependent upon the first. If A and B are walking\nin the street together and A touches B and says, \u201cThere is the\nLord Chief Justice,\u201d B\u2019s experience while he contemplates the\ndignitary is only adventitiously dependent upon A\u2019s experience.\nBut if A, having met the Lord Chief Justice, describes him to\na friend afterwards in a quarry at Portland, for example, his\nfriend\u2019s experience will depend very largely upon the particular\njudges he may himself have encountered, and for the rest will\nderive its special features from A\u2019s description. Unless A has\nremarkable gifts of description and B extraordinarily sensitive\nand discriminating receptive ability, their two experiences will\ntally at best but roughly. They may completely fail to tally\nwithout either being clearly aware of the fact.\n\nIn general, long and varied acquaintanceship, close familiarity,\nlives whose circumstances have often corresponded, in short an\nexceptional fund of common experience is needed, if people, in\nthe absence of special communicative gifts, active and receptive,\nare to communicate, and even with these gifts the success of\nthe communication in difficult cases depends upon the extent\nto which past similarities in experience can be made use of.\nWithout such similarities communication is impossible. Difficult\ncases are those in which the speaker must himself supply and\ncontrol a large part of the causes of the listener\u2019s experience;\nin which correspondingly the listener has to struggle against\nthe intrusions of elements from his own past experience which\nare irrelevant. When A can point and B gaze, the matter is sometimes\neasy; although, as is well known, a complex object, for example\na landscape, where many different selections are possible corresponding\nto different emphases of interest, cannot be dealt with in so\nsimple a manner. Less complex things in which the interesting\nfeature is more salient, for example, a gentleman asleep in Church,\nmay be merely indicated with more confidence of communication,\nalthough here again one person may feel indignation and another\namusement at the sight.\n\nIn difficult cases the vehicle of communication must inevitably\nbe complex. The effect of a word varies with the other words\namong which it is placed. What would be highly ambiguous by itself\nbecomes definite in a suitable context. So it is throughout;\nthe effect of any element depends upon the other elements present\nwith it. Even in such shallow communication as is involved in\nmerely making out the letters in a handwriting this principle\nis all-important, and in the deepest forms of communication the\nsame principle holds good. To this is due the superiority of\nverse to prose for the most difficult and deepest communications,\npoetry being by far the more complex vehicle. A similar instance\nis the increased ambiguity of a monochromatic reproduction as\ncompared with the original painting. What _difficulty_ of\ncommunication depends upon we have already considered. It should\nnot be confused with the difficulty of the matter communicated,\nalthough the two are often connected. Some very difficult calculations,\nfor example, can be communicated with ease. _Depth_ of communication\nlikewise is not necessarily connected with difficulty. It is\na name for the degree of completeness in the response required.\nA glance at the diagram on p. 116 will make this use of the term\nclear. Communications involving attitudes are deeper than those\nin which references alone are concerned. Abstract and analytic\nprose, in fact, depends for its success upon the shallowness\nof its draught. It must avoid any stirring of the emotions lest\nits required distinctions become obscured.\n\n\n[56] The very strange and important phenomena of apparent telepathy,\nand the feats of some \u2018psychometrists\u2019 and \u2018clairvoyants\u2019, although\nthey may call for a great extension of our ideas as to how minds\ninfluence one another, do not require any such desperate devices\nas transference of, or participation in, _identical_ experiences.\nIf they did, the possibility of investigating them by the only\ntechnique with which anything has ever been successfully investigated\nwould be remote. On any \u2018identity\u2019 or \u2018participation\u2019 theory,\ncommunication becomes an ineffable and irremovable mystery. There\nmay, of course, be any number of strange events occurring about\nwhich we cannot know, but to discuss such events is unprofitable.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXII\n\nThe Availability of the Poet\u2019s Experience\n\n That he is the wisest, the happiest and the best, inasmuch\n as he is a poet, is equally incontrovertible; the greatest poets\n have been men of the most spotless virtue, of the most consummate\n prudence, and, if we would look into the interior of their lives,\n the most fortunate of men.\u2014_The Defence of Poetry_.\n\n\nThe special communicative gifts, either active or passive, which\nhave been alluded to, are no peculiar irreducible abilities.\nThey can be described in terms of activities already mentioned.\nThe use of past similarities in experience and the control of\nthese elements through the dependence of their effects upon one\nanother, make up the speaker\u2019s, the active communicator\u2019s gift.\nDiscrimination, suggestibility, free and clear resuscitation\nof elements of past experience _disentangled from one another_,\nand control of irrelevant personal details and accidents, make\nup the recipient\u2019s gift. We may now consider these more closely.\n\nCertain favourable and unfavourable special circumstances in\nthe temperaments or characters of the persons concerned may be\nset aside. Thus courage or audacity, enterprise, goodwill, absence\nof undue pride or conceit, honesty, humaneness, humility in its\nfinest sense, humour, tolerance, good health, and the Confucian\ncharacteristics of the \u2018superior man\u2019 are favourable general\nconditions for communication. But we will assume them present\nin sufficient degree and pass on to the less evident because\nmore fundamental conditions. In the first place all those which\nwe have enumerated as desirable in the recipient are also necessary\nin the artist. He is pre-eminently accessible to external influences\nand discriminating with regard to them. He is distinguished further\nby the freedom in which all these impressions are held in suspension,\nand by the ease with which they form new relations between themselves.\nThe greatest difference between the artist or poet and the ordinary\nperson is found, as has often been pointed out, in the range,\ndelicacy, and freedom of the connections he is able to make between\ndifferent elements of his experience. \u201cAll the images of nature\nwere still present to him,\u201d says Dryden, with felicity, of Shakespeare,\n\u201cand he drew them not laboriously but luckily.\u201d It is this available\npossession of the past which is the first characteristic of the\nadept in communication, of the poet or the artist.\n\nAvailability, not mere possession, however, is what is essential.\nMany people are endowed with memories of marble upon which time\ncan do little to efface even the slightest mark, but they benefit\nlittle from their endowment. A merely repetitive retention is\nrather a disability than an asset in communication, since it\nmakes the separation of the private and irrelevant from the essential\nso difficult. Persons to whom the past comes back as a whole\nare likely to be found in an asylum.\n\nWhat is in question here is not memory, in the stricter sense\nin which past experience is dated and placed, but free reproduction.\nTo be able to revive an experience is not to remember when and\nwhere and how it occurred, but merely to have that peculiar state\nof mind available. Why some experiences are available and others\nnot is unfortunately still a matter for conjecture merely. The\ndifficulty upon most accounts, Semon\u2019s for example, is to explain\nwhy _all_ our past experience is not being revived all the\ntime. But some plausible conjectures are not difficult to make,\nand the absence of clear evidence or conclusive proof should\nnot prevent our making them if they are recognised for conjectures.\n\nHow far an experience is revivable would seem to depend in the\nfirst place upon the interests, the impulses, active in the experience.\nUnless similar interests recur its revival would seem to be difficult.\nThe original experience is built upon a number of impulses; it\ncame about only through these impulses. We may even say that\nit is those impulses. The first condition for its revival is\nthe occurrence of impulses similar to _some_ of these.\n\nThe patient in the asylum occupied in reliving the same piece\nof experience indefinitely does so (if he does) because he is\nlimited very strictly in the range of his possible impulses,\nother impulses not being allowed to intervene. Hence the completeness\nwith which he is said to reconstruct the past. Most revival is\ndistorted because only some of the original impulses are repeated,\nnew impulses being-involved and a compromise resulting.\n\nThe impulses implicated in experiences may be many and varied\nor few and alike. An experience which has a very simple impulse\nstructure will, we may suppose, tend to come back only when these\nimpulses are again relatively dominant. Other things being equal\nit will have less chance of revival than an experience with a\nmore complex structure. Recalling the illustration used in Chapter\nXIV, the broader the facet the more numerous are the positions\nfrom which the polyhedron will settle down on that facet. It\nis a first principle of psychology that the partial return only\nof a situation may reinstate the whole, and since most impulses\nhave belonged in the past to many varied wholes there must evidently\nbe much rivalry as to which wholes do actually recur. What seems\nto decide the dispute more than anything else is the character\nof the original connections between the parts. As has recently\nbeen emphasised by the exponents of _Gestalt-psychologie_,\nmere original contiguity or simultaneity is comparatively powerless\nto control revival. Compare the learning of a geometric theorem\nby heart with understanding it, or even a brief study of some\nbuilding with mere daily familiarity.\n\nWhat then is the difference between understanding a situation\nand the more usual reactions to it? It is a difference in the\ndegree of organisation of the impulses which it arouses. It is\nthe difference between a systematised complex response, or ordered\nsequence of responses, and a welter of responses. We must not\ntake \u2018understanding\u2019 in too specialised a sense here, or we shall\noverlook the immense importance of this difference in determining\nrevival. We are accustomed to make an artificial distinction\nbetween intellectual or theoretical and non-intellectual or emotional\nmental activities. To understand a situation in the sense here\nintended is not necessarily to reflect upon it, to inquire into\nits principles and consciously distinguish its characters, but\nto respond to it as a whole, in a coherent way which allows its\nparts their due share and their proper independence in the response.\nExperience which has this organised character, it is reasonable\nto suppose, has more chance of revival, is more available as\na whole and in parts, than more confused experience.\n\nContrast the behaviour of the sleepy and the fully awake, of\nthe normal man with the lightly and the more deeply an\u00e6sthetised\npatient, of the starved or fevered with the healthy. To describe\nthese differences in neural potency, and to mark the degree of\nphysiological efficiency, Dr Head has recently[57] suggested the\nterm _vigilance_, a useful addition to our symbolic machinery.\nIn a high state of vigilance the nervous system reacts to stimuli\nwith highly adapted, discriminating, and ordered responses; in\na lowered state of vigilance the responses are less discriminating,\nless delicately adapted. Whether we are considering the decerebrate\npreparation or the intact poet, the simplest automatisms or the\nmost highly conscious acts, what happens in a given stimulus\nsituation varies with the vigilance of the appropriate portion\nof the nervous system. The point as regards revival can be put\nconveniently by saying that experiences of high vigilance are\nthe most likely to be available. The degree of vigilance of the\nindividual at the moment at which revival is attempted is, of\ncourse, equally but more evidently an important factor.\n\nThe answer then, at least in part, to the problem of how the\npoet\u2019s experience is more than usually available to him is that\nit is, as he undergoes it, more than usually organised through\nhis more than usual vigilance. Connections become established\nfor him which in the ordinary mind, much more rigid and exclusive\nin its play of impulses, are never effected, and it is through\nthese original connections that so much more of his past comes\nto be freely revivable for him at need.\n\nThe same explanation may be put in another way. In order to keep\nany steadiness and clarity in his attitudes the ordinary man\nis under the necessity on most occasions of suppressing the greater\npart of the impulses which the situation might arouse. He is\nincapable of organising them; therefore they have to be left\nout. In the same situation the artist is able to admit far more\nwithout confusion. Hence the fact that his resultant behaviour\nis apt to cause dismay, irritation or envy, or to seem incomprehensible.\nThe wheeling of the pigeons in Trafalgar Square may seem to have\nno relation to the colour of the water in the basins, or to the\ntones of a speaker\u2019s voice or to the drift of his remarks. A\nnarrow field of stimulation is all that we can manage, and we\noverlook the rest. But the artist does not, and when he needs\nit, he has it at his disposal.\n\nThe dangers to which he is exposed, the apparent inconsequence,\nthe difficulty on many occasions of co-operating with him, of\nrelying upon him, of predicting what he will do, are evident\nand often expatiated upon. His superficial resemblance to persons\nwho are merely mental chaoses, unorganised, without selective\nability and of weak and diffused attention, is likewise clear.\nEssentially he is the opposite of these.\n\n\n[57] Henry Head, \u2018The Conception of Nervous and Mental Energy\u2019\nin the _British Journal of Psychology_, Oct. 1923, Vol.\nXIV, p. 126.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIII\n\nTolstoy\u2019s Infection Theory\n\n Beauty is no quality in things themselves; it exists merely in the\n mind which contemplates them.\u2014_Hume_.\n\n\nIt is strange that speculations upon the arts should so rarely\nhave begun from the most obvious fact about them. Mr Roger Fry,\nin his interesting Retrospect, records the shock with which Tolstoy\u2019s\ninsistence upon communication struck contemporary students in\nEngland. \u201cWhat remained of immense importance was the idea that\na work of art was not the record of beauty already existent\nelsewhere, but the expression of an emotion felt by the artist\nand conveyed to the spectator.\u201d[58] It will be useful to examine\nTolstoy\u2019s account. He formulates his theory[59] as follows: \u201cArt\nbecomes more or less infectious in consequence of three conditions:\n\n (i) In consequence of a greater or lesser\n peculiarity of the sensation conveyed.\n\n (ii) In consequence of a greater or lesser\n clearness of the transmission of this\n sensation.\n\n (iii) In consequence of the sincerity of the\n artist, that is, of the greater or lesser\n force with which the artist himself\n experiences the sensation which he is\n conveying.\u201d\n\nHe adds, in curious contradiction to his other view which we\nhave already discussed, \u201cNot only is the infectiousness a certain\nsign of art, but the degree of the infection is the only standard\nof the value of art.\u201d\n\nThis contradiction we may perhaps remove or at least mitigate\nif we notice that \u2018degree of infection\u2019 is a highly ambiguous\nphrase. It may be equivalent to\u2014\n\n (i) the number of persons who may be infected,\n\n (ii) the completeness with which the experience is reproduced\n in them.\n\nThese are the two most relevant senses here, and both are involved\nin Tolstoy\u2019s exposition. The first would bring this view into\nconnection with his doctrine that only so far as art is accessible\nto all men is it valuable. The second, however, cannot be reconciled\nwith that view, but that he held it cannot be doubted. \u201cThe more\nthe sensation to be conveyed is special,\u201d he goes on, \u201cthe more\nstrongly does it act upon the receiver; the more special the\ncondition of the mind is, to which the reader is transferred,\nthe more willingly and the more powerfully does he blend with\nit.\u201d\n\nThis is plainly untrue. What Tolstoy would have said with more\nreflection is that some special experiences are interesting and\nowe their attraction partly to their strangeness, their unusual\ncharacter. But many unusual and special experiences are unattractive\nand repellent. Dyspeptics, amateurs of psycho-analysis, fishermen,\nand golfers, have very often most remarkable things to recount.\nWe shun having to listen precisely because they are so special.\nFurther, many experiences by their very oddness are incommunicable.\n\nOnly so far as common interests are aroused does the ease and\ncompleteness of transmission depend upon the rarity and strangeness\nof the experience communicated. With this proviso Tolstoy\u2019s remark\nis obviously justified. That he should have stressed it is an\nindication of his sincerity and candour. So much of his doctrine\nis a simple denial that special experiences are a fit subject\nfor art. A division between experiences which though special\nare yet in the main path of humanity and accessible to all men\nif they are sufficiently finely developed in normal directions,\nand those other special experiences which are due to abnormality,\ndisease, or eccentric and erratic specialisation, is what he\nwould have added if his attention had been drawn to the point.\nHe would have enjoyed classifying the fashionables and intellectuals,\nthe etiolate cultured classes, among the insane.\n\nThe second condition of infectiousness, the greater or less clearness\nof the transmission of the sensation, is more important. How\nto obtain clear transmission is precisely the problem of communication.\nWe have seen that it is a matter of the availability of common\nexperiences, the elicitation of these by a suitable vehicle,\nand the control and extrusion of irrelevant elements, so far\nas they arise, through the complexity of the vehicle.\n\nThe third condition, the sincerity of the artist, is more obscure.\nTolstoy\u2019s own elucidation carries us but a little way. What is\nthis force with which an experience occurs? Certainly experiences\nmay be of the utmost intensity without thereby being any more\neasy to convey. A lightning flash, for example, which just misses\none upon a summit, is much more difficult to describe than the\nsame flash seen from the valley. Tolstoy, however, is speaking\nof the experience as evoked by the artist in the course of communication,\nof the \u201cemotion, kindred to that which was before the subject\nof contemplation\u201d, which then \u201cis gradually produced and does\nitself exist in the mind\u201d, to quote Wordsworth\u2019s celebrated account\nof the source of poetry. He is speaking of the fullness, steadiness\nand clearness with which the experience to be communicated develops\nin the mind of the communicator at the moment of expression.\nInrushes of emotion, accompanied by scraps and odd bits of imagery,\nthought and incipient activity, are not uncommon, and the process\nof jotting down what comes to mind at the moment is all that\nthe would-be poet can achieve.\n\n Round him much embryo, much abortion lay,\n Much future ode and abdicated play:\n Nonsense precipitate like running lead,\n Which slipped through cracks and zigzags of the head.\n\nOpposed to him is the poet who \u201cdescribed in _ideal_ perfection,\nbrings the whole soul of man into activity. . . .\u201d His is \u201ca\nmore than usual state of emotion, with more than usual order;\njudgment ever awake, and steady self-possession, with enthusiasm\nand feeling profound or vehement[60].\u201d As so often, Coleridge\ndrops the invaluable hint almost inadvertently. The wholeness\nof the mind in the creative moment is the essential consideration,\nthe free participation in the evocation of the experience of\nall the impulses, conscious or unconscious, relevant to it, without\nsuppressions or restrictions. As we have seen, this completeness\nor wholeness is the rarest and the most difficult condition required\nfor supreme communicative ability. How it works we have also\nseen, and if this is, as doubtless it must be, what Tolstoy meant\nby sincerity, however queer some of his tests for it were, we\nhave found yet another indication of how great his contribution\nto critical theory, under happier circumstances, might have been.\n\n\n[58] _Vision and Design_, p. 194.\n\n[59] _What is Art_, Sect. XV.\n\n[60] _Biographia Literaria_, Vol. 11, Ch. XIV, p. 12.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIV\n\nThe Normality of the Artist\n\n Prose is an uninterrupted, polite warfare with poetry . . .\n every abstraction wants to have a jibe at poetry and wishes\n to be uttered with a mocking voice.\u2014_The Joyful Wisdom_.\n\n\nIf the availability of his past experience is the first characteristic\nof the poet, the second is what we may provisionally call his\nnormality. So far as his experience does not tally with that\nof those with whom he communicates, there will be failure. But\nboth the sense in which it must tally and the sense in which\nthe artist is normal need to be carefully considered.\n\nWithin racial[61] boundaries, and perhaps within the limits of\ncertain very general types,[62] many impulses are common to all\nmen. Their stimuli and the courses which they take seem to be\nuniform. At the same time there are many other impulses which\nare not uniform. It is difficult to give instances, since there\nare so few names for impulses, but sounds are fairly uniform\nwhile words used in isolation are fairly ambiguous stimuli. Impulses\ncould, if we knew enough, be arranged in an order of general\nuniformity or stability. Some impulses remain the same, taking\nthe same course on the same occasions, from age to age, from\nprehistoric times until to-day. Some change as fashions change.\nBetween the two extremes are the vast majority; neither, when\nthe nervous system is vigilant, very fixed nor very erratic;\nset off by a given stimulus and taking the course they do because\nother impulses are also active or have just been active.\n\nFor successful communication a number of impulses with their\neffective stimuli must be common to the communicators, and further\nthe general ways in which impulses modify one another must be\nshared. We evidently cannot expect that many total situations\nand responses will have been common, and it is not necessary\nthat they should be. Within limits the disparities can be overcome\nby what is called imagination.\n\nThere is nothing peculiarly mysterious about imagination. It\nis no more marvellous than any other of the ways of the\nmind. Yet it has so often been treated as an arcanum that we\nnaturally approach it with caution. It is desirable at least\nto avoid part of the fate which befell Coleridge,[63] and our\naccount will be devoid of theological implications.\n\nGiven some impulses active others are thereby aroused in the\nabsence of what would otherwise be their necessary stimuli. Such\nimpulses I call imaginative, whether images occur or not, for\nimage-production is not at all essentially involved in what the\ncritic is interested in as imagination. Which other impulses\nare brought in is in part determined by which were co-operative\ntogether originally when all the impulses had their own stimuli,\nthat is to say, in the non-imaginary experiences from which the\nimaginary experience derives. In so far as this factor comes\nin the imagination may be said to be _repetitive_. The imagination\nwe are concerned with may be called _formative_[64] by way\nof distinction. For present circumstances are at least as important.\nRemember in a changed mood a scene which took place under a strong\nemotion. How altered is its every aspect! The selection of the\nimpulses which take effect is changed; the impulses are distorted,\nthey run in different courses. The imaginative construction is\nalways at least as much determined by what is going on in the\npresent as by what went on in the past, _pasts_ rather,\nwhence it springs.\n\nMany of the most curious features of the arts, the limitation\nof their number, their formal characteristics and the conditions\nof impersonality, detachment and so forth, which have given rise\nto much confused discussion of the \u2018\u00e6sthetic\u2019 state for example,\nare explained by this fact. In difficult communication the artist\nmust find some means of so controlling a part of the recipient\u2019s\nexperience that the imaginative development will be governed\nby this part and not left to the accidents of repetition which\nwill differ naturally from individual to individual. As a basis\nfor every art, therefore, will be found a type of impulse which\nis extraordinarily uniform, which fixes the framework, as it\nwere, within which the rest of the response develops. These are\namong the most uniform impulses, among those which come nearest\nto having a one-one correlation with their stimuli, of all those\nwhich we experience.\n\nIn poetry, rhythm metre and tune or cadence; in music, rhythm\npitch timbre and tune; in painting, form and colour; in sculpture,\nvolume and stress; in all the arts, what are usually called the\nformal elements are the stimuli, simple or complex, which can\nbe most depended upon to produce uniform responses. It is true\nthat these responses are not so uniform as the reflexes, as sneezing\nor blinking for example. But even these are to a considerable\nextent subject to interference and modification by impulses of\nhigher levels. What communication requires is responses which\nare uniform, sufficiently varied, and capable of being set off\nby stimuli which are physically manageable. These three requisites\nexplain why the number of the arts is limited and why formal\nelements have such importance.\n\nThey are the skeleton or scaffolding upon or within which the\nfurther impulses involved in the communication are supported.\nThey supply the present dependable part of the experience by\nwhich the rest, the more erratic, ambiguous part of the imaginative\ndevelopment, is controlled. By themselves (although there has\nbeen a natural tendency in criticism to maintain the contrary\nopinion) they are often quite inadequate. As we have seen, differences\nof all degrees, both between and within the arts, exist.\n\nThe fashion in which the poet\u2019s impulses must tally with those\nof his readers, will now be moderately clear. The poet is in\nthe least favourable position, perhaps, among the artists, but\nas a compensation the range and fullness of the communications\nopen to him is, if he can overcome the difficulties, very great.\nBut evidently the least eccentricity on his part, either in the\nresponses which he makes to rhythms and verbal tunes, or in the\nways in which these govern and modify his further responses or\nare modified by them, will be disastrous. It is the same for\nall the arts. A defective or eccentric colour sensibility, a\ncommon defect as is well known, may play havoc with an artist\u2019s\nwork, _qua_ communication, without necessarily involving\nany deficiency of value in his own experience. It is theoretically\npossible for an individual to develop in himself states of mind\nof very high value and yet to be so unusual in his own sensibility\nas to seem ridiculous or be incomprehensible to others. The question\nthen arises as to which is in the right, the artist or his uncomprehending\ncritics. This frequent dilemma raised alike by great innovating\nartists and by nincompoops brings us back to the problem of normality.\n\nTo be normal is to be a standard, but not, as things are and\nare likely to remain, an average; and to inquire into the characters\nof the norm or to ask who are normal is to raise a question as\nto value. The artist departs from the average, but so do other\npeople. His departure, however, is one of the reasons why we\nattend to his work; other people\u2019s departures may be reasons\nwhy we should not. What are the main differences which decide\nwhether a departure is a merit or a defect?\n\nThe theory of value outlined above indicates some of these differences.\nIf the artist\u2019s organisation is such as to allow him a fuller\nlife than the average, with less unnecessary interference between\nits component impulses, then plainly we should do well to be\nmore like him, _if we can_ and as far as we can. But the\nqualification, _if we can_, has far-reaching consequences.\nPolitically it _might_ be better for the community to be\norganised on the model of ant and bee communities, but, since\nit cannot, the question whether we should try to make it so does\nnot arise. Similarly, if the artist\u2019s organisation[65] is so eccentric\nas to make general approximation to it impossible, or if a general\napproximation would involve (people being what they are) greater\nlosses than gains, then however admirable it may be in itself,\nwe shall be justified in neglecting it. The case, if it indeed\noccurs, is exceptional but instructive theoretically. What is\nexcellent and what is to be imitated are not necessarily the\nsame. But it is interesting to note that mentalities to which\nthe usual and ordinary man is not capable of approximating without\nloss can almost always be shown to be defective, and that the\ndefects themselves are the barrier to approximation. Certain\nmystical poets are perhaps as good an example of this as any.\nHowever admirable the experience of a Boehme or a Blake, of a\nNietzsche or of the Apocalypst, the features which prevent general\nparticipation in it, the barriers to communication, are not the\nfeatures upon which its value chiefly depends. It is the inchoate\npart of Blake\u2019s personality which makes him incomprehensible,\nnot the parts which were better organised than those of every\none else.\n\nThe explanation of the rarity of admirable though utterly eccentric\nexperience is not difficult. The metaphorical remark that we\nare all branches of the same tree is its most compendious form.\nSo much must be alike in the nature of all men, their situation\nin the world so much the same, and organisation building upon\nthis basis must depend upon such similar processes, that variation\nboth wide and successful is most unlikely. That we are apt to\nexaggerate the differences between men is well known. If we consider\nwhat is usually called mind, alone, we may well suppose that\nminds may differ _toto c\u0153lo_, but if we look more carefully,\ntaking account of the whole man, including his spinal reflexes\nfor example, seeing his mind as but the most delicate and most\nadvanced part of his total organisation, we shall not be tempted\nto think him so diverse. People of course do seem extraordinarily\ndifferent in the ways in which they think and feel. But we are\nspecialised to detect these differences. Further, we tend constantly\nto overlook differences in situation which would explain differences\nin behaviour. We assume to a ridiculous extent that what is stimulating\nus will stimulate others in the same way, forgetting that what\nwill happen depends upon what has happened before and upon what\nis already happening within, about which we can usually know\nlittle.\n\nThe ways then in which the artist will differ from the average\nwill as a rule presuppose an immense degree of similarity. They\nwill be further developments of organisations already well advanced\nin the majority. His variations will be confined to the newest,\nthe most plastic, the least fixed part of the mind, the parts\nfor which reorganisation is most easy. Thus his differences are\nfar less serious obstacles to communication than, shall we say,\nsuch differences as divide the hypochondriac from the healthy.\nAnd, further, so far as they require reorganisation there will\ncommonly be good reasons why this should be carried out. We should\nnot forget that finer organisation is the most successful way\nof relieving strain, a fact of relevance in the theory of evolution.\nThe new response will be more advantageous than the old, more\nsuccessful in satisfying varied appetencies.\n\nBut the advantages may be localised or general, minor as well\nas major. The artist stands at the parting of a multitude of\nways. His advance may be and often is in a direction which if\nfollowed up would be generally disadvantageous although for the\nmoment it leads to an increase of value. The metaphor is of course\ninsufficient. We can improve it by substituting a manifold of\nmany dimensions for the cross-roads. Which way is the mind to\ngrow and which ways are compatible with which is the question.\nThere are specialist and universal poets, and the specialist\nmay be developing in a manner either consistent or inconsistent[66]\nwith general development, a consideration of extreme importance\nin judging the value of his work. Its bearing upon the permanence\nof his work will be discussed later.\n\nAt any moment, in any situation, a variety of attitudes is possible.\nWhich is the best is decided not only by the impulses which gain\norganised satisfaction in the attitude but also by the effect\nof the attitude upon the rest of the organisation of the individual.\nWe should have to consider the whole system and all the possibilities\nof all probable situations which might arise if we were to be\nsure that any one attitude is the best. Since we cannot do this,\nbut can only note the most obvious objections to some, we have\nto be content if we can avoid those attitudes which are most\nevidently wasteful.\n\nFor the normality of the poet is to be estimated in terms of\nwaste. Most human attitudes are wasteful, some to a shocking\ndegree. The mind which is, so far as can be seen, least wasteful,\nwe take as a norm or standard, and, if possible, we develop in\nour degree similar experiences. The taking of the norm is for\nthe most part done unconsciously by mere preference, by the shock\nof delight which follows the release of stifled impulse into\norganised freedom. Often the choice is mistaken, the advantage\nwhich leads to preference is too localised, involves losses in\nthe end, losses round the next corner as it were.\n\nLittle by little experience corrects such illusory preference,\nnot through reflection\u2014almost all critical choices are irreflective,\nspontaneous, as some say\u2014but through unconscious reorganisation\nof impulses. We rarely change our tastes, we rather find them\nchanged. We return to the poems which made us weep tears of delight\nwhen we were young and find them dusty rhetoric. With a tender\nhurt inside we wonder what has happened.\n\nSometimes, of course, experience corrects nothing. There may\nbe nothing which needs correcting, or too much. The localised\nadvantage, the sweet aching thrill of the Boosey Ballad\u2014\n\n I have a rose, a white, white rose,\n \u2019Twas given me long ago,\n When the winds had fallen to silence,\n And the stars were dim and low.\n It lies in an old book faded,\n Between the pages white,\n But the ages cannot dim the dream\n It brings to me to-night!\n\nThe localised advantage may be irresistible in its appeal; the\npersonality will not surrender it, no matter what, of greater\nworth is forgone for its sake, or what possibilities passing\nby are lost, unglimpsed in the enthralment.\n\n\n[61] The degree of racial difference is peculiarly difficult to\nestimate. In view of the extent of mixture which has taken place\nit may be of great importance in considering even the art of\none culture or tradition alone. Cf. F. G. Crookshank, _The\nMongol in our Midst_.\n\n[62] These types if they must be admitted, have not yet been described\nsatisfactorily. The defects of such attempts as those of Jung,\nfor example, are shown by the fact that individuals change so\nreadily and so freely from \u2018type\u2019 to \u2018type\u2019, being extrovert\none hour and introvert the next, rationalist and intuitive from\nmoment to moment. This is of course denied by the Zurich School\nbut not by the majority of observers. To point it out is not\nto overlook much that is valuable in these distinctions. A satisfactory\nclassification would doubtless be very complex, and perhaps of\nthe form: An individual of Type A is extrovert under these conditions,\nintrovert under those, etc.\n\n[63] _Biographia Literaria_, Ch. XIII. \u201cThe primary IMAGINATION\nI hold to be the living Power and prime Agent of all human perception,\nand as a repetition in the finite mind of the eternal act of\ncreation in the infinite I AM.\u201d The luminous hints dropped by\nColeridge in the neighbourhood of this sentence would seem to\nhave dazzled succeeding speculators. How otherwise explain why\nthey have been overlooked.\n\n[64] Coleridge\u2019s distinction between IMAGINATION and Fancy was\nin part the same as this. But he introduced value considerations\nalso, Imagination being such combination or fusion of mental\nelements as resulted in certain valuable states of mind, and\nFancy being a mere trivial playing with these elements. The discussion\nof this distinction will be postponed to Chapter XXXII, where\nthe different uses of the term \u2018imagination\u2019 are separated.\n\n[65] It is useful in this discussion to distinguish between the\nartist\u2019s personality as involved in his work and such other parts\nof it as are not involved. With these last we are not here concerned.\n\n[66] A weakness of the modern Irish school (even at its best,\nin Mr Yeats) or of the exquisite poetry of Mr De la Mare, may\nbe that its sensibility is a development out of the main track.\nIt is this which seems to make it minor poetry in a sense in\nwhich Mr Hardy\u2019s best work or Mr Eliot\u2019s _The Waste Land_\nis major poetry.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXV\n\nBadness in Poetry\n\n Il faut dissiper un malentendu: nous sommes pourris d\u2019art!\n _Le Corbusier-Saugnier_.\n\n\nThe theory of badness in poetry has never received the study\nwhich it deserves, partly on account of its difficulty. For with\nbad art even more than with good unless we are careful to distinguish\nthe communicative from the value aspects, even when these are\nconnected, we shall find the issues obscured. Sometimes art is\nbad because communication is defective, the vehicle inoperative;\nsometimes because the experience communicated is worthless; sometimes\nfor both reasons. It would perhaps be best to restrict the term\nbad art to cases in which genuine communication does to a considerable\ndegree take place, what is communicated being worthless, and\nto call the other cases defective art. But this is not the usual\npractice of critics, any work which produces an experience displeasing\nto the critic being commonly called bad, whether or not this\nexperience is like that responsible for the work.\n\nLet us begin by considering an instance of defective communication;\nchoosing an example in which it is likely that the original experience\nhad some value.\n\n THE POOL\n Are you alive?\n I touch you.\n You quiver like a sea-fish.\n I cover you with my net.\n What are you\u2014banded one?\n\nI take a complete work to avoid possible unfairness. Here we\nhave the whole of the link which is to mediate between the experiences\nof the author and of the reader. Aristotle, in a different connection,\nit is true, and for different reasons, affirmed that a work of\nart must possess a certain magnitude, and we can adapt his remark\nhere. Not the brevity only of the vehicle, but its simplicity,\nmakes it ineffective. The sacrifice of metre in free verse needs,\nin almost all cases, to be compensated by length. The loss of\nso much of the formal structure leads otherwise to tenuousness\nand ambiguity. Even when, as here, the original experience is\npresumably slight, tenuous and fleeting, the mere correspondence\nof matter to form is insufficient. The experience evoked in the\nreader is not sufficiently specific. A poet may, it is true,\nmake an unlimited demand upon his reader, and the greatest poets\nmake the greatest claim, but the demand made must be proportional\nto the poet\u2019s own contribution. The reader here supplies too\nmuch of the poem. Had the poet said only, \u201cI went and poked about\nfor rocklings and caught the pool itself\u201d, the reader, who converts\nwhat is printed above into a poem, would still have been able\nto construct an experience of equal value; for what results is\nalmost independent of the author.\n\nTo pass to a case in which communication is successful, where\nthe objection lies to what is communicated:\n\n After the fierce midsummer all ablaze\n Has burned itself to ashes and expires\n In the intensity of its own fires,\n Then come the mellow, mild, St Martin days\n Crowned with the calm of peace, but sad with haze.\n So after Love has led us, till he tires\n Of his own throes and torments, and desires,\n Comes large-eyed Friendship: with a restful gaze\n He beckons us to follow, and across\n Cool, verdant vales we wander free from care.\n Is it a touch of frost lies in the air?\n Why are we haunted with a sense of loss?\n We do not wish the pain back, or the heat;\n And yet, and yet, these days are incomplete.\n\nAs to the success of the communication there can be no question.\nBoth the popularity of the author, Ella Wheeler Wilcox, of whose\nwork this is a favourable specimen, and records of the response\nmade by well-educated persons, who read it without being aware\nof the authorship, leave this beyond doubt. It reproduces the\nstate of mind of the writer very exactly. With a very numerous\nclass of readers pleasure and admiration ensue. The explanation\nis, probably, in the soothing effect of aligning the very active\nLove-Friendship groups of impulses with so settled yet rich a\ngroup as the Summer-Autumn simile brings in. The mind finds for\na moment an attitude in which to contemplate a pair of situations\n(Love and Friendship) together, situations which are for many\nminds particularly difficult to see together. The heavy regular\nrhythm, the dead stamp of the rimes, the obviousness of the descriptions\n(\u2018mellow, mild, St Martin\u2019; \u2018cool verdant vales\u2019) their alliteration,\nthe triteness of the close, all these accentuate the impression\nof conclusiveness. The restless spirit is appeased, one of its\nchief problems is made to seem as if, regarded from a lofty,\nall-embracing standpoint, it is no problem but a process of nature.\n\n\n\nThis reconciliation, this appeasement, is common to much good\nand to much bad poetry alike. But the value of it depends upon\nthe level of organisation at which it takes place, upon whether\nthe reconciled impulses are adequate or inadequate. In this case\nthose who have adequate impulses as regards any of the four main\nsystems involved, Summer, Autumn, Love, Friendship, are not appeased.\nOnly for those who make certain conventional, stereotyped maladjustments\ninstead, does the magic work.\n\nThe nature and source of these stock conventional attitudes is\nof great interest. Suggestion is very largely responsible for\nthem. The normal child under the age of ten is probably free\nfrom them, or at least with him they have no fixity or privileged\nstanding. But as general reflection develops the place of the\nfree direct play of experience is taken by the deliberate organisation\nof attitudes, a clumsy and crude substitute. \u2018Ideas\u2019, as they\nare commonly called, arise. A boy\u2019s \u2018Idea\u2019 of Friendship or of\nSummer or of his Country is not, though the name would seem to\nimply it, primarily an intellectual affair. It is rather an attitude,\nor set of attitudes, of tendencies to act in certain fashions\nrather than others. Now reflection, unless very prolonged and\nvery arduous, tends to fix the attitude by making us dwell in\nit, by _removing us from experience_. In the development\nof any attitude there are stages, points of rest, of relatively\ngreater stability. These, as we dwell in them, become more and\nmore difficult to pass, and it is not surprising that most people\nremain all their lives in various halfway houses.\n\nThese stages or levels of emotional adjustment seem, for the\nmost part, to be fixed not by any special suitability to circumstances,\ncertainly not to present circumstances, but much more by social\nsuggestion and by accidents which withdraw us from actual experience,\nthe one force which might push us further. At present bad literature,\nbad art, the cinema, etc., are an influence of the first importance\nin fixing immature and actually inapplicable attitudes to most\nthings. Even the decision as to what constitutes a pretty girl\nor a handsome young man, an affair apparently natural and personal\nenough, is largely determined by magazine covers and movie stars.\nThe quite common opinion that the arts have after all very little\neffect upon the community shows only that too little attention\nis being paid to the effects of bad art.\n\nThe losses incurred by these artificial fixations of attitudes\nare evident. Through them the average adult is worse, not better\nadjusted to the possibilities of his existence than the child.\nHe is even in the most important things functionally unable to\nface facts: do what he will he is only able to face fictions,\nfictions projected by his own stock responses.\n\nAgainst these stock responses the artist\u2019s internal and external\nconflicts are fought, and with them the popular writer\u2019s triumphs\nare made. Any combination of these general Ideas, hit at the\nright level or halting point of development, is, if suitably\nadvertised, certain of success. Best-sellers in all the arts,\nexemplifying as they do the most general levels of attitude development,\nare worthy of very close study. No theory of criticism is satisfactory\nwhich is not able to explain their wide appeal and to give clear\nreasons why those who disdain them are not necessarily snobs.\n\nThe critic and the Sales Manager are not ordinarily regarded\nas of the same craft, nor are the poet and the advertising agent.\nIt is true that some serious artists are occasionally tempted\ninto poster designing. It is, however, doubtful whether their\nwork pays. But the written appeals which have the soundest financial\nprospects as estimated by the most able American advertisers\nare such that no critic can safely ignore them. For they do undoubtedly\nrepresent the literary ideals present and future of the people\nto whom they are addressed.[67] They are tested in a way which\nfew other forms of literature are tested, their effects are watched\nby adepts whose livelihood depends upon the accuracy of their\njudgment, and they are among the best indices available of what\nis happening to taste. Criticism will justify itself as an applied,\nscience when it is able to indicate how an advertisement may\nbe profitable without necessarily being crass. We shall see later\nunder what conditions popularity and possible high value are\ncompatible.\n\nThe strongest objection to, let us say, the sonnet we have quoted,\nis that a person who enjoys it, through the very organisation\nof his responses which enables him to enjoy it, is debarred from\nappreciating many things which, if he could appreciate them,\nhe would prefer. We must not, of course, forget those variations\nin psychological efficiency discussed in Chapter XXII as degrees\nof vigilance. Even a good critic at a sufficiently low ebb of\nneural potency might mistake such a sonnet for one of Shakespeare\u2019s\nor with more ease for one of Rossetti\u2019s. But when vigilance was\nrestored he would see, or at least feel, the differences. The\npoint is that a reader who, at a high degree of vigilance, thoroughly\nenters into and enjoys this class of verse, is necessarily so\norganised that he will fail to respond to poetry. Time and much\nvaried experience might change him sufficiently, but by then\nhe would no longer be able to enjoy such verse, he would no longer\nbe the same person.\n\nA general statement such as this about the incompatibility of\ninexpressibly complex adjustments must naturally be incapable\nof strict proof. Individuals with alternating personalities and\nsubject to fugues would have to be considered. So would the phenomena\nof \u2018mutations of regime\u2019 unaccompanied by change of vigilance\nif such occur. None the less very much evidence substantiates\nthe statement. The experience of all those who have passed through\nthe stages in the development of attitudes presupposed by great\npoetry is probably conclusive.\n\nEven though the intricacies of the nervous system should be capable\nof getting round this objection, there remain sufficient other\nreasons why indulgence in verse of this character should be condemned.\nThere can be no doubt whatever that the value of the experience\nwhich results from it is small. On a pleasure theory of value\nthere might well be doubt, since those who do enjoy it certainly\nappear to enjoy it in a high degree. But on the theory here maintained,\nthe fact that those who have passed through the stage of enjoying\nthe _Poems of Passion_ to that of enjoying the bulk of the\ncontents of the _Golden Treasury_, for example, do not return,\nsettles the matter. We must bear in mind, of course, the conditions\nwhich have to be satisfied before this test is conclusive. That\na man who has passed through the stage of drinking nothing but\nbeer to the stage of drinking nothing but brandy rarely returns,\ndoes not prove that brandy is the better drink. It merely proves\nthat it is the more efficient intoxicant. We have to ask in applying\nthe test what the responses in question are, and in the case\nof poetry they are so varied, so representative of all the activities\nof life, that actual universal preference on the part of those\nwho have tried both kinds fairly is the same (on our view) as\nsuperiority in value of the one over the other. Keats, by universal\nqualified opinion, is a more efficient poet than Wilcox, and\nthat is the same thing as saying that his works are more valuable.\n\n\n[67] A specimen: \u201cThe thoughtful man, the man on business bent,\nwends his way to Wembley with definite purpose. He seeketh knowledge,\ndesireth increase of commerce or willeth to study new epoch-making\ninventions.\u201d\u2014_Official Advertisement_.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVI\n\nJudgment and Divergent Readings\n\n _The Prime Minister_\u2014The misunderstanding\u2014in so far as it is a\n misunderstanding\u2014is purely a misunderstanding. . . .\n\n _The Leader of the Opposition_\u2014With the utmost goodwill on this\n side, I find myself with far less grasp of the whole subject than\n I had. . . .\u2014_The Times_, 8th July 1924.\n\n\nAmbiguity in a poem, as with any other communication, may be\nthe fault of the poet or of the reader. The ambiguities due to\nerratic reading are as important for criticism as others, and\npractically more troublesome. There are strong social incentives\nfor overlooking them. Talking to one another we assume, in nine\ncases out of ten like the merest simpletons, that our readings\nagree, and that when we differ in our opinions it is something\nelse, not our experiences but our judgments about them which\nare at variance. Most discussion about works of art is waste\nof time _as communication_ for this reason. It may, of course,\nhave great value as a means by which people may severally develop\ntheir own reactions.\n\nThese assumptions which so densely obscure the issue raise innumerable\npractical difficulties both for criticism and for the construction\nof a theory of criticism. It is well worth while to analyse typical\nsituations a little further.\n\nThe closing lines of the Fifth Sonnet of Wordsworth\u2019s River Duddon\nseries will afford a convenient instance:\u2014\n\n Sole listener, Duddon! to the breeze that played\n With thy clear voice, I caught the fitful sound\n Wafted o\u2019er sullen moss and craggy mound,\n Unfruitful solitudes that seemed to upbraid\n The sun in heaven!\u2014but now, to form a shade\n For thee, green alders have together wound\n Their foliage; ashes flung their arms around;\n And birch trees risen in silver colonnade.\n And thou hast also tempted here to rise,\n Mid sheltering pines, this cottage rude and grey;\n Whose ruddy children, by the mother\u2019s eyes\n Carelessly watched, sport through the summer day,\n Thy pleased associates\u2014light as endless May\n On infant bosoms lonely nature lies.\n\nTwo readers who found themselves, as they thought, in entire\nagreement as to the excellence of this sonnet, and especially\nas to the beauty of its close, were surprised shortly afterwards\nto discover that they had been reading quite different poems.\nBy the one the last sentence was interpreted as saying that the\ngloom of lonely nature, of sullen moss and craggy ground, however\nit might seem later on in life, had no oppressive effect upon\nthe children. By the other it was read as saying that however\nbarren and gloomy might be the scene, actually lonely nature\nthere in itself had no such character, but was, as it were, floating\n\u201clight as endless May on infant bosoms\u201d. The two readings, by\nthrowing their effect back upon what had preceded and in addition\ncompletely altering the rhythm of the close, produced what it\nis no exaggeration to describe as two different poems. Neither\nwould be uncharacteristic of Wordsworth, although doubtless the\nfirst reading is the one to be accepted.\n\nThis exemplifies what is perhaps the rarest case,[68] that in\nwhich agreement as to value covers an actual grave difference\nin the experiences valued. More usually there is some genuine\nsource for the agreement, to be found in some common character\nof the experiences. What this common character is may be difficult\nto discover. It may be merely the rhythm, or the cadence of some\nphrase, or the form of a sequence of references. But sometimes,\nif it is a more obvious part, such as a description or metaphor,\na discussion between critical readers, who are aware that their\nexperiences differ, will bring it to light.\n\nAnother common case is exemplified by some famous discussions\nof _Hamlet_. It is curious that people with such different\nconceptions of the character of Hamlet himself and of the action\nof the play, have been able to agree none the less as to its\nvalue as a whole, apart, of course, from its incidental values.\nMuch has to be discounted in estimating this agreement. On some\ninterpretations praise of the play as a whole is certainly insincere.\nOn the interpretation which makes Claudius the hero, whose tragic\nfrailty lies in the fact that his long-suffering patience with\nthe baseless suspicions of the crazy nuisance Hamlet breaks down\nin the end and brings the noble monarch to disaster, there would\nbe little beyond the playwright\u2019s subtlety which could honestly\nbe commended. But with all allowances it seems certain that widely\ndifferent interpretations have seemed to good critics to result\nin the same peculiar high value of tragedy. The explanation is\nthat tragic value is a general not a specific character of responses.\nJust as a collision between motorcars and a collision between\nships are equally collisions, so the impulses whose equilibrium\nproduces the _catharsis_ of tragedy may be very varied,\nprovided that their relations to one another are correct.\n\nVery many of the values of the arts are of this general kind.\nBesides the experiences which result from the building up of\nconnected attitudes, there are those produced by the breaking\ndown of some attitude which is a clog and a bar to other activities.\nFrom Blake\u2019s \u201cTruly, my Satan, thou art but a dunce\u201d,[69] to Voltaire\u2019s\n\u201cBon p\u00e8re de famille est capable de tout\u201d, such works can be\nfound in all degrees. It matters little what the detail of the\nimpulses which make up the obstructing attitude for different\npeople in each case may be. This often varies, but when the attitude\ncollapses the effect can be agreed upon. The great masters of\nirony\u2014Rabelais and the Flaubert of _Bouvard et P\u00e9cuchet_\u2014are\nthe chief exponents of this kind of exorcism.\n\n\n[68] For another instance see Browning, _Parting at Morning_.\n\n[69] _The Keys of the Gates: To the Accuser who is the God of\nthis World_.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVII\n\nLevels of Response and the Width of Appeal\n\n L\u2019art n\u2019est pas chose populaire, encore moins \u2018poule de luxe\u2019. . . .\n L\u2019art est d\u2019essence hautaine.\u2014_Le Corbusier-Saugnier_.\n\n\nThere still remains the most interesting of the cases in which apparent\nagreement disguises real differences, that in which a work occasions\nvaluable responses of the same kind at a number of different levels.\n_Macbeth_ is as good an example as any. Its very wide popularity is due\nto the fact that crude responses to its situations integrate with one\nanother, not so well as more refined responses, but still in something\nof the same fashion. At one end of the scale it is a highly successful,\neasily apprehended, two-colour melodrama, at the other a peculiarly\nenigmatic and subtle tragedy, and in between there are various stages\nwhich give fairly satisfactory results. Thus people of very different\ncapacities for discrimination and with their attitudes developed in\nvery different degrees can join in admiring it. This possibility\nof being enjoyed at many levels[70] is a recognised characteristic\nof Elizabethan Drama. _The Pilgrim\u2019s Progress_, _Robinson Crusoe_,\n_Gulliver\u2019s Travels_, the Ballads, are other instances. The differences\nbetween such things and, for example, the work of Donne, Milton, Blake,\nLandor, Stendhal, Henry James, Baudelaire raise some of the most\ninteresting of critical problems.\n\nThere is a common opinion, sometimes very strongly held, that\na work which appeals to all kinds and all degrees of men is thereby\nproved to be greater, more valuable, than one which appeals only\nto some. There may be a confusion in this opinion. The sum of\nvalue yielded, since men actually are of different degrees, the\nsocial value that is to say of such work, will naturally be greater.\nBut it does not follow that the maximum value for the reader\nof the highest level need be greater. The common belief that\nit is necessarily greater, that the work of wide appeal must\nbe in itself a more admirable thing than work which appeals only\nto those who discriminate finely, is due to the assumption that\nit appeals everywhere for the same reasons and thus is shown\nto touch something essential and fundamental in human nature.\nBut no one in a position to judge, who has, for example, some\nexperience of the teaching of English, will maintain that Shakespeare\u2019s\nappeal, to take the chief instance, is homogeneous. Different\npeople read and go to see the same play for utterly different\nreasons. Where two people applaud we tend to assume, in spite\nof our better knowledge, that their experiences have been the\nsame: the experience of the first would often be nauseous to\nthe second, if by accident they were exchanged, and the first\nwould be left helpless, lost and bewildered. On this false assumption\nit is easy to build up a formidable theory about art\u2019s concern\nwith the basic elements of human nature and to arraign modern\nart for superficiality. But there have always been these two\nkinds, work with the wide, and work with only the special appeal.\nWhat actually are the differences between them?\n\nThe one, the art which keeps the child from play and the old\nman from his chimney-corner, evidently builds up its attitudes\nwith the simplest, most aboriginal impulses, and it handles them\nso that the undeveloped mind can weave them into some sort of\nsatisfying fabric while the more mature mind, qualifying and\ncomplicating them until they perhaps lose all likeness to their\nearlier form, still finds them serve its needs. The other is\nbuilt up from impulses which, except in a personality capable\nof very nice adjustments, do not unite in any valuable way, and\noften the impulses themselves are of a kind of which only a highly\ndeveloped mind or one with special experience is capable. This\nlast point, however, is separable, and raises a question which\nwill be discussed later.\n\nPlainly each of the two methods has its advantages. The poet\nof wide appeal, it is tempting to suppose, has an advantage in\nthat the impulses involved are general, have been interested\nall through life and are very representative of experience. And\nhe has the further advantage perhaps of avoiding a certain dangerous\nfinality. Impulses which adjust themselves at so many levels\nmay go on doing so perhaps indefinitely. There may be something\nin the suggestion that Shakespeare wrote better than he knew.\nCertainly it is a serious charge against much of Henry James,\nfor example, that when the reader has once successfully read\nit there is nothing further which he can do. He can only repeat\nhis reading. There is often a point at which the parts of the\nexperience click together, the required attitude is achieved,\nand no further development is possible. Together with this goes\nthe sense in the reader that all had to be just as it is and\nnot otherwise, whereas with much of Shakespeare we feel that\nanything might have been different and the result the same. \u201cNot\nlaboriously but luckily.\u201d\n\nBut this is only sometimes true of the sophisticated poet who makes no\nappeal below a certain level. It is not true of Pope, for example, or\nof Walt Whitman, to choose two unlike authors who at their best are not\ngenerally appreciated. And as a counterbalancing advantage for such\npoets their greater freedom must be noticed. Perhaps the chief reason\nfor the decline of drama in the seventeenth century (social factors\napart) was the exhaustion of the best themes which could be used in\norder to appeal at all levels. Drama, to secure audiences large enough\nto be encouraging, must make a wide-spread appeal; but the limitations\nwhich this condition imposes upon action are very strict. There are no\nsimilar restrictions for lyric poetry, and it is significant that the\ngreatest lyrics have so often a high-level appeal only. The _Mad Song_\nof Blake, _The Ph\u0153nix and the Turtle_, _The Hymn of Pan_, most great\nsonnets, are instances in point.\n\nThere is, too, no good reason why impulses which only begin to\nmake up valuable attitudes in highly organised and discriminating\nminds should lead to attitudes less valuable or more fragile,\nmore fixed and final than others. We must not allow the unique\ninstance of Shakespeare to weigh too heavily; after all, _King\nLear_, the most inexhaustible of his works, is not a thing\nwhich has great popular appeal.\n\n\n[70] We must, of course, distinguish art of this kind from the\nChristmas party or magazine kind of production, in which the\nauthor provides something (different and in a different place)\nfor everybody. The works of Dickens might be cited as examples.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVIII\n\nThe Allusiveness of Modern Poetry\n\n Tehee! Tehee! O sweet delight!\n He tickles this age who can\n Call Tullia\u2019s ape a marmosyte,\n And Leda\u2019s goose a swan!\n _Anon_.\n\n\nWe have distinguished between impulses which are involved at\nall stages of development, their course and fate naturally varying\nwith the stage, and those which do not go off at all except in\ndeveloped minds. The responses of the non-mathematical and the\nmathematical mind to a formula illustrate the difference. It\nis the use of responses not available without special experience,\nwhich more than anything else narrows the range of the artist\u2019s\ncommunication and creates the gulf between expert and popular\ntaste.\n\nIn the second chorus of _Hellas_ in the middle of the second\nstanza the rhythm, tune, and handling, though not the metre,\nbecome suddenly uncharacteristic of Shelley. A fullness of tone,\na queer, gentle cadence, and a leisurely ease of movement belong\nto the fifth and following lines:\n\n A mortal shape to him\n Was like the vapour dim\n Which the orient planet animates with light.\n Hell, sin, and slavery, came,\n Like bloodhounds mild and tame,\n Nor preyed until their Lord had taken flight.\n\nAnd this tone and movement are in clear contrast with the fever,\nthe impetuosity, the shrillness and rapidity of the first stanza,\nor of the closing lines of the second:\n\n The moon of Mahomet\n Arose, and it shall set:\n While, blazoned as on heaven\u2019s immortal noon,\n The Cross leads generations on.\n\nThe difference is difficult to describe except perhaps: by the\naid of a musical notation. It is like the difference between\ntwo voices, and in spite of the highly characteristic matter[71]\nof the lines, the reader feels that not Shelley but some other\npoet is speaking. What Shelley is doing becomes unmistakable\nin the third and last stanza. The corresponding lines, again\nin clear contrast with the lines surrounding them, have the same\nstrange modulation:\n\n So fleet, so faint, so fair,\n The Powers of Earth and Air\n Fled from the folding-star of Bethlehem.\n Apollo, Pan and Love,\n And even Olympian Jove,\n Grew weak, for killing Truth had glared on them.\n\nIn a manner more familiar perhaps in music than in poetry Shelley\nis echoing another poem, borrowing, as it were, Milton\u2019s voice\nthough not his words, making in fact a musical quotation, a poetical\nallusion of an exquisite felicity.\n\nBut by so doing he is necessarily restricting the number of the\nreaders who will fully appreciate him.\n\nSuch allusions are a normal and regular part of the resources\nof all poets who belong to the literary tradition, that is to\nsay, of the vast majority of poets in modern times. They are\nnot often so unobtrusive and the place which they are given in\nthe structure of the poem varies. Sometimes, as in this instance,\na failure on the part of the reader has no important consequences.\nOne familiar with the _Hymn on the Morning of Christ\u2019s Nativity_\nwill respond more fully and with a deeper sense of the situation;\nbut a reader unfamiliar with it is not deprived of any major\npart of the poem. In other cases the loss is more serious. Another\ninstance from Shelley will illustrate this, and it is interesting\nfor its own sake. The Shape which guides the Chariot in the _Triumph\nof Life_ is described and identified for the reader in a large\ndegree through another Miltonic quotation or allusion:\n\n A Shape\n So sate within, as one whom years deform,\n Beneath a dusky hood and double cape,\n Crouching within the shadow of a tomb,\n And o\u2019er what seemed the head a cloud-like crape\n Was bent.\n\nShelley, it is known, crystallised much of his philosophy in\nthe sentence: \u2018Death is the veil which those who live call life\u2019,\nand the reference[72] here to the guardian of Hell Gate,\n\n What seem\u2019d his head\n The likeness of a Kingly Crown had on,\n\nis not accidental or unimportant for the understanding of the\npoem.\n\nSome care is needed in considering the problem of allusions.\nThere may be worthy and unworthy motives behind their employment\nad their enjoyment. There are some to whom a familiarity with\nliterature occasions a sense of superiority over others which\nis trivial and mean. The pleasure of recognition, proportional\nas it is to the difficulty or unobtrusiveness of the allusion\nis a thing of slight value, not to be confused with literary\nor poetic values. It is perfectly possible for a reader, familiar\nwith the _Nativity Hymn_, for example, to receive all that\nShelley intended without ever noticing the allusion, without,\nthat is to say, any recognition. But the erudite often forget\nthat this happens. To turn the capacity of recognising recondite\nreferences into a shibboleth by which culture may be estimated\nis a perversion to which scholarly persons are too much addicted.\nThe point is worth mentioning, since this snobbishness, percolating\ndown (or, if the metaphor be preferred, by repercussion) is responsible\nfor much insincerity and timidity, for wrong attitudes of many\nkinds towards literature, for irritation and oppression developing\ninto distaste and neglect of poetry. Allusion is a trap for the\nwriter almost as effective as for the academic critic. It invites\ninsincerity. It may encourage and disguise laziness. When it\nbecomes a habit it is a disease. But these dangers form no ground\nfor denying to allusion, and the similar resources of which it\nis typical, a fit and justifiable place in poetry.\n\nAllusion is the most striking of the ways in which poetry takes\ninto its service elements and forms of experience which are not\ninevitable to life but need to be specially acquired. And the\ndifficulty which it raises is merely a special instance of a\ngeneral communicative difficulty which will probably increase\nfor the poetry of the future. All the thought and feeling of\nrecent man goes on in terms of experience which is much more\nlikely to be special and peculiar to the individual, than, let\nus say, the experience of medieval man. The survival of medieval\nman on such a vast scale among us should not mislead in this\nmatter. The people who are most keenly and variously interested,\nthat is to say, the people whose lives are most valuable on our\ntheory of value, the people for whom the poet writes and by his\nappeal to whom he is judged, inevitably build up their minds\nwith far more varied elements than has ever been the case before.\nAnd the poet, in so far as he is equal to his opportunities,\ndoes the same. It is hard, and, in fact, impossible, to deny\nhim his natural and necessary resources on the ground that a\nmajority of his readers will not understand. This is not his\nfault but the fault of the social structure. Given present conditions\nand future developments in the directions indicated by the changes\nof the last two hundred years, it is extremely probable that\npoets will become not less but more allusive, that their work\nwill depend more and more not only upon other poetry but upon\nall manner of special fields of familiarity.[73] Many of the finest\nand most widely significant experiences, and those therefore\nmost suitable for poetry, come nowadays, for example, through\nreading pieces of advanced research. There is nothing new in\nthis, of course, nothing that was not happening when Donne wrote.\nThe difficulty springs from the fact that research is so much\nfurther ahead than it used to be.\n\n\n[71] Cf. _Prometheus Unbound_, Act 1:\n\n \u2018the air around them\n looks radiant as the air around a star\u2019;\n\nalso _Triumph of Life_: \u2018as veil by veil the silent splendour drops\n From Lucifer\u2019.\n\n[72] _Paradise Lost_, Bk. II, line 672.\n\n[73] A very interesting contemporary example in connection with\nwhich the problem arises perhaps more acutely than ever before\nis Mr Eliot\u2019s _The Waste Land_ already mentioned. The impatience\nof so many critics and the fact that they have complained of\nthe presence and necessity of notes well illustrates the confusion\nwhich prevails upon this question. A more reasonable complaint\nwould have been that Mr Eliot did not provide a larger apparatus\nof elucidation. (See Appendix).\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIX\n\nPermanence as a Criterion\n\n Wherewith being crown\u2019d,\n Crooked eclipses \u2019gainst his glory fight.\n Shakespeare, _Sonnet LX_.\n\n\nThe permanence of poetry is a subject closely connected with\nthe foregoing. Just as there is a prejudice in favour of work\nwith a wide popular appeal, so there is another in favour of\nwork which lasts, which has \u201cstood the verdict of the centuries\u201d,\nor is thought likely to stand it. Both are in part due to critical\ntimidity; if we cannot decide ourselves, let us at least count\nhands and go with the majority.\n\nBut circumstances which have nothing to do with value sometimes\ndetermine survival, and work which is of great value must often perish\nfor that very reason. It never gets printed, none will look at it or\nlisten to it. And immortality often attaches itself to the bad as\nfirmly as to the good. Few things are worse than _Hiawatha_ or _The\nBlack Cat_, _Lorna Doone_ or _Le Crime de Silvestre Bonnard_, and some\nof the greatest favourites[74] of the anthologies figure there through\ntheir \u2018bad eminence\u2019.\n\nThere are, however, reasons for connecting persistence of appeal\nwith a certain type of structure, and, which is more interesting,\ninstant fame with a failure to appeal to subsequent generations.\nWork which relies upon ready-made attitudes, without being able\nto reconstitute similar attitudes when they are not already existent,\nwill often make an appeal to one generation which is a mystery\nto the generations with different attitudes which follow. But\nthis disadvantage from the point of view of permanence of communication\ndoes not necessarily involve any lack of value for those to whom\nthe experiences are accessible. Very often, of course, it will\naccompany low value; but this need not be so.\n\nThe permanence of some art has often been an excuse for fantastic\nhypotheses. Such art has been thought to embody immortal essences,\nto reveal special kinds of \u2018eternal\u2019 truths. But such debilitating\nspeculations here no less than elsewhere should be avoided. Those\nare not the terms in which the matter may best be discussed.\nThe uniformity of the impulses from which the work of art starts\nis a sufficient explanation of its permanence. Where the impulses\ninvolved are only accidentally touched off through being temporarily\nin a heightened state of excitability, we may reasonably expect\nthat there will be little permanence. As a catchword will work\none year like magic, since certain attitudes are for social reasons\nready poised on a hair-trigger adjustment, and the next year\nbe inoperative and incomprehensible, so, on a larger scale and\nin less striking degree, men\u2019s special social circumstances often\nprovide opportunities for works of art which at other times are\nquite inadequate stimuli. There are fashions in the most important\nthings as in the least, but for the artist to profit by them\nis usually to forgo permanence. The greater the ease of communication\nunder such conditions the greater the danger of obsolescence.\n\nFar more of the great art of the past is actually obsolete than\ncertain critics pretend, who forget what a special apparatus\nof erudition they themselves bring to their criticism. The _Divina\nCommedia_ is a representative example. It is true that for\nadequately equipped readers who can imaginatively reproduce the\nworld outlook of Aquinas, and certain attitudes to woman and\nto chastity, which are even more inaccessible, there is no obsolescence.\nBut this is true of the most forgotten poems. Actual obsolescence\nis not in general a sign of low value, but merely of the use\nof special circumstances for communication. That a work reflects,\nsummarises and is penetrated by its age and period is not a ground\nfor assigning it a low value, and yet this saturation more than\nanything else limits the duration of its appeal. Only so far\nas a work avoids the catchword type in its method, and relies\nupon elements likely to remain stable, formal elements for example,\ncan it escape the touch of time. That Dante is neglected is due\nonly indirectly to his present-day obscurity; he is still as\naccessible as ever through his formal side. It is the labour\nrequired from readers who are not content with a partial approach\nwhich explains why he is so little read even by the scholarly.\nWhat can be translated in: him, the content, is precisely what\nis of least present and future interest, and at the same time\nmost difficult to understand.\n\n\n[74] E.g. \u2018_When lovely woman stoops to folly,\u2019 Heraclitus,\nThe Millers Daughter, Alexander Selkirk_, and (its best known\nparts at least) _The Skylark_.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXX\n\nThe Definition of a Poem\n\n Men take the words they find in use among their neighbours, and that\n they may not seem ignorant what they stand for use them confidently\n without much troubling their heads about a certain fixed\n meaning. . . . it being all one to draw these men out of their\n mistakes, who have no settled notions, as to dispossess a Vagrant\n of his habitation, who has no settled abode. This I guess to be\n so; and every one may observe in himself or others whether it\n be so or not.\n Locke.\n\n\nIt may be useful to collect here some of the results of the foregoing\nsections and consider them from the point of view of the practising\ncritic. The most salient perhaps is the desirability of distinguishing\nclearly between the communicative and the value aspects of a\nwork of art. We may praise or condemn a work on either ground\nor upon both, but if it fails entirely as a vehicle of communication\nwe are, to say the least, not well placed for denying its value.\n\nBut, it may be said, it will then have no value for _us_\nand its value or disvalue for us is all that we as critics pretend\nor should pretend to judge. To make such a reply, however, is\nto abdicate as a critic. At the least a critic is concerned with\nthe value of things for himself and for people like him. Otherwise\nhis criticism is mere autobiography. And any critic worth attention\nmakes a further claim, a claim to sanity. His judgment is only\nof general interest in so far as it is representative and reflects\nwhat happens in a mind of a certain kind, developed in a certain\nfashion. The services of bad critics are sometimes not less than\nthose of good critics, but that is only because we can divine\nfrom their responses what other people\u2019s responses are likely\nto be.\n\nWe must distinguish between standard or normal criticism and\nerratic or eccentric criticism. As critics Lamb or Coleridge\nare very far from normal; none the less they are of extraordinary\nfertility in suggestion. Their responses are often erratic even\nwhen of most revelatory character. In such cases we do not take\nthem as standards to which we endeavour to approximate, we do\nnot attempt to see eye to eye with them. Instead we use them\nas means by which to make quite different approaches ourselves\nto the works which they have characteristically but eccentrically\ninterpreted.\n\nThe distinction between a personal or idiosyncratic judgment\nand a normative is sometimes overlooked. A critic should often\nbe in a position to say, \u201cI don\u2019t like this but I know it is\ngood\u201d, or \u201cI like this and condemn it\u201d, or \u201cThis is the effect\nwhich it produces upon me, and this quite different effect is\nthe one it should produce.\u201d For obvious reasons he rarely makes\nany such statements. But many people would regard praise of a\nwork which is actually disliked by the praiser as immoral. This\nis a confusion of ideas. Any honest reader knows fairly well\nthe points at which his sensibility is distorted, at which he\nfails as a normal critic and in what ways. It is his duty to\ntake these into consideration in passing judgment upon the value\nof a work. His rank as a critic depends at least as much upon\nhis ability to discount these personal peculiarities as upon\nany hypothetical impeccability of his actual responses.\n\nSo far we have been considering those cases in which the vehicle\nis sufficiently adequate and the critic sufficiently representative\nand careful for the response to be a good index of the value\nof the poem. But these cases are comparatively rare. The superstition\nwhich any language not intolerably prolix and uncouth encourages\nthat there is something actual, _the poem_, which all readers\nhave access to and upon which they pass judgment, misleads us.\nWe naturally talk about poems (and pictures, etc.) in a way which\nmakes it impossible for anybody to discover what it is we are\ntalking about. Most critical discussion, in other words, is primarily\nemotive with only a very loose and fourfold equivocal reference.\nWe may be talking about the artist\u2019s experience, such of it as\nis relevant OF about The experience of a qualified reader who\nmade no mistakes, or about an ideal and perfect reader\u2019s possible\nexperience, or about our own actual experience. All four in most\ncases will be qualitatively different. Communication is perhaps\nnever perfect, so the first and the last will differ. The second\nand third differ also, from the others and from one another,\nthe third being what we ought unrestrictedly to experience, or\nthe best experience we could possibly undergo, whereas the second\nis merely what we ought to experience as things are, or the best\nexperience that we can expect.\n\nWhich of these possible definitions of a poem shall we adopt?\nThe question is one of convenience merely; but it is by no means\neasy to decide. The most usual practice is to mean by _the\npoem_ either the first or the last; or, by forgetting what\ncommunication is, to mean both confusedly together. The last\ninvolves the personal judgment to which exception was taken on\nthe previous page, and has the further disadvantage that there\nwould be for every sonnet as many poems as readers. A and B,\ndiscussing _Westminster Bridge_ as they thought, would unwittingly\nbe discussing two different things. For some purposes, for the\ndisentanglement of some misunderstandings, it is convenient\nto define a poem temporarily in this manner.\n\nTo define the poem as the artist\u2019s experience is a better solution.\nBut it will not do as it stands since nobody but the artist has\nthat experience. We must be more ingenious. We cannot take any\nsingle experience as the poem; we must have a class of more or\nless similar experiences instead. Let us mean by _Westminster\nBridge_ not the actual experience which led Wordsworth on\na certain morning about a century ago to write what he did, but\nthe class composed of all actual experiences, occasioned by the\nwords, which do not differ within certain limits from that experience.\nThen anyone who has had one of the experiences comprised in the\nclass can be said to have read the poem. The permissible ranges\nof variation in the class need (of course) very careful scrutiny.\nTo work them out fully and draw up a neat formal definition of\na poem would be an amusing and useful occupation for any literary\nlogician with a knowledge of psychology. The experiences must\nevidently include the reading of the words with fairly close\ncorrespondence in rhythm and tune. Pitch difference would not\nmatter, provided that pitch relations were preserved. Imagery\nmight be allowed to vary indefinitely in its sensory aspect but\nwould be narrowly restricted otherwise. If the reader will run\nover the diagram of a poetic experience given in Chapter XVI\nand consider in what respects his and his friends\u2019 experiences\nmust agree if they are to be able to refer to them indifferently\nas though they were one and the same without confusion or misunderstanding,\nhe will see what kind of thing a detailed definition of a poem\nwould be.\n\nThis, although it may seem odd and complicated, is by far the\nmost convenient, in fact it is the only workable way of defining\na poem; namely, as a class of experiences which do not differ\nin any character more than a certain amount, varying for each\ncharacter, from a standard experience. We may take as this standard\nexperience the relevant experience of the poet when contemplating\nthe completed composition[75].\n\nAnyone whose experience approximates in this degree to the standard\nexperience will be able to judge the poem and his remarks about\nit will be about some experience which is included in the class.\nThus we have what we want, a sense, namely, in which a critic\ncan be said to have not read the poem or to have misread it.\nIn this sense unrecognised failures are extremely common.\n\n\n\nThe justification for this outbreak of pedantry, as it may appear,\nis that it brings into prominence one of the reasons for the\nbackwardness of critical theory. If the definition of a poem\nis a matter of so much difficulty and complexity, the discussion\nof the principles by which poetry should be judged may be expected\nto be confused. Critics have as yet hardly begun to ask themselves\nwhat they are doing or under what conditions they work. It is\ntrue that a recognition of the critic\u2019s predicament need not\nbe explicit in order to be effective, but few with much experience\nof literary debate will underestimate the extent to which it\nis disregarded or the consequences which ensue from this neglect.\nThe discussions in the foregoing chapters are intended as no\nmore than examples of the problems which an explicit recognition\nof the situation will admit and of the ways in which they will\nbe solved.\n\n\n[75] Difficulties even here arise, e.g. the poet may be dissatisfied\nwithout reason. Coleridge thought _Kubla Khan_ merely \u2018a\npsychological curiosity\u2019 without poetic merits, and may have\nbeen justified in some degree. If he was not, it is his dream\nexperience which we should presumably have to take as our standard.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXI\n\nArt, Play, and Civilisation\n\n L\u2019heure est & la construction, pas au badinage.\n _Le Corbuster-Saugnier_.\n\n\nThe value of the experiences which we Seek from the arts does\nnot lie, so we have insisted, in the exquisiteness of the moment\nof consciousness; a set of isolated ecstasies is not a sufficient\nexplanation. Its inadequacy is additional evidence that the theories\nof value and of the mind upon which it rests are defective. We\nmust now consider what wider explanations are made possible by\nthe theory of value and the outline account of mental activity\nand of communication above indicated. The ground, in part at\nleast, is cleared. What now can be said as to why the arts are\nimportant and why good taste and sound criticism are not mere\nluxuries, trivial excrescences grafted upon an independent civilisation?\n\nA number of accounts of varying adequacy each in some degree\ninteresting but needing careful interpretation have been put\nforward. The arts communicate experiences, it has been said,\nand make states of mind accessible to the many which otherwise\nwould be only possible to few. To this it might be added that\nthe arts are also a means by which experiences arise in the mind\nof the artist which would never otherwise come about. Both as\nan occasion for a collectedness and concentration difficult to\nattain in the ordinary course of life, and as the means by which\nhuman effort may acquire a continuity analogous to but more subtle\nthan the continuity of science, the study and practice of the\narts can give immensely increased power to the artist, preserving\nhim from that diffusion of his energies which is perhaps his\ngreatest danger. All this is true, but it does not go to the\nroot of the matter.\n\nAgain the educational aspect of the arts is constantly being\nstressed, sometimes in a manner which does them disservice. \u2018Message\u2019\nhunting\u2014the type of interest which discovers in _Macbeth_\nthe moral that \u2018Honesty is the best policy\u2019; in _Othello_\na recommendation to \u2018Look before you leap\u2019, in _Hamlet_\nperhaps a proof that \u2018Procrastination is the Thief of Time\u2019,\nor in _King Lear_ an indication that \u2018Your sins will find\nyou out[76]\u2019, in Shelley an exhortation to Idealism, in Browning\ncomfort for the discouraged and assurances as to a future life;\nbut in Donne or Keats no \u2018message\u2019\u2014this mode of interpreting\nthe phrase \u2018a criticism of life\u2019, though to a minute degree on\nthe right lines, is probably more damaging than those entirely\nerratic theories, of which \u2018Art for Art\u2019s sake\u2019 is an example,\nwith which we have been more concerned.\n\nNone the less but in subtler ways the educational influence of\nthe arts is all-pervasive. We must not overlook bad art in estimating\nit. \u201cI should be said to insist absurdly on the power of my own\nconfraternity\u201d wrote a novelist of the 19th century \u201cif I were\nto declare that the bulk of the young people in the upper and\nmiddle classes receive their moral teaching chiefly from the\nnovels that they read. Mothers would no doubt think of their\nown sweet teaching; fathers of the examples which they set; and\nschoolmasters of the excellence of their instructions. Happy\nis the country which has such mothers, fathers and schoolmasters!\nBut the novelist creeps in closer than the father, closer than\nthe schoolmaster, closer almost than the mother. He is the chosen\nguide, the tutor whom the young pupil chooses for herself. She\nretires with him, suspecting no lesson . . . and there she is\ntaught how she shall learn to love; how she shall receive the\nlover when he comes; how far she should advance to meet the joy;\nwhy she should be reticent and not throw herself at once into\nthis new delight.\u201d\n\nThe influence is also exerted in more indirect ways. There need\nbe, we must remember, no discernible connection or resemblance\nwhatever between the experience due to the work of art and the\nlater behaviour and experience which is modified through it.\nWithout such resemblance the influence may easily be overlooked\nor denied, but not by anyone who has a sufficient conception\nof the ways in which attitudes develop. No one who has repeatedly\nlived through experiences at the level of discrimination and\nco-ordination presupposed by the greater writers, can ever, when\nfully \u2018vigilant\u2019, be contented with ordinary crudities though\na touch of liver may of course suspend these superior responses.\nAnd conversely, keen and vigilant enjoyment of Miss Dell, Mr\nBurroughs, Mrs Wilcox or Mr Hutchinson, when untouched by doubts\nor the joys of ironic contemplation, is likely to have as a consequence\nnot only an acceptance of the mediocre in ordinary life, but\na blurring and confusion of impulses and a very widespread loss\nof value.\n\nThese remarks apply even more evidently to the Cinema. People\ndo not much imitate what they see upon the screen or what they\nread of in best-sellers. It would matter little if they did.\nSuch effects would show themselves clearly and the evil would\nbe of a manageable kind. They tend instead to develop stock attitudes\nand stereotyped ideas, the attitudes and ideas of producers:\nattitudes and ideas which can be \u2018put across\u2019 _quickly_\nthrough a medium that lends itself to crude rather than to sensitive\nhandling. Even a good dramatist\u2019s work will tend to be coarser\nthan that of a novelist of equal ability. He has to make his\neffects more quickly and in a more obvious way. The Cinema suffers\nstill more than the stage from this disability. It has its compensating\nadvantages in the greater demands which it makes of the audience,\nbut hitherto very few producers have been able to turn them to\naccount. Thus the ideas and attitudes with which the \u2018movie fan\u2019\nbecomes familiar tend to be peculiarly clumsy and inapplicable\nto life. Other causes, connected with the mentality of producers,\nincrease the effect.\n\nThe danger lies not in the fact that school-girls are sometimes\nincited to poke revolvers at taximen, but in much subtler and\nmore insinuating influences. Most films indeed are much more\nsuited to children than to adults, and it is the adults who really\nsuffer from them. No one can intensely and whole-heartedly enjoy\nand enter into experiences whose fabric is as crude as that of\nthe average super-film without a disorganisation which has its\neffects in everyday life. The extent to which second-hand experience\nof a crass and inchoate type is replacing ordinary life offers\na threat which has not yet been realised. If a false theory of\nthe severance and disconnection between \u2018\u00e6sthetic\u2019 and ordinary\nexperience has prevented the value of the arts from being understood,\nit has also preserved their dangers from recognition.\n\nThose who have attempted to find a place in the whole structure\nof life for the arts have often made use of the conception of\nPlay; and Groos and Herbert Spencer are famous exponents of the\ntheory. As with so many other \u00c6sthetic Doctrines the opinion\nthat Art is a form of Play may indicate either a very shallow\nor a very penetrating view. All depends upon the conception of\nPlay which is entertained. Originally the view arose in connection\nwith survival values. Art, it was thought, had little practical\nvalue of the obvious kinds, so some indirect means must be found\nby which it could be thought to be of service. Perhaps, like\nplay, it was a means of harmlessly expending superfluous energy.\nA more useful contribution was made when the problem of the value\nof play itself was seriously attacked. The immense practical\nutility of most forms of play then became evident. Characteristically\nplay is the preparatory organisation and development of impulses.\nIt may easily become too narrowly specialised, and the impulses\nactive may be such as never to receive \u2018serious\u2019 exercise. None\nthe less with our present understanding of the amazingly recondite\ninteractions between what appear to be totally different activities\nof the nervous system, the importance of play is not likely to\nneed much insistence.\n\nThere are many human activities which, fortunately or unfortunately\nas the case may be, are no longer required of or possible to\ncivilised man. Yet their total discontinuance may lead to grave\ndisturbances. For some of these play serves as an opportunity.\nThe view that art provides in some cases an analogous outlet\nthrough vicarious experience has naturally been put forward,\nnotably by Mr Havelock Ellis. \u201cWe have lost the orgy, but in\nits place we have art[77].\u201d If we do not extend the \u2018sublimation\u2019\ntheory too far or try to bring under this Safety-valve heading\nwork with which it has no concern, it may be granted that in\nsome cases the explanation is in place. But the temptation to\nextend it, and so to misconceive the whole matter, is great.\n\nThe objection to the Play Theory, unless very carefully stated,\nlies in its suggestion that the experiences of Art are in some\nway incomplete, that they are substitutes, meagre copies of the\nreal thing, well enough for those who cannot obtain better. \u201cThe\nmoralising force of Art lies, not in its capacity to present\na timid imitation of our experiences, but in its power to go\nbeyond our experience, satisfying and harmonising the unfulfilled\nactivities of our nature.\u201d[78] The Copy View, with the antithesis\nbetween Life and Literature which so often accompanies it, is\na devastating misconception. Coupled with the suggestion involved\nby the word \u2018Play,\u2019 that such things are for the young rather\nthan for the mature, and that Art is something one grows out\nof, it has a large share of the responsibility for the present\nstate of the Arts and of Criticism. Its only rival in obscuring\nthe issues is its close cousin the Amusement or Relaxation Theory.\n\nThe experiences which the arts offer are not obtainable, or but\nrarely, elsewhere. Would that they were! They are not incomplete;\nthey might better be described as ordinary experiences completed.\nThey are not such that the most adequately equipped person can\ndispense with them and suffer no loss, and this loss is not momentary,\nbut recurrent and permanent; the best equipped are precisely\nthe people who most value these experiences. Nor is Art, as by\nway of corollary is sometimes maintained, a thing which had its\u2019\nfunction in the youth of the world, but with the development\nof Science becomes obsolete. It may very possibly decline and\neven disappear, but if it does a biological calamity of the first\norder will have occurred. Nor again is it something which may\nbe postponed while premillennial man grapples with more immediate\nproblems. The raising of the standard of response is as immediate\na problem as any, and the arts are the chief instrument by which\nit may be raised _or lowered_.\n\nHitherto we have been concerned chiefly with more or less specific\neffects of the experiences of the arts, with the effects, upon\nsingle definite groups or systems of impulses, of their exercise\nin these experiences. The Play Theory tends to limit us to these\nconsequences. Important though they are, we must not overlook\nthe more general effects which any well-organised experience\nproduces. They may in certain cases be extraordinarily widespread.\nSuch an apparently irrelevant test as the ability to stand upon\none foot without unsteadiness has recently been employed, by\nMr Burt, as an index to mental and especially to emotional organisation.\nAll our activities react upon one another to a prodigious extent\nin ways which we can only as yet conjecture.\n\nFiner adjustment, clearer and more delicate accommodation or\nreconciliation of impulses in any one field tends to promote\nit in others. A step in mathematical accomplishment, other things\nbeing equal, facilitates the acquisition of a new turn in ski-ing.\nOther things are rarely equal it should perhaps be remarked.\nIf this is true even of such special narrowly restricted impulses\nas are involved in a scientific technique, it is far more evident\nwhen the major, the most widespread systems, those active in\nour responses to human beings and to the exigences of existence,\nare engaged.\n\nThere is abundant evidence that removal of confusion in one sphere\nof activity tends to be favourable to its removal elsewhere.\nThe ease with which a trained mind approaches a new subject is\nthe plainest example, but equally a person whose ordinary emotional\nexperience is clear, controlled and coherent, is the least likely\nto be thrown into confusion by an unheard-of predicament. Complications\nsometimes obscure this effect: a mathematician approaching psychology\nmay attempt to apply methods which are inappropriate, and the\nsanest people may prove stupid in their dealings with individuals\nof other races. The specialist, either intellectual or moral,\nwho is helpless outside his own narrow field is a familiar figure\nin inferior comedy. But what would have to be shown before the\nprinciple is invalidated is that, granted equal specialisation,\nthe successful specialist is not better fitted for life in general\nthan his unsuccessful _confr\u00e8re_. Few people, however, will\ndispute the assertion that transference of ability frequently\noccurs although the mode by which it comes about may be obscure.\n\nWhen very widespread and very fundamental impulses are implicated,\nwhere attitudes constantly taken up in ordinary life are aroused,\nthis transference effect may be very marked. Everybody knows\nthe feeling of freedom, of relief, of increased competence and\nsanity, that follows any reading in which more than usual order\nand coherence has been given to our responses. We seem to feel\nthat our command of life, our insight into it and our discrimination\nof its possibilities, is enhanced, even for situations having\nlittle or nothing to do with the subject of the reading. It may\nbe a chapter of _G\u00f6sta Berling_ or of _The ABC of Atoms_,\nthe close of the _Vanity of Human Wishes_, or the opening\nof _Harry Richmond_; whatever the differences the refreshment\nis the same. And conversely everybody knows the diminution of\nenergy, the bafflement, the sense of helplessness, which an ill-written,\ncrude, or muddled book, or a badly acted play, will produce,\nunless the critical task of diagnosis is able to restore equanimity\nand composure.\n\nNeither the subject nor the closeness of correspondence between\nthe experience and the reader\u2019s own situation has any bearing\nupon these effects. But indeed, to anyone who realises what kind\nof a thing an experience is, and through what means it comes\nabout, the old antithesis between subject and treatment ceases\nto be of interest (cf. Chapter XVI). They are not separable or\ndistinct things and the division is of no service. In this case\nthe effects we are considering depend only upon the kind and\ndegree of organisation which is given to the experiences. If\nit is at the level of our own best attempts or above it (but\nnot so far above as to be out of reach) we are refreshed. But\nif our own organisation is broken down, forced to a cruder, a\nmore wasteful level, we are depressed and temporarily incapacitated,\nnot only locally but generally. It is when what we are offered,\nand inveigled into accepting, is only slightly inferior to our\nown developed capacity, so that it is no easy matter to see what\nis wrong, that the effect is greatest. Stuff of an evident and\nextreme badness is exhilarating rather than depressing when taken\nfrom a discriminating standpoint; and there need be nothing snobbish\nor self-congratulatory in such reading. What is really discomposing\nand damaging to the critical reader is the mediocre, the work\nwhich falls just below his own standards of response. Hence the\nrage which some feel at the productions of Sir James Barrie,\nMr Locke, or Sir Hall Caine, a rage which work comparatively\ndevoid of merits fails to excite.\n\nThese effects are not merely momentary or evanescent; if we would\nunderstand the place of the arts in civilisation we must consider\nthem more closely. An improvement of response is the only benefit\nwhich anyone can receive, and the degradation, the lowering of\na response, is the only calamity. When we take into account not\nmerely the impulses actually concerned in the experience but\nall the allied groups which thrive or suffer with it, and all\nthe far-reaching effects of success or failure upon activities\nwhich may seem to be independent, the fact that some people feel\nso keenly about the arts is no longer surprising.\n\nUnderestimation of the importance of the arts is nearly always\ndue to ignorance of the workings of the mind. Experiences such\nas these, into which we willingly and whole-heartedly enter,\nor into which we may be enticed and inveigled, present peculiar\nopportunities for betrayal. They are the most formative of experiences,\nbecause in them the development and systematisation of our impulses\ngoes to the furthest lengths. In ordinary life a thousand considerations\nprohibit for most of us any complete working out of our response;\nthe range and complexity of the impulse-systems involved is less;\nthe need for action, the comparative uncertainty and vagueness\nof the situation, the intrusion of accidental irrelevancies,\ninconvenient temporal spacing\u2014the action being too slow or too\nfast\u2014all these obscure the issue and prevent the full development\nof the experience. We have to jump to some rough and ready solution.\nBut in the \u2018imaginative experience\u2019 these obstacles are removed.\nThus what happens here, what precise stresses, preponderances,\nconflicts, resolutions and interinanimations, what remote relationships\nbetween different systems of impulses arise, what before unapprehended\nand inexecutable connections are established, is a matter which,\nwe see clearly, may modify all the rest of life. As a chemist\u2019s\nbalance to a grocer\u2019s scales, so is the mind in the imaginative\nmoment to the mind engaged in ordinary intercourse or practical\naffairs. The comparison will bear pressing. The results, for\ngood or evil, of the untrammelled response are not lost to us\nin our usual trafficking.\n\n\n[76] Even Coleridge was not exempt from this failing. Cf. his\ncomments on Gloster.\n\n[77] Essay on Casanova, in _Affirmations_, p. 115.\n\n[78] _Affirmations_, p. 115.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXII\n\nThe Imagination\n\n Reason, in itself confounded,\n Saw division grow together;\n To themselves yet either neither,\n Simple were so well compounded.\n _The Ph\u0153nix and the Turtle._\n\n\nAt least six distinct senses of the word \u2018imagination\u2019 are still\ncurrent in critical discussion. It is convenient to separate\nthem before passing on to consider the one which is most important.\n\n (i) The production of vivid images, usually visual images,\n already sufficiently discussed, is the commonest and the\n least interesting thing which is referred to by imagination.\n\n (ii) The use of figurative language is frequently all that is\n meant. People who naturally employ metaphor and simile,\n especially when it is of an unusual kind, are said to\n have imagination. This may or may not be accompanied\n by imagination in the other senses. It should not be\n overlooked that metaphor and simile\u2014the two may be\n considered together\u2014have a great variety of functions in\n speech. A metaphor may be illustrative or diagrammatical,\n providing a concrete instance of a relation which would\n otherwise have to be stated in abstract terms. This is the\n most common scientific or prose use of metaphor. It is\n rare in emotive language and in poetry; Shelley\u2019s \u201cDome\n of many-coloured glass\u201d is almost the only example which\n springs to mind. More usually the elucidation is a mere\n pretence; some attitude of the speaker to his subject\n or to his audience is using the metaphor as a means of\n expression. \u201cThe freedom of my writings has indeed provoked\n an implacable tribe\u201d said Gibbon, \u201cbut as I was safe from\n the stings, I was soon accustomed to the buzzing of the\n hornets\u201d. But metaphor has yet further uses. It is the\n supreme agent by which disparate and hitherto unconnected\n things are brought together in poetry for the sake of the\n effects upon attitude and impulse which spring from their\n collocation and from the combinations which the mind then\n establishes between them. There are few metaphors whose\n effect, if carefully examined, can be traced to the logical\n relations involved. Metaphor is a semi-surreptitious method\n by which a greater variety of elements can be wrought\n into the fabric of the experience. Not that there is any\n virtue in variety by itself, though the list of critics who\n seem to have thought so would be lengthy; a page of the\n dictionary can show more variety than any page of poetry.\n But what is needed for the wholeness of an experience is\n not always naturally present, and metaphor supplies an\n excuse by which what is needed may be smuggled in. This\n is an instance of a very strange phenomenon constantly\n appearing in the arts. What is most essential often seems\n to be done as it were inadvertently, to be a by-product,\n an accidental concomitant. Those who look only to the\n ostensible purposes for the explanation of the effects, who\n make prose analyses of poems, must inevitably find them\n a mystery. But why overt and evident intention should so\n often destroy the effect is certainly a difficult problem.\n\n (iii) A narrower sense is that in which sympathetic reproducing\n of other people\u2019s states of mind, particularly their\n emotional states, is what is meant. \u201cYou haven\u2019t enough\n imagination,\u201d the dramatist says to the critic who\n thinks that his persons behave unnaturally. This kind of\n imagination is plainly a necessity for communication, and\n is covered by what has already been said in Chapter XXIV.\n It has no necessary connection with senses of imagination\n which imply value. Bad plays to be successful require it as\n much as good.\n\n (iv) Inventiveness, the bringing together of elements which are\n not ordinarily connected, is another sense. According to\n this Edison is said to have possessed imagination, and any\n fantastic romance will show it _in excelsis_. Although\n this comes nearer to a sense in which value is implied, it\n is still too general. The lunatic will beat any of us at\n combining odd ideas: Dr Cook outstrips Peary, and Bottomley\n outshines Sir John Bradbury.\n\n (v) Next we have that kind of relevant connection of things\n ordinarily thought of as disparate which is exemplified in\n scientific imagination. This is an ordering of experience\n in definite ways and for a definite end or purpose, not\n necessarily deliberate and conscious, but limited to a\n given field of phenomena. The _technical_ triumphs of the\n arts are instances of this kind of imagination. As with\n all ordering, value considerations are very likely to be\n implied, but the value may be limited or conditional.\n\n (vi) Finally we come to the sense of imagination with which we\n are here most concerned. The original formulation[79] was\n Coleridge\u2019s greatest contribution to critical theory, and\n except in the way of interpretation, it is hard to add\n anything to what he has said, though, as we have already\n noted in Chapter XXIV, some things might be taken away from\n it with advantage.\n\n \u201cThat synthetic and magical power, to which we have exclusively\n appropriated the name of imagination . . . reveals itself\n in the balance or reconciliation of opposite or discordant\n qualities . . . the sense of novelty and freshness, with\n old and familiar objects; a more than usual state of\n emotion, with more than usual order; judgement ever awake\n and steady self-possession with enthusiasm and feeling\n profound or vehement.\u201d \u201cThe sense of musical delight . . .\n with the power of reducing multitude into unity of effect,\n and modifying a series of thoughts by some one predominant\n thought or feeling[80]\u201d these are gifts of the imagination.\n It was natural, we shall shortly see why, for Coleridge to\n carry his further speculations upon Imagination into the\n realms of Transcendentalism, but setting this aside, there\n is enough in this description and in the many applications\n and elucidations scattered through the _Biographia_ and\n the _Lectures_ to justify Coleridge\u2019s claim to have put\n his finger more nearly than anyone else upon the essential\n characteristic of poetic as of all valuable experience.\n\nIn describing the poet we laid stress upon the availability of\nhis experience, upon the width of the field of stimulation which\nhe can accept, and the completeness of the response which he\ncan make. Compared with him the ordinary man suppresses nine-tenths\nof his impulses, because he is incapable of managing them without\nconfusion. He goes about in blinkers because what he would otherwise\nsee would upset him. But the poet through his superior power\nof ordering experience is freed from this necessity. Impulses\nwhich commonly interfere with one another and are conflicting,\nindependent, and mutually distractive, in him combine into a\nstable poise. He selects, of course, but the range of suppression\nwhich is necessary for him is diminished, and for this very reason\nsuch suppressions as he makes are more rigorously carried out.\nHence the curious local callousness of the artist which so often\nstrikes the observer.\n\nBut these impulses active in the artist become mutually modified\nand thereby ordered to an extent which only occurs in the ordinary\nman at rare moments, under the shock of, for example, a great\nbereavement or an undreamt-of happiness; at instants when the\n\u201cfilm of familiarity and selfish solicitude\u201d, which commonly\nhides nine-tenths of life from him, seems to be lifted and he\nfeels strangely alive and aware of the actuality of existence.\nIn these moments his myriad inhibitions are weakened; his responses,\ncanalised\u2014to use an inappropriate metaphor\u2014by routine and by\npractical but restricted convenience, break loose and make up\na new order with one another; he feels as though everything were\nbeginning anew. But for most men after their early years such\nexperiences are infrequent; a time comes when they are incapable\nof them unaided, and they receive them only through the arts.\nFor great art has this effect, and owes thereto its supreme place\nin human life.\n\nThe poet makes unconsciously a selection which outwits the force\nof habit; the impulses he awakens are freed, through the very\nmeans by which they are aroused, from the inhibitions that ordinary\ncircumstances encourage; the irrelevant and the extraneous is\nexcluded; and upon the resulting simplified but widened field\nof impulses he imposes an order which their greater plasticity\nallows them to accept. Almost always too the chief part of his\nwork is done through those impulses which we have seen to be\nmost uniform and regular, those which are aroused by what are\ncalled the \u2018formal elements\u2019. They are also the most primitive,\nand for that reason commonly among those which are most inhibited,\nmost curtailed and subordinated to superimposed purposes. We\nrarely let a colour affect us purely as a colour, we use it as\na sign by which we recognise some coloured object. Thus our responses\nto colours in themselves become so abbreviated that many people\ncome to think that the pigments painters use are in some way\nmore colourful than Nature. What happens is that inhibitions\nare released, and at the same time mutual interactions between\nimpulses take place which only sunsets seem to evoke in everyday\nexperience. We have seen in discussing communication one reason\nfor the pre-eminence of \u2018formal elements\u2019 in art, the uniformity\nof the responses which they can be depended upon to produce.\nIn their primitiveness we find another. The sense that the accidental\nand adventitious aspect of life has receded, that we are beginning\nagain, that our contact with actuality is increased, is largely\ndue to this restoration of their full natural powers to sensations.\n\nBut this restoration is not enough; merely looking at a landscape\nin a mirror, or standing on one\u2019s head will do it. What is much\nmore essential is the increased organisation, the heightened\npower of combining all the several effects of formal elements\ninto a single response, which the poet bestows. To point out\nthat \u201cthe sense of musical delight is a gift of the imagination\u201d\nwas\u2019 one of Coleridge\u2019s most brilliant feats. It is in such resolution\nof a welter of disconnected impulses into a single ordered response\nthat in all the arts imagination is most shown, but for the reason\nthat here its operation is most intricate and most inaccessible\nto observation, we shall study it more profitably in its other\nmanifestations.\n\nWe have suggested, but only by accident, that imagination\ncharacteristically produces effects similar to those which accompany\ngreat and sudden crises in experience. This would be misleading. What\nis true is that those imaginative syntheses which most nearly approach\nto these climaxes, Tragedy for example, are the most easy to analyse.\nWhat clearer instance of the \u201cbalance or reconciliation of opposite and\ndiscordant qualities\u201d can be found than Tragedy. Pity, the impulse to\napproach, and Terror, the impulse to retreat, are brought in Tragedy to\na reconciliation which they find nowhere else, and with them who knows\nwhat other allied groups of equally discordant impulses. Their union\nin an ordered single response is the _catharsis_ by which Tragedy is\nrecognised, whether Aristotle meant anything of this kind or not. This\nis the explanation of that sense of release, of repose in the midst of\nstress, of balance and composure, given by Tragedy, for there is no\nother way in which such impulses, once awakened, can be set at rest\nwithout suppression.\n\nIt is essential to recognise that in the full tragic experience\nthere is no suppression. The mind does not shy away from anything,\nit does not protect itself with any illusion, it stands uncomforted,\nunintimidated, alone and self-reliant. The test of its success\nis whether it can face what is before it and respond to it without\nany of the innumerable subterfuges by which it ordinarily dodges\nthe full development of experience. Suppressions and sublimations\nalike are devices by which we endeavour to avoid issues which\nmight bewilder us. The essence of Tragedy is that it forces us\nto live for a moment without them. When we succeed we find, as\nusual, that there is no difficulty; the difficulty came from\nthe suppressions and sublimations. The joy which is so strangely\nthe heart of the experience is not an indication that \u2018all\u2019s\nright with the world\u2019 or that \u2018somewhere, somehow, there is Justice\u2019;\nit is an indication that all is right here and now in the nervous\nsystem. Because Tragedy is the experience which most invites\nthese subterfuges, it is the greatest and the rarest thing in\nliterature, for the vast majority of works which pass by that\nname are of a different order. Tragedy is only possible to a\nmind which is for the moment agnostic or Manichean. The least\ntouch of any theology which has a compensating Heaven to offer\nthe tragic hero is fatal. That is why _Romeo and Juliet_\nis not a Tragedy in the sense in which _King Lear_ is.\n\nBut there is more in Tragedy than unmitigated experience. Besides\nTerror there is Pity, and if there is substituted for either\nsomething a little different\u2014Horror or Dread, say, for Terror;\nRegret or Shame for Pity; or that kind of Pity which yields the\nadjective \u2018Pitiable\u2019 in place of that which yields \u2018Piteous\u2019\u2014the\nwhole effect is altered. It is the relation between the two sets\nof impulses, Pity and Terror, which gives its specific character\nto Tragedy, and from that relation the peculiar poise of the\nTragic experience springs.\n\nThe metaphor of a balance or poise will bear consideration. For\nPity and Terror are opposites in a sense in which Pity and Dread\nare not. Dread or Horror are nearer than Terror to Pity, for\nthey contain attraction as well as repulsion. As in colour, tones\njust not in harmonic relation are peculiarly unmanageable and\njarring, so it is with these more easily describable responses.\nThe extraordinarily stable experience of Tragedy, which is capable\nof admitting almost any other impulses so long as the relation\nof the main components is exactly right, changes at once if these\nare altered. Even if it keeps its coherence it becomes at once\na far narrower, more limited, and exclusive thing, a much more\npartial, restricted and specialised response. Tragedy is perhaps\nthe most general, all-accepting, all-ordering experience known.\nIt can take anything into its organisation, modifying it so that\nit finds a place. It is invulnerable; there is nothing which\ndoes not present to the tragic attitude _when fully developed_\na fitting aspect and only a fitting aspect. Its sole rivals in\nthis respect are the attitudes of Falstaff and of the Voltaire\nof _Candide_. But pseudo-tragedy\u2014the greater part of Greek\nTragedy as well as almost all Elizabethan Tragedy outside Shakespeare\u2019s\nsix masterpieces comes under this head\u2014is one of the most fragile\nand precarious of attitudes. Parody easily overthrows it, the\nironic addition paralyses it; even a mediocre joke may make it\nlook lopsided and extravagant.\n\nThis balanced poise, stable through its power of inclusion, not\nthrough the force of its exclusions, is not peculiar to Tragedy.\nIt is a general characteristic of all the most valuable experiences\nof the arts. It can be given by a carpet or a pot or by a gesture\nas unmistakably as by the Parthenon, it may come about through\nan epigram as clearly as through a Sonata. We must resist the\ntemptation to analyse its cause into sets of opposed characters\nin the object. As a rule no such analysis can be made. The balance\nis not in the structure of the stimulating object, it is in the\nresponse. By remembering this we escape the danger of supposing\nthat we have found a formula for Beauty.\n\nAlthough for most people these experiences are infrequent apart\nfrom the arts, almost any occasion may give rise to them. The\nmost important general condition is mental health, a high state\nof \u2018vigilance\u2019; the next is the frequent occurrence of such experiences\nin the recent past. None of the effects of art is more transferable\nthan this balance or equilibrium.\n\nDespite all differences in the impulses concerned, a certain\ngeneral similarity can be observed in all these cases of supremely\nfine and complete organisation. It is this similarity which has\nled to the legends of the \u2018\u00e6sthetic state\u2019, the \u2018\u00e6sthetic emotion\u2019\nand the single quality Beauty, the same in all its manifestations.\nWe had occasion in Chapter II to suggest that the characteristics\nby which \u00e6sthetic experience is usually defined\u2014that impersonality,\ndisinterestedness and detachment so much stressed and so little\ndiscussed by \u00e6stheticians\u2014are really two sets of quite different\ncharacters.\n\nOne set we have seen (Chapters X and XXIV) to be merely conditions\nof communication having nothing essentially to do with value,\nconditions involved in valueless and valuable communications\nalike. We have suggested above, however, that this kind of detachment\nand severance from ordinary circumstances and accidental personal\ninterests may be of special service in these supremely valuable[81]\ncommunications, since it makes the breaking down of inhibitions\nmore easy. This same facilitation of response is also, it should\nbe added, the explanation of the peculiarly pernicious effect\nof bad but competent art.\n\nWe may now turn to consider that other set of characters which have\nbeen confused with these communicative conditions, and which may\njustifiably be taken as defining a special field for those interested\nin the values of experience. There are two ways in which impulses\nmay be organised; by exclusion and by inclusion, by synthesis and by\nelimination. Although every coherent state of mind depends upon both,\nit is permissible to contrast experiences which win stability and\norder through a narrowing of the response with those which widen it.\nA very great deal of poetry and art is content with the full, ordered\ndevelopment of comparatively special and limited experiences, with\na definite emotion, for example, Sorrow, Joy, Pride, or a definite\nattitude, Love, Indignation, Admiration, Hope, or with a specific mood,\nMelancholy, Optimism or Longing. And such art has its own value and\nits place in human affairs. No one will quarrel with \u2018Break, break,\nbreak,\u2019 or with the _Coronach_ or with _Rose Aylmer_ or with _Love\u2019s\nPhilosophy_,[82] although clearly they are limited and exclusive. But\nthey are not the greatest kind of poetry; we do not expect from them\nwhat we find in the _Ode to the Nightingale_, in _Proud Maisie_, in\n_Sir Patrick Spens_, in _The Definition of Love_ or in the _Nocturnall\nupon S. Lucie\u2019s Day_.\n\nThe structures of these two kinds of experiences are different,\nand the difference is not one of subject but of the relations\n_inter se_ of the several impulses active in the experience.\nA poem of the first group is built out of sets of impulses which\nrun parallel, which have the same direction. In a poem of the\nsecond group the most obvious feature is the extraordinarily\nheterogeneity of the distinguishable impulses. But they are more\nthan heterogeneous, they are opposed. They are such that in ordinary,\nnon-poetic, non-imaginative experience, one or other set would\nbe suppressed to give as it might appear freer development to\nthe others.\n\nThe difference comes out clearly if we consider how comparatively\nunstable poems of the first kind are. They will not bear an ironical\ncontemplation. We have only to read _The War Song of Dinas Vawr_ in\nclose conjunction with the _Coronach_, or to remember that unfortunate\nphrase \u2018Those lips, O slippery blisses\u2019! from _Endymion_, while reading\n_Love\u2019s Philosophy_, to notice this. Irony in this sense consists in\nthe bringing in of the opposite, the complementary impulses; that is\nwhy poetry which is exposed to it is not of the highest order, and why\nirony itself is so constantly a characteristic of poetry which is.\n\nThese opposed impulses from the resolution of which such experiences\nspring cannot usually be analysed. When, as is most often the\ncase, they are aroused through formal means, it is evidently\nimpossible to do so. But sometimes, as in the above cited cases,\nthey can, and through this accident literary criticism is able\nto go a step further than the criticism of the other arts.\n\nWe can only conjecture dimly what difference holds between a\nbalance and reconciliation of impulses and a mere rivalry or\nconflict. One difference is that a balance sustains one state\nof mind, but a conflict two alternating states. This, however,\ndoes not take us very far. The chief misconception which prevents\nprogress here is the switchboard view of the mind. What conception\nshould be put in its place is still doubtful, but we have already\n(Chapters XIV and XX) discussed the reasons which make a more\nadequate conception imperative. The rest of the difficulty is\ndue merely to ignorance; we do not yet know enough about the\ncentral nervous system.\n\nWith this preliminary disavowal of undue certainty we may proceed.\nThe equilibrium[83] of opposed impulses, which we suspect to be\nthe ground-plan of the most valuable \u00e6sthetic responses, brings\ninto play far more of our personality than is possible in experiences\nof a more defined emotion. We cease to be orientated in one definite\ndirection; more facets of the mind are exposed and, what is the\nsame thing, more aspects of things are able to affect us. To\nrespond, not through one narrow channel of interest, but simultaneously\nand coherently through many, is to be _disinterested_ in\nthe only sense of the word which concerns us here. A state of\nmind which is not disinterested is one which sees things only\nfrom one standpoint or under one aspect. At the same time since\nmore of our personality is engaged the independence and individuality\nof other things becomes greater. We seem to see \u2018all round\u2019 them,\nto see them as they really are; we see them apart from any one\nparticular interest which they may have for us. Of course without\nsome interest we should not see them at all, but the less any\none particular interest is indispensable, the more _detached_\nour attitude becomes. And to say that we are _impersonal_\nis merely a curious way of saying that our personality is more\n_completely_ involved.\n\nThese characters of \u00e6sthetic experiences can thus be shown to\nbe very natural consequences of the diversity, of their components.\nBut that so many different impulses should enter in is only what\nmay be expected in an experience whose ground-plan is a balance\nof opposites. For every impulse which does not complete itself\nin isolation tends to bring in allied systems. The state of irresolution\nshows this clearly. The difference between any such welter of\nvacillating impulses and the states of composure we are considering\nmay well be a matter of mediating relations between the supporting\nsystems brought in from either side. One thing only perhaps is\ncertain; what happens is the exact opposite to a deadlock, for\ncompared to the experience of great poetry every other state\nof mind is one of bafflement.\n\nThe consciousness which arises in these moments of completed\nbeing lends itself inevitably to transcendental descriptions.\n\u201cThis Exstasie doth unperplex\u201d, we seem to see things as they\nreally are, and because we are freed from the bewilderment which\nour own maladjustment brings with it,\n\n The heavy and the weary weight\n Of all this unintelligible world\n Is lightened.\n\nWordsworth\u2019s Pantheistic interpretation of the imaginative experience\nin _Tintern Abbey_[84] is one which in varying forms has\nbeen given by many poets and critics. The reconciliation of it\nwith the account here presented raises a point of extreme importance,\nthe demarcation of the two main uses of language.\n\n\n[79] Coleridge\u2019s debt here to Schelling has been over-estimated.\nSuch borrowings as he made were more hampering to him than helpful.\n\n[80] _Biographia Literaria_, II, pp. 12, 14.\n\n[81] It may perhaps be desirable to point out that this description\nof the effects of art follows from the theory of value outlined\nin Chapter VII. They are the most valuable experiences because\nthey are the least wasteful. Thus the place assigned to them\nis not a mere personal expression of preference.\n\n[82] May I assume that references here will not distress the reader?\nTennyson, Scott, Landor, Shelley, Keats, Scott, Anon; Marvell,\nDonne, Peacock. I am anxious to facilitate the actual detailed\ncomparison of these poems.\n\n[83] This topic is discussed from a slightly different angle in\n_The Foundations of \u00c6sthetics_ (Allen and Unwin, 1922).\n\n[84] I will quote the familiar passage for the reader\u2019s convenience:\n\n I have felt\n A presence that disturbs me with the joy\n Of elevated thoughts: a sense sublime\n Of something far more deeply interfused,\n Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns,\n And the round ocean and the living air,\n And the blue sky, and in the mind of man:\n A motion and a spirit that impels\n All thinking things, all objects of all thought\n And rolls through all things.\n\nNot itself an instance of imaginative utterance, although some\ninstances _can_ be found in the poem.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXIII\n\nTruth and Revelation Theories\n\n Oh never rudely will I blame his faith\n In the might of stars and angels! \u2019Tis not merely\n The human being\u2019s pride that peoples space\n With life and mystical predominance;\n Since likewise for the stricken heart of Love\n This visible nature, and this common world\n Is all too narrow . . . .\n Coleridge, _Piccolomini_.\n\n\nKnowledge, it is recognised, is good, and since the experiences\nwhich we have been discussing may readily be supposed to give\nknowledge, there is a strong tradition in criticism which seeks\nto derive their value from the worth of knowledge. But not all\nknowledge is equally valuable: the kind of information which\nwe can acquire indefinitely by steady perusal of Whitaker or\nof an Encyclop\u00e6dia is of negligible value. Therefore a special\nkind of knowledge has been alleged.\n\nThe problem which ensues is for many people the most interesting\npart of critical theory. That so many capital-letter words\u2014such\nas Real, Ideal, Essential, Necessary, Ultimate, Absolute, Fundamental,\nProfound, and many others\u2014tend to appear in Truth doctrines is\nevidence of the interest. This heavy artillery is more than anything\nelse a mode of emphasis, analogous to italics, underlining and\nsolemn tones of utterance. It serves to impress upon the reader\nthat he would do well to become serious and attentive, and like\nall such devices it tends to lose its effect unless cunningly\nemployed.\n\nWe may most conveniently begin by considering a range of representative\ndoctrines chosen from the writings of famous critics with a view\nto illustrating chiefly their differences. Some, it is true,\nwill hardly repay investigation. It is far too easy to write,\nwith Carlyle \u201cAll real art is the disimprisonment of the soul\nof fact[85]\u201d or \u201cThe infinite is made to blend itself with the\nfinite; to stand visible, and, as it were, attainable there.\nOf this sort are all true works of art; in this (if we know a\nwork of art from the daub of artifice) we discern eternity looking\nthrough time, the God-like rendered visible[86]\u201d.\n\nAll the difficulty begins when this has been written, and what\nhas been said is of no assistance towards its elucidation. Nor\nis Pater, for all his praise of clarity and accuracy, of much\nbetter quality. \u201cTruth! there can be no merit, no craft at all,\nwithout that. And, further, all beauty is in the long run only\nfineness of truth or what we call expression, the finer accommodation\nof speech to that vision within\u201d[87]. It would perhaps be difficult,\noutside Croce,[88] to find a more unmistakable confusion between\nvalue and communicative efficacy. But the _Essay_ is a veritable\nmuseum of critical blunders.\n\nThe extracts which follow are arranged approximately in order\nof obscurity. They rise from the most matter of fact to the most\nmystical uses of truth-notions in criticism. All might be taken\nas glosses upon the phrase \u2018Truth to Nature\u2019; they serve to show\nwhat different things may be meant by what is apparently simple\nlanguage.\n\nWe may begin with Aristotle. He makes three remarks which bear\nupon the matter. The first is in connection with the antithesis\nbetween Tragedy and History.\n\n\u201cPoetry is a more philosophical and a more serious thing than\nHistory: for Poetry is chiefly conversant about general (universal)\ntruth, History about particular. In what manner, for example,\nany person of a certain character would speak or act, probably\nor necessarily\u2014this is universal; and this is the object of Poetry.\nBut what Alcibiades did, or what happened to him\u2014this is particular\ntruth.\u201d (_Poetics_, IX).\n\nHis second remark is made in connection with the requisites of\nTragic Character:\u2014\n\n\u201cThe third requisite (in addition to goodness in a special sense,\nappropriateness, and consistency) of Character is that it have\n_verisimilitude_[89]\u201d. (_Poetics_, XV).\n\nAristotle\u2019s third observation is in the same chapter:\u2014\n\n\u201cThe poet when he imitates passionate or indolent men and such,\nshould preserve the type and yet ennoble it[90]\u201d.\n\nWordsworth\u2019s interpretation carries us a definite stage nearer\nto the mystical:\u2014\n\n\u201cAristotle, I have been told, has said that poetry is the most\nphilosophic of all writing. It is so. Its object is truth\u2014not\nindividual and local, but general and operative. Not standing\nupon external testimony, but carried alive into the heart by\npassion: truth which is its own testimony; which gives competence\nand confidence to the tribunal to which it appeals, and receives\nthem from the same tribunal[91]\u201d.\n\nWordsworth remains still on the hither side of the gap, as does\nGoethe in suggesting that \u201cThe beautiful is the manifestation\nof secret laws of nature which, but for this disclosure, had\nbeen for ever concealed from us[92]\u201d. But Coleridge, from whom\nWordsworth probably heard about Aristotle, takes the step into\nmysticism unhesitatingly:\u2014\n\n\u201cIf the artist copies the mere nature, the _natura naturata_,\nwhat idle rivalry!\u2014if he proceeds only from a given form which\nis supposed to answer to the notion of beauty\u2014what an emptiness,\nwhat an unreality, there always is in his productions. Believe\nme, you must master the essence, the _natura naturans_,\nwhich presupposes a bond between nature in the higher sense and\nthe soul of man[93]\u201d.\n\nBut Coleridge held many mystical views, not always easy to reconcile\nwith one another. In the same Essay he continues:\u2014\n\n\u201cIn the objects of nature are presented as in a mirror all the\npossible elements, steps and processes of intellect antecedent\nto consciousness, and therefore to the full development of the\nintelligential act; and man\u2019s mind is the very focus of all the\nrays of intellect which are scattered throughout the images of\nnature. Now so to place these images, totalised and fitted to\nthe limits of the human mind, as to elicit from and to superinduce\nupon the forms themselves the moral reflections to which they\napproximate, to make the external internal, the internal external,\nto make nature thought and thought nature\u2014this is the mystery\nof genius in the Fine Arts.\u201d\n\nEven when Coleridge is most \u2018the God-intoxicated man\u2019 his remarks\nto a careful reader suggest that if they could be decoded, as\nit were, they would provide at the least a basis for interesting\nspeculation. Many adumbrations of this mystical view might be\nquoted. \u201cThere is a communication between mystery and mystery,\nbetween the unknown soul and the unknown reality; at one particular\npoint in the texture of life the hidden truth seems to break\nthrough the veil\u201d, writes Mr Middleton Murry in an Essay[94]\nwhich as an emotive utterance disguised to resemble an argument\nis of interest. How this feeling of insight arises we have seen\nin the foregoing chapter; the sense of immediate revelation of\nwhich he treats as \u201cthe primary stuff out of which literature\nis created\u201d is certainly characteristic of the greater kinds\nof art. And there must be few who have not by one arrangement\nor another contrived from these visionary moments a philosophy\nwhich, for a time, has seemed to them unshakable because for\na time emotionally satisfying. But emotional satisfaction gained\nat the cost of intellectual bondage is unstable. When it does\nnot induce a partial stupor it breaks down. The freely inquiring\nmind has a fatal way of overthrowing all immediate and mystical\nintuitions which, instead of being duly subordinate, insist on\ngiving it orders.\n\nFor the inquiring mind is simply the human being\u2019s way of finding\na place and function for all its experiences and activities,\na place and function compatible with the rest of its experience.\nWhen the mystical insight is understood, and its claims fitly\ndirected, although it may seem to those who still misunderstand\nit to have lost all the attributes for which they have sought\nto retain it, and to be no longer either mystical or an insight,\nit does not lose but gains in value. But this further adjustment\nis often very difficult to make.\n\nThese Revelation Doctrines, when we know what they are really\nabout, come nearer, we shall see, to supplying an explanation\nof the value of the arts than any of the other traditional accounts.\nBut the process of translation is no easy matter. They are not\nwhat they seem, these utterances apparently about Truth. In interpreting\nthem we shall find ourselves forced to consider language from\nan angle and with a closeness which are not usual, and to do\nso, certain very powerful resistances and deeply ingrained habits\nof the mind have first to be broken down.\n\n\n[85] _Shooting Niagara_.\n\n[86] _Sartor Resartus_.\n\n[87] _Essay on Style_.\n\n[88] A discussion of Croce\u2019s doctrines might seem advisable at\nsome point. But all that is strictly necessary has already been\nsaid in _The Foundations of \u00c6sthetics_. It may be repeated\nhere in the vigorous terms of Giovanni Papini (_Four and Twenty\nMinds_): \u201cIf you disregard critical trivialities and didactic\naccessories, the entire \u00e6sthetic system of Croce amounts merely\nto a hunt for pseudonyms of the word \u2018art\u2019, and may indeed be\nstated briefly and accurately in this formula: art = intuition\n= expression = feeling = imagination = fancy = lyricism = beauty.\nAnd you must be careful not to take these words with the shadings\nand distinctions which they have in ordinary or scientific language.\nNot a bit of it. Every word is merely a different series of syllables\nsignifying absolutely and completely the same thing.\u201d When you\nare not careful the amalgam of confusions and contradictions\nwhich ensues is very remarkable. It is interesting to notice\nthat Croce\u2019s appeal has been exclusively to those unfamiliar\nwith the subject, to the man of letters and the dilettante. He\nhas been ignored by serious students of the mind. How many of\nthose for example who have been impressed by his dicta as to\nexpression and language have been aware of how the problem has\nbeen discussed before, or have ever heard of the \u2018imageless thought\u2019\ncontroversy? Upon the ways in which Croce\u2019s strategy has inveigled\nthe guileless into supposing him to be saying something, Papini\nis excellent. \u2018The Barabbas of art, the Thug of philosophy, the\nApache of culture\u2019\u2014Papini so describes himself\u2014has here rendered\na notable service to those who have been depressed by the vogue\nof \u2018Expressionism\u2019.\n\n[89] _\u1f45\u03bc\u03bf\u03b9\u03bf\u03bd_. This word is variously translated \u2018resemblance\u2019\n(Twining), and \u2018truth to life\u2019? (Butcher). Its usual meaning\nin the _Poetics_ is \u2018the quality of _being like ourselves_\u2019,\n\u2018_average_ humanity\u2019.\n\n[90] Cf. Eastlake, _Literature of the Fine Arts_.\n\n\u201cThe elephant with his objectionable legs and inexpressive hide\nmay still be supposed to be a very normal specimen and may accordingly\nbe a fit object for artistic imitation.\u201d\n\n[91] Preface to _Lyrical Ballads_.\n\n[92] Compare Thomas Rymer, _A Short View of Tragedy_.\n\n\u201cA little preparation and forecast might do well now and then.\nFor his Desdemona\u2019s Marriage, he might have helped out the probability\nby figuring how that some way or other a Blackamoor woman had\nbeen her nurse and suckled her; or that once upon a time some\n_Virtuoso_ had transfused into her veins the Blood of a\nBlack Sheep.\u201d We may take it such are not the secret laws of\nnature to which Goethe was alluding.\n\n[93] _On Poesy or Art_.\n\n[94] \u2018Literature and Religion\u2019 in _The Necessity of Art_,\npublished by The Student Christian Movement, p. 155.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXIV\n\nThe Two Uses of Language\n\n The intelligible forms of ancient poets\n The fair humanities of old religion . . .\n They live no longer in the faith of reason:\n But still the heart doth need a language, still\n Doth the old instinct bring back the old names.\n Coleridge, _Piccolomini_.\n\n\nThere are two totally distinct uses of language. But because\nthe theory of language is the most neglected of all studies they\nare in fact hardly ever distinguished. Yet both for the theory\nof poetry and for the narrower aim of understanding much which\nis said about poetry a clear comprehension of the differences\nbetween these uses is indispensable. For this we must look somewhat\nclosely at the mental processes which accompany them.\n\nIt is unfortunate but not surprising that most of the psychological\nterms which we naturally employ tend to blur the distinction.\n\u2018Knowledge\u2019, \u2018belief\u2019, \u2018assertion\u2019, \u2018thought\u2019, and \u2018understanding\u2019,\nfor, example, as ordinarily used, are ambiguous in a fashion\nwhich disguises and obscures the point which must be brought\nout. They record distinctions which are oblique to the distinctions\nrequired, they are cross-cuts of analysis made in the wrong place\nand in the wrong direction, useful enough for some purposes no\ndoubt, but for this present purpose very confusing. We shall\ndo well to put them out of mind for a while if possible.\n\nThe chief departure made from current conceptions in the sketch of the\nmind given in Chapter XI lay in the substitution of the _causes_, the\n_characters_ and the _consequences_ of a mental event, for its aspects\nas _thought_, _feeling_ and _will_. This treatment was introduced with\na view to the analysis which now occupies us. Among the causes of most\nmental events, we urged, two sets may be distinguished. On the one hand\nthere are the present stimuli reaching the mind through the sensory\nnerves, and, in co-operation with these, the effects of past stimuli\nassociated with them. On the other hand is a set of quite different\nfactors, the state of the organism, its needs, its readiness to respond\nto this or that kind of stimulus. The impulses which arise take their\ncharacter and their course from the interaction of these two sets. We\nmust keep them clearly distinguished.\n\nThe relative importance of the two sets of factors varies enormously.\nA sufficiently hungry man will eat almost anything which can\nbe chewed or swallowed. The nature of the substance, within these\nlimits, has very little effect upon his behaviour. A replete\nperson, by contrast, will only eat such things as he expects\nwill taste pleasant, or regards as possessing definite beneficial\nproperties, for example, medicines. His behaviour, in other words,\ndepends almost entirely upon the character of his optical or\nolfactory stimulation.\n\nSo far as an impulse owes its character to its stimulus (or to\nsuch effects of past accompanying or connected stimuli as are\nrevived) so far is it a _reference_, to use the term which\nwe introduced in Chapter XI, to stand for the property of mental\nevents which we substitute for thought or cognition.[95] It is\nplain that the independent internal conditions of the organism\nusually intervene to distort reference in some degree. But very\nmany of our needs can only be satisfied if the impulses are left\nundistorted. Bitter experience has taught us to leave some of\nthem alone, to let them reflect or correspond with external states\nof affairs as much as they can, undisturbed as far as possible\nby internal states of affairs, our needs and desires.\n\nIn all our behaviour can be distinguished stimuli we receive,\nand the ways in which we use them. What we receive may be any\nkind of stimulus, but only when the reaction we make to it tallies\nwith its nature and varies with it in quasi-independence of the\nuses we make of it does reference occur.\n\nThose to whom visual images are of service in considering complex\nmatters may find it convenient at this point to imagine a circle\nor sphere constantly bombarded by minute particles (stimuli).\nWithin the sphere may be pictured complex mechanisms continually\nchanging for reasons having nothing to do with the external stimuli.\nThese mechanisms by opening little gateways select which of the\nstimuli shall be allowed to come in and take effect. So far as\nthe subsequent convulsions are due to the nature of the impacts\nand to lingering effects of impacts which have accompanied similar\nimpacts in the past, the convulsions are referential. So far\nas they are due to the independent motions of the internal mechanisms\nthemselves, reference fails. This diagrammatic image may possibly\nbe of convenience to some. By those who distrust such things\nit may with advantage be disregarded. It is not introduced as\na contribution to neurology, and is in no way a ground for the\nauthor\u2019s view.\n\nThe extent to which reference is interfered with by needs and\ndesires is underestimated even by those who, not having yet forgotten\nthe events of 1914-1918, are most sceptical as to the independence\nof opinions and desires. Even the most ordinary and familiar\nobjects are perceived as it pleases us to perceive them rather\nthan as they are, whenever error does not directly deprive us\nof advantages. It is almost impossible for anyone to secure a\ncorrect impression of his own personal appearance or of the features\nof anyone in whom he is personally interested. Nor is it perhaps\noften desirable that he should.\n\nFor the demarcation of the fields where impulse should be as\ncompletely as possible dependent upon and correspondent with\nexternal situation, those in which reference should take prior\nplace from those in which it may be subordinated to appetencies\nwith advantage, is not a simple matter. On many views of the\ngood and of what should be, themselves results of subordinating\nreference to emotional satisfactions, there could be no question.\nTruth, it would be said, has claims prior to all other considerations.\nLove not grounded upon knowledge would be described as worthless.\nWe ought not to admire what is not beautiful and if our mistress\nbe not really beautiful when impartially considered we ought,\nso the doctrine runs, to admire her, if at all, for other reasons.\nThe chief points of interest about such views are the confusions\nwhich make them plausible. Beauty as an internal quality of things\nis usually involved, as well as Good the unanalysable Idea. Both\nare special twists given to some of our impulses by habits deriving\nultimately from desires. They linger in our minds because to\nthink of a thing as Good or Beautiful gives more _immediate_\nemotional satisfaction than to _refer_ to it as satisfying\nour impulses in one special fashion (cf. Chapter VII) or another\n(cf. Chapter XXXII).\n\nTo think about Good or Beauty is not necessarily to refer to\nanything. For the term \u2018thinking\u2019 covers mental operations in\nwhich the impulses are so completely governed by internal factors\nand so out of control of stimulus that no reference occurs. Most\n\u2018thinking of\u2019 includes reference in some degree, of course, but\nnot all, and similarly much reference would not commonly be described\nas thinking. When we drop something which is too hot to hold\nwe would not usually be said to have done so through thinking.\nThe two terms overlap, and their definitions, if there be a definition\nof \u2018thinking\u2019 as commonly used, are of different types. This\nis why \u2018Thought\u2019 was on an earlier page described as marking\nan oblique distinction.\n\nTo return, the claims of reference are by no means easy to adjust\nwith other claims. An immense extension of our powers of referring\nhas recently been made. With amazing swiftness Science has opened\nout field after field of possible reference. Science is simply\nthe organisation of references with a view solely to the convenience\nand facilitation of reference. It has advanced mainly because\nother claims, typically the claims of our religious desires,\nhave been set aside. For it is no accident that Science and Religion\nconflict. They are different principles upon which impulses may\nbe organised, and the more closely they are examined the more\ninevitable is the incompatibility seen to be. Any so-called reconciliation\nwhich is ever effected will involve bestowing the name Religion\nupon something utterly different from any of the systematisations\nof impulses which it now denotes, for the reason that the belief\nelements present would have a different character.\n\nMany attempts have been made to reduce Science to a position\nof subjection to some instinct or emotion or desire, to curiosity\nfor example. A special passion for knowledge for its own sake\nhas even been invented. But in fact all the passions and all\nthe instincts, all human needs and desires may _on occasion_\nsupply the motive force for Science. There is no human activity\nwhich may not on occasion require undistorted reference. The\nessential point, however, is that Science is autonomous. The\nimpulses developed in it are modified only by one another, with\na view to the greatest possible completeness and systematisation,\nand for the facilitation of further references. So far as other\nconsiderations distort them they are not yet Science or have\nfallen out of it.\n\nTo declare Science autonomous is very different from subordinating\nall our activities to it. It is merely to assert that so far\nas any body of references is undistorted it belongs to Science.\nIt is not in the least to assert that no references may be distorted\nif advantage can thereby be gained. And just as there are innumerable\nhuman activities which require undistorted references if they\nare to be satisfied, so there are innumerable other human activities\nnot less important which equally require distorted references\nor, more plainly, _fictions_.\n\nThe use of fictions, the imaginative use of them rather, is not\na way of hoodwinking ourselves. It is not a process of pretending\nto ourselves that things are not as they are. It is perfectly\ncompatible with the fullest and grimmest recognition of the exact\nstate of affairs on all occasions. It is no make-believe. But\nso awkwardly have our references and our attitudes become entangled\nthat such pathetic spectacles as Mr Yeats trying desperately\nto believe in fairies or Mr Lawrence impugning the validity of\nsolar physics, are all too common. To be forced by desire into\nany unwarrantable belief is a calamity. The state which ensues\nis often extraordinarily damaging to the mind. But this common\nmisuse of fictions should not blind us to their immense services\nprovided we do not take them for what they are not, degrading\nthe chief means by which our attitudes to actual life may be\nadjusted into the material of a long-drawn delirium[96].\n\nIf we knew enough it might be possible that all necessary attitudes\ncould be obtained through scientific references alone. Since\nwe do not know very much yet, we can leave this very remote possibility,\nonce recognised, alone.\n\nFictions whether aroused by statements or by analogous things\nin other arts may be used in many ways. They may be used, for\nexample, to deceive. But this is not a characteristic use in\npoetry. The distinction which needs to be kept clear does not\nset up fictions in opposition to verifiable truths in the scientific\nsense. A statement may be used for the sake of the _reference_,\ntrue or false, which it causes. This is the _scientific_\nuse of language. But it may also be used for the sake of the\neffects in emotion and attitude produced by the reference it\noccasions. This is the _emotive_ use of language. The distinction\nonce clearly grasped is simple. We may either use words for the\nsake of the references they promote, or we may use them for the\nsake of the attitudes and emotions which ensue. Many arrangements\nof words evoke attitudes without any reference being required\n_en route_. They-operate like musical phrases. But usually\nreferences are involved _as conditions_ for, or _stages\nin_, the ensuing development of attitudes, yet it is still\nthe attitudes not the references which are important. It matters\nnot at all in such cases whether the references are true or false.\nTheir sole function is to bring about and support the attitudes\nwhich are the further response. The questioning, verificatory\nway of handling them is irrelevant, and in a competent reader\nit is not allowed to interfere. \u201cBetter a plausible impossibility\nthan an improbable possibility\u201d said Aristotle very wisely; there\nis less danger of an inappropriate reaction.\n\nThe differences between the mental processes involved in the\ntwo cases are very great, though easily overlooked. Consider\nwhat failure for each use amounts to. For scientific language\na difference in the references is itself failure: the end has\nnot been attained. But for emotive language the widest differences\nin reference are of no importance if the further effects in attitude\nand emotion are of the required kind.\n\nFurther, in the scientific use of language not only must the\nreferences be correct for success, but the connections and relations\nof references to one another must be of the kind which we call\nlogical. They must not get in one another\u2019s way, and must be\nso organised as not to impede further reference. But for emotive\npurposes logical arrangement is not necessary. It may be and\noften is an obstacle. For what matters is that the series of\nattitudes due to the references should have their own proper\norganisation, their own emotional interconnection, and this often\nhas no dependence upon the logical relations of such references\nas may be concerned in bringing the attitudes into being.\n\nA few notes of the chief uses of the word \u2018Truth\u2019 in Criticism\nmay help to prevent misunderstanding:\u2014\n\n1. The scientific sense that, namely, in which references, and\nderivatively statements symbolising references, are true, need\nnot delay us. A reference is true when the things to which it\nrefers are actually together in the way in which it refers to\nthem. Otherwise it is false. This sense is one very little involved\nby any of the arts. For the avoidance of confusions it would\nbe well if the term \u2018true\u2019 could be reserved for this use. In\npurely scientific discourse it could and should be, but such\ndiscourse is uncommon. In point of fact the emotive power which\nattaches to the word is far too great for it to be abandoned\nin general discussion; the temptation to a speaker who needs\nto stir certain emotions and evoke certain attitudes of approval\nand acceptance is overwhelming. No matter how various the senses\nin which it may be used, and even when it is being used in no\nsense whatever, its effects in promoting attitudes will still\nmake it indispensable; people will still continue to use the\nword with the same promiscuity as ever.\n\n2. The most usual other sense is that of acceptability. The \u2018Truth\u2019 of\n_Robinson Crusoe_ is the acceptability of the things we are told, their\nacceptability in the interests of the effects of the narrative, not\ntheir correspondence with any actual facts involving Alexander Selkirk\nor another. Similarly the falsity of happy endings to _Lear_ or to _Don\nQuixote_, is their failure to be acceptable to those who have fully\nresponded to the rest of the work. It is in this sense that \u2018Truth\u2019\nis equivalent to \u2018internal necessity\u2019 or rightness. That is \u2018true\u2019\nor \u2018internally necessary\u2019 which completes or accords with the rest\nof the experience, which co-operates to arouse our ordered response,\nwhether the response of Beauty or another. \u201cWhat the Imagination seizes\nas Beauty must be Truth\u201d, said Keats, using this sense of \u2018Truth\u2019,\nthough not without confusion. Sometimes it is held that whatever is\nredundant or otiose, whatever is not required, although not obstructive\nor disruptive, is also false. \u201cSurplusage!\u201d said Pater, \u201cthe artist\nwill dread that, as the runner on his muscles[97]\u201d himself perhaps\nin this instance sweating his sentence down too finely. But this\nis to make excessive demands upon the artist. It is to apply the\naxe of retrenchment in the wrong place. Superabundance is a common\ncharacteristic of great art, much less dangerous than the preciousness\nthat too contrived an economy tends to produce. The essential point\nis whether what is unnecessary interferes or not with the rest of the\nresponse. If it does not, the whole thing is all the better probably\nfor the extra solidity which it thereby gains.\n\nThis internal acceptability or \u2018convincingness\u2019 needs to be contrasted\nwith other acceptabilities. Thomas Rymer, for example, refused\nto accept Iago for external reasons: \u201cTo entertain the audience\nwith something new and surprising against common sense and nature,\nhe would pass upon us a close, dissembling rascal, instead of\nan open-hearted, frank, plain-dealing Souldier, a character constantly\nborn by them for some thousands of years in the World.\u201d \u201cThe\ntruth is\u201d he observes \u201cthis authors head was full of villainous,\nunnatural images\u201d[98].\n\nHe is remembering no doubt Aristotle\u2019s remark that \u201cthe artist\nmust preserve the type and yet ennoble it\u201d, but interpreting\nit in his own way. For him the type is fixed simply by convention\nand his acceptances take no note of internal necessities but\nare governed merely by accordance with external canons. His is\nan extreme case, but to avoid his error in subtler matters is\nin fact sometimes the hardest part of the critic\u2019s undertaking.\nBut whether our conception of the type is derived in some such\nabsurd way, or taken, for example, as from a handbook of zoology,\nis of slight consequence. It is the taking of any _external_\ncanon which is critically dangerous. When in the same connection\nRymer objects that there never was a Moorish General in the service\nof the Venetian Republic, he is applying another external canon,\nthat of historic fact. This mistake is less insidious, but Ruskin\nused to be particularly fond of the analogous mistake in connection\nwith the \u2018truth\u2019 of drawing.\n\n3. Truth may be equivalent to Sincerity. This character of the\nartist\u2019s work we have already touched upon briefly in connection\nwith Tolstoy\u2019s theory of communication (Chapter XXIII). It may\nperhaps be most easily defined from the critic\u2019s point of view\nnegatively, as the absence of any apparent attempt on the part\nof the artist to work effects upon the reader which do not work\nfor himself. Too simple definitions must be avoided. It is well\nknown that Burns in writing \u2018_Ae fond kiss_\u2019 was only too\nanxious to escape _Nancy\u2019s_ (Mrs Maclehose\u2019s) attentions,\nand similar instances could be multiplied indefinitely. Absurdly\nnaive views upon the matter[99] exemplified by the opinion that\nBottomley must have believed himself to be inspired or he would\nnot have moved his audiences, are far too common. At the level\nat which Bottomley harangued any kind of exaltation in the orator,\nwhether due to pride or to champagne, would make his stuff effective.\nBut at Burns\u2019 level a very different situation arises. Here his\nprobity and sincerity _as an artist_ are involved; external\ncircumstances are irrelevant, but there is perhaps internal evidence\nin the poem of a flaw in its creating impulse. Compare as a closely\nsimilar poem in which there is no flaw, Byron\u2019s \u2018_When we two\nparted_\u2019.\n\n\n[95] The reader who is a psychologist will notice many points\nin this statement at which elaboration and qualifications are\nrequired. For example, when we are \u2018introspecting\u2019 factors normally\nbelonging to the second set may enter the first. But he will\nbe able, if he grasps the general theory, to supply these complications\nhimself. I did not wish to burden the text with unnecessary intricacies.\n\n[96] Revelation Doctrines when once given a foothold tend to interfere\neverywhere. They serve as a kind of omnipotent major premise\njustifying any and every conclusion. A specimen: \u201cSince the function\nof Art is to pierce through to the Real World, then it follows\nthat the artist cannot be too definite in his outlines, and that\ngood drawing is the foundation of all good art.\u201d\u2014Charles Gardner,\n_Vision and Vesture_, p. 54.\n\n[97] _Essay on Style_, p. 19.\n\n[99] _Short View of Tragedy_.\n\n[99] Cf. A. Clutton-Brock, _The Times_, 11th July 1922, p.\n13.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXV\n\nPoetry and Beliefs\n\n What I see very well is the wide-spread, infinite harm of putting\n fancy for knowledge (to speak like Socrates), or rather of\n living by choice in a twilight of the mind where fancy and\n knowledge are indiscernible.\u2014_Euripides the Rationalist_.\n\n\nIt is evident that the bulk of poetry consists of statements\nwhich only the very foolish would think of attempting to verify.\nThey are not the kind of things which can be verified. If we\nrecall what was said in Chapter XVI as to the natural generality\nor vagueness of reference we shall see another reason why references\nas they occur in poetry are rarely susceptible of scientific\ntruth or falsity. Only references which are brought into certain\nhighly complex and very special combinations, so as to correspond\nto the ways in which things actually hang together, can be either\ntrue or false, and most references in poetry are not knit together\nin this way.\n\nBut even when they are, on examination, frankly false, this is\nno defect. Unless, indeed, the obviousness of the falsity forces\nthe reader to reactions which are incongruent or disturbing to\nthe poem. And equally, a point more often misunderstood, their\ntruth, when they are true, is no merit[100]. The people who say\n\u2018How True!\u2019 at intervals while reading Shakespeare are misusing\nhis work, and, comparatively speaking, wasting their time. For\nall that matters in either case is acceptance, that is to say,\nthe initiation and development of the further response.\n\nPoetry affords the clearest examples of this subordination of\nreference to attitude. It is the supreme form of _emotive_\nlanguage. But there can be no doubt that originally all language\nwas emotive; its scientific use is a later development, and most\nlanguage is still emotive. Yet the late development has come\nto seem the natural and the normal use, largely because the only\npeople who have reflected upon language were at the moment of\nreflection using it scientifically.\n\nThe emotions and attitudes resulting from a statement used emotively\nneed not be directed towards anything to which the statement\nrefers. This is clearly evident in dramatic poetry, but much\nmore poetry than is usually supposed is dramatic in structure.\nAs a rule a statement in poetry arouses attitudes much more wide\nand general in direction than the references of the statement.\nNeglect of this fact makes most verbal analysis of poetry irrelevant.\nAnd the same is true of those critical but emotive utterances\nabout poetry which gave rise to this discussion. No one, it is\nplain, can read poetry successfully without, consciously or unconsciously,\nobserving the distinction between the two uses of words. That\ndoes not need to be insisted upon. But further no one can understand\nsuch utterances about poetry as that quoted from Dr Mackail in\nour third chapter, or Dr Bradley\u2019s cry that \u201cPoetry is a spirit\u201d,\nor Shelley\u2019s that \u201cA poem is the very image of life expressed\nin its eternal truth\u201d, or the passages quoted above from Coleridge,\nwithout distinguishing the making of a statement from the incitement\nor expression of an attitude. But too much inferior poetry has\nbeen poured out as criticism, too much sack and too little bread;\nconfusion between the two activities, on the part of writers\nand readers alike, is what is primarily responsible for the backwardness\nof critical studies. What other stultifications of human endeavour\nit is also responsible for we need not linger here to point out.\nThe separation of prose from poetry, if we may so paraphrase\nthe distinction, is no mere academic activity. There is hardly\na problem outside mathematics which is not complicated by its\nneglect, and hardly any emotional response which is not crippled\nby irrelevant intrusions. No revolution in human affairs would\nbe greater than that which a wide-spread observance of this distinction\nwould bring about.\n\nOne perversion in especial needs to be noticed. It is constantly\npresent in critical discussion, and is in fact responsible for\nRevelation Doctrines. Many attitudes, which arise without dependence\nupon any reference, merely by the interplay and resolution of\nimpulses otherwise awakened, can be momentarily encouraged by\nsuitable beliefs held as scientific beliefs are held. So far\nas this encouragement is concerned, the truth or falsity of these\nbeliefs does not matter, the immediate effect is the same in\neither case. When the attitude is important, the temptation to\nbase it upon some reference which is treated as established scientific\ntruths are treated is very great, and the poet thus easily comes\nto invite the destruction of his work; Wordsworth puts forward\nhis Pantheism, and other people doctrines of Inspiration, Idealism\nand Revelation.\n\nThe effect is twofold; an appearance of security and stability\nis given to the attitude, which thus seems to be justified; and\nat the same time it is no longer so necessary to sustain this\nattitude by the more difficult means peculiar to the arts, or\nto pay full attention to form. The reader can be relied upon\nto do more than his share. That neither effect is desirable is\neasily seen. The attitude for the sake of which the belief is\nintroduced is thereby made not more but less stable. Remove the\nbelief, once it has affected the attitude; the attitude collapses.\nIt may later be restored by more appropriate means, but that\nis another matter. And all such beliefs are very likely to be\nremoved; their logical connections with other beliefs scientifically\nentertained are, to say the least, shaky. In the second place\nthese attitudes, produced not by the appropriate means but, as\nit were by a short cut, through beliefs, are rarely so healthy,\nso vigorous and full of life as the others. Unlike attitudes\nnormally produced they usually require an increased stimulus\nevery time that they are reinstated. The belief has to grow more\nand more fervent, more and more convinced, in order to produce\nthe same attitude. The believer has to pass from one paroxysm\nof conviction to another, enduring each time a greater strain.\n\nThis substitution of an intellectual formula for the poem or\nwork of art is of course most easily observed in the case of\nreligion, where the temptation is greatest. In place of an experience,\nwhich is a direct response to a certain selection of the possibilities\nof stimulation, we have a highly indirect response, made, not\nto the actual influences of the world upon us, but to a special\nkind of belief as to some particular state of affairs.[101] There\nis a suppressed conditional clause implicit in all poetry. If\nthings were such and such then . . . and so the response develops.\nThe amplitude and fineness of the response, its sanction and\nauthority, in other words, depend upon this freedom from actual\nassertion in all cases in which the belief is questionable on\nany ground whatsoever. For any such assertion involves suppressions,\nof indefinite extent, which may be fatal to the wholeness, the\nintegrity of the experience. And the assertion is almost always\nunnecessary; if we look closely we find that the greatest poets,\nas poets, though frequently not as critics, refrain from assertion.\nBut it is easy, by what seems only a slight change of approach,\nto make the initial step an act of faith, and to make the whole\nresponse dependent upon a belief as to a matter of fact. Even\nwhen the belief is true, the damage done to the whole experience\nmay be great, in the case of a person whose reasons for this\nbelief are inadequate, for example, and the increased temporary\nvivacity which is the cause of perversion is no sufficient compensation.\nAs a convenient example it may be permissible to refer to the\nPoet Laureate\u2019s anthology, _The Spirit of Man_, and I have\nthe less hesitation since the passages there gathered together\nare chosen with such unerring taste and discrimination. But to\nturn them into a statement of a philosophy is very noticeably\nto degrade them and to restrict and diminish their value. The\nuse of verse quotations as chapter headings is open to the same\nobjection. The experiences which ensue may seem very similar\nto the experiences of free reading; they feel similar; but all\nthe signs which can be most trusted, after-effects for example,\nshow them to be different. The vast differences in the means\nby which they are brought about is also good ground for supposing\nthem to be dissimilar, but this difference is obscured through\nthe ambiguities of the term \u2018belief\u2019.\n\nThere are few terms which are more troublesome in psychology\nthan belief, formidable though this charge may seem. The sense\nin which we believe a scientific proposition is not the sense\nin which we believe emotive utterances, whether they are political\n\u2018We will not sheathe the sword\u2019, or critical \u2018The progress of\npoetry is immortal\u2019, or poetic. Both senses of belief are complicated\nand difficult, to define. Yet we commonly appear to assume that\nthey are the same or that they differ only in the kind and degree\nof evidence available. Scientific belief we may perhaps define\nas readiness to act as though the reference symbolised by the\nproposition which is believed were true. Readiness to act in\n_all_ circumstances and in _all_ connections into which\nit can enter. This rough definition would, of course, need elaborating\nto be complete, but for our present purposes it may suffice.\nThe other element usually included in a definition of belief,\nnamely a feeling or emotion of acceptance, the \u2018This is sooth,\naccept it!\u2019 feeling, is often absent in scientific belief and\nis not essential.\n\nEmotive belief is very different. Readiness to act as though\nsome references were true is often involved, but the connections\nand circumstances in which this readiness remains are narrowly\nrestricted. Similarly the extent of the action is ordinarily\nlimited. Consider the acceptances involved in the understanding\nof a play, for example. They form a system any element of which\nis believed while the rest are believed and so long as the acceptance\nof the whole growing system leads to successful response. Some,\nhowever, are of the form \u2018Given this then that would follow\u2019,\ngeneral beliefs, that is to say, of the kind which led Aristotle,\nin the passage quoted above, to describe Poetry as a more philosophical\nthing than history because chiefly conversant of universal truth.\nBut if we look closely into most instances of such beliefs we\nsee that they are entertained only in the special circumstances\nof the poetic experience. They are held as conditions for further\neffects, our attitudes and emotional responses, and not as we\nhold beliefs in laws of nature, which we expect to find verified\non all occasions. If dramatic necessities were actually scientific\nlaws we should know much more psychology than any reasonable\nperson pretends that we do. That these beliefs as to \u201chow any\nperson of a certain character would speak or act, probably or\nnecessarily\u201d, upon which so much drama seems to depend, are not\nscientific, but are held only for the sake of their dramatic\neffect, is shown clearly by the ease with which we abandon them\nif the advantage lies the other way. The medical impossibility\nof Desdemona\u2019s last speech is perhaps as good an example as any.\n\nThe bulk of the beliefs involved in the arts are of this kind,\nprovisional acceptances, holding only in special circumstances\n(in the state of mind which is the poem or work of art) acceptances\nmade for the sake of the \u2018imaginative experience\u2019 which they\nmake possible. The difference between these emotive beliefs and\nscientific beliefs is not one of degree but of kind. As feelings\nthey are very similar, but as attitudes their difference in structure\nhas widespread consequences.\n\nThere remains to be discussed another set of emotive effects\nwhich may also be called beliefs. Instead of occurring part way\nin, or at the beginning of a response, they come as a rule at\nthe end, and thus are less likely to be confused with scientific\nbeliefs. Very often the whole state of mind in which we are left\nby a poem, or by music, or, more rarely perhaps, by other forms\nof art, is of a kind which it is natural to describe as a belief.\nWhen all provisional acceptances have lapsed, when the single\nreferences and their connections which may have led up to the\nfinal response are forgotten, we may still have an attitude and\nan emotion which has to introspection all the characters of a\nbelief. This belief, which is a consequence not a cause of the\nexperience, is the chief source of the confusion upon which Revelation\nDoctrines depend.\n\nIf we ask what in such cases it is which is believed, we are\nlikely to receive, and to offer, answers both varied and vague.\nFor strong belief-feelings, as is well known and as is shown\nby certain doses of alcohol or hashish, and pre-eminently of\nnitrous oxide, will readily attach themselves to almost any reference,\ndistorting it to suit their purpose. Few people without experience\nof the nitrous-oxide revelation have any conception of their\ncapacity for believing or of the extent to which belief-feelings\nand attitudes are parasitic. Thus when, through reading _Adonais_,\nfor example, we are left in a strong emotional attitude which\nfeels like belief, it is only too easy to think that we are believing\nin immortality or survival, or in something else capable of statement,\nand fatally easy also to attribute the value of the poem to the\nalleged effect, or conversely to regret that it should depend\nupon such a scientifically doubtful conclusion. Scientific beliefs,\nas opposed to these emotive beliefs, are beliefs \u2018_that_\nso and so\u2019. They can be stated with greater or less precision,\nas the case may be, but always in some form. It is for some people\ndifficult to admit beliefs which are objectless, which are not\nabout anything or in anything; beliefs which cannot be stated.\nYet most of the beliefs of children and primitive peoples, and\nof the unscientific generally seem to be of this kind. Their\nparasitic nature helps to confuse the issue. What we have to\ndistinguish are beliefs which are grounded in fact, i.e., are\ndue to reference, and beliefs which are due to other causes,\nand merely attach themselves to such references as will support\nthem.\n\nThat an objectless belief is a ridiculous or an incomplete thing\nis a prejudice deriving only from confusion. Such beliefs have,\nof course, no place in science, but in themselves they are often\nof the utmost value. Provided always that they do not furnish\nthemselves with illicit objects. It is the objectless belief\nwhich is masquerading as a belief in this or that, which is ridiculous;\nmore often than not it is also a serious nuisance. When they\nare kept from tampering with the development of reference such\nemotional attitudes may be, as revelation doctrines in such strange\nforms maintain, among the most important and valuable effects\nwhich the arts can produce.\n\nIt is often held that recent generations suffer more from nervous\nstrain than some at least of their predecessors, and many reasons\nfor this have been suggested. Certainly the types of nervous\ndisease most prevalent seem to have changed. An explanation not\nsufficiently noticed perhaps is the break-down of traditional\naccounts of the universe, and the strain imposed by the vain\nattempt to orient the mind by belief of the scientific kind alone.\nIn the pre-scientific era, the devout adherent to the Catholic\naccount of the world, for example, found a sufficient basis for\nnearly all his main attitudes in what he took to be scientific\ntruth. It would be fairer to say that the difference between\nascertained fact and acceptable fiction did not obtrude itself\nfor him. To-day this is changed, and if he believes such an account,\nhe does not do so, if intelligent, without considerable difficulty\nor without a fairly persistent strain. The complete sceptic,\nof course, is a new phenomenon, dissenters in the past having\ncommonly disbelieved only because they held a different belief\nof the same kind. These topics have, it is true, been touched\nupon by psycho-analysts, but not with a very clear understanding\nof the situation. The Vienna School would merely have us away\nwith antiquated lumber; the Zurich School would hand us a new\noutfit of superstitions. Actually what is needed is a habit of\nmind which allows both reference and the development of attitudes\ntheir proper independence. This habit of mind is not to be attained\nat once, or for most people with ease. We try desperately to\nsupport our attitudes with beliefs as to facts, verified or accepted\nas scientifically established, and by so doing we weaken our\nown emotional backbone. For the justification of any attitude\n_per se_ is its success for the needs of the being. It is\nnot justified by the soundness of the views which may seem to\nbe, and in pathological cases are, its ground and causes. The\nsource of our attitudes should be in experience itself; compare\nWhitman\u2019s praise of the cow which does not worry about its soul.\nOpinion as to matters of fact, knowledge, belief, are not necessarily\ninvolved in any of our attitudes to the world in general, or\nto particular phases of it. If we bring them in, if, by a psychological\nperversion only too easy to fall into, we make them the basis\nof our adjustment, we run extreme risks of later disorganisation\nelsewhere.\n\nMany people find great difficulty in accepting or even in understanding\nthis position. They are so accustomed to regarding \u2018recognised\nfacts\u2019 as the natural basis of attitudes, that they cannot conceive\nhow anyone can be otherwise organised. The hard-headed positivist\nand the convinced adherent of a religion from opposite sides\nencounter the same difficulty. The first at the best suffers\nfrom an insufficient material for the development of his attitudes;\nthe second from intellectual bondage and unconscious insincerity.\nThe one starves himself; the other is like the little pig in\nthe fable who chose to have his house built of cabbages and ate\nit, and so the grim wolf with privy paw devoured him. For clear\nand impartial awareness of the nature of the world in which we\nlive and the development of attitudes which will enable us to\nlive in it finely are both necessities, and neither can be subordinated\nto the other. They are almost independent, such connections as\nexist in well-organised individuals being adventitious. Those\nwho find this a hard saying may be invited to consider the effect\nupon them of those works of art which most unmistakably attune\nthem to existence. The central experience of Tragedy and its\nchief value is an attitude indispensable for a fully developed\nlife. But in the reading of _King Lear_ what facts verifiable\nby science, or accepted and believed in as we accept and believe\nin ascertained facts, are relevant? None whatever. Still more\nclearly in the experiences of some music, of some architecture\nand of some abstract design, attitudes are evoked and developed\nwhich are unquestionably independent of all beliefs as to fact,\nand these are exceptional only in being protected by accident\nfrom the most insidious perversion to which the mind is liable.\nFor the intermingling of knowledge and belief is indeed a perversion,\nthrough which both activities suffer degradation.\n\nThese objectless beliefs, which though merely attitudes seem\nto be knowledge, are not difficult to explain. Some system of\nimpulses not ordinarily in adjustment within itself or adjusted\nto the world finds something which orders it or gives it fit\nexercise. Then follows the peculiar sense of ease, of restfulness,\nof free, unimpeded activity, and the feeling of acceptance, of\nsomething more positive than acquiescence. This feeling is the\nreason why such states may be called beliefs. They share this\nfeeling with, for example, the state which follows the conclusive\nanswering of a question. Most attitude-adjustments which are\nsuccessful possess it in some degree, but those which are very\nregular and familiar, such as sitting down to meat or stretching\nout in bed, naturally tend to lose it. But when the required\nattitude has been long needed, where its coming is unforeseen\nand the manner in which it is brought about complicated and inexplicable,\nwhere we know no more than that formerly we were unready and\nthat now we are ready for life in some particular phase, the\nfeeling which results may be intense. Such are the occasions\nupon which the arts seem to lift away the burden of existence,\nand we seem ourselves to be looking into the heart of things.\nTo be seeing whatever it is as it really is, to be cleared in\nvision and to be recipients of a revelation.\n\nWe have considered already the detail of these states of consciousness\nand their conjectural impulse basis. We can now take this feeling\nof a revealed significance, this attitude of readiness, acceptance\nand understanding, which has led to so many Revelation Doctrines,\nnot as actually implying knowledge, but for what it is\u2014the conscious\naccompaniment of our successful adjustment to life. But it is,\nwe must admit, no certain sign by itself that our adjustment\nis adequate or admirable. Even the most firm adherents to Revelation\nDoctrines admit that there are bogus revelations, and on our\naccount it is equally important to distinguish between \u2018feelings\nof significance\u2019 which indicate that all is well and those which\ndo not. In a sense all indicate that _something_ is going\nwell, otherwise there would be no acceptance, no belief but rejection.\nThe real question is \u2018What is it?\u2019 Thus after the queer reshuffling\nof inhibitions and releases which follows the taking of a dose\nof alcohol, for example, the sense of revelation is apt to occur\nwith unusual authority. Doubtless this feeling of significance\nis a sign that as the organism is for the moment, its affairs\nare for the moment thriving. But when the momentary special condition\nof the system has given place to the more usual, more stable\nand more generally advantageous adjustment, the authority of\nthe vision falls away from it; we find that what we were doing\nis by no means so wonderful or so desirable as we thought and\nthat our belief was nonsensical. So it is less noticeably with\nmany moments in which the world seems to be showing its real\nface to us.\n\nThe chief difficulty of all Revelation Doctrines has always been\nto discover what it is which is revealed. If these states of\nmind are knowledge it should be possible to state what it is\nthat they know. It is often easy enough to find something which\nwe can suppose to be what we know. Belief feelings, we have seen,\nare _parasitic_, and will attach themselves to all kinds\nof hosts. In literature it is especially easy to find hosts.\nBut in music, in the non-representative arts of design, in architecture\nor ceramics, for example, the task of finding something to believe,\nor to believe in, is not so easy. Yet the \u2018feeling of significance\u2019\nis as common[102] in these other arts as in literature. Denial\nof this is usually proof only of an interest limited to literature.\n\nThis difficulty has usually been met by asserting that the alleged\nknowledge given in the revelation is non-intellectual. It refuses\nto be rationalised, it is said. Well and good; but if so why\ncall it knowledge? Either it is capable of corroborating or of\nconflicting with the other things we usually call knowledge,\nsuch as the laws of thermodynamics, capable of being stated and\nbrought into connection with what else we know; or it is not\nknowledge, not capable of being stated. We cannot have it both\nways, and no sneers at the limitations of logic, the commonest\nof the resources of the confused, amend the dilemma. In fact\nit resembles knowledge only in being an attitude and a feeling\nvery similar to some attitudes and feelings which may and often\ndo accompany knowledge. But \u2018Knowledge\u2019 is an immensely potent\nemotive word engendering reverence towards any state of mind\nto which it is applied. And these \u2018feelings of significance\u2019\nare those among our states of mind which most deserve to be revered.\nThat they should be so obstinately described as knowledge even\nby those who most carefully remove from them all the characteristics\nof knowledge is not surprising.\n\nTraditionally what is said to be known thus mystically through\nthe arts is Beauty, a remote and divine entity not otherwise\nto be apprehended, one of the Eternal Absolute Values. And this\nis doubtless emotively a way of talking which is effective for\na while. When its power abates, as the power of such utterances\nwill, there are several developments which may easily be used\nto revive it. \u201cBeauty is eternal, and we may say that it is already\nmanifest as a heavenly thing\u2014the beauty of Nature is indeed an\nearnest to us of the ultimate goodness which lies behind the\napparent cruelty and moral confusion of organic life. . . . Yet\nwe feel that these three are ultimately one, and human speech\nbears constant witness to the universal conviction that Goodness\nis beautiful, that Beauty is good, that Truth is Beauty. We can\nhardly avoid the use of the word \u2018trinity\u2019, and if we are theists\nat all we cannot but say that they are one, because they are\nthe manifestation of one God. If we are not theists there is\nno explanation.\u201d[103]\n\nHuman speech is indeed the witness, and to what else does it\nnot witness? It would be strange if in a matter of such moment\nas this the greatest of all emotive words did not come into play.\n\u201cIn religion we believe that God is Beauty and Life, that God\nis Truth and Light, that God is Goodness and Love, and that because\nhe is all these they are all one, and the Trinity in Unity and\nUnity in Trinity is to be worshipped.\u201d[104] No one who can interpret\nemotive language, who can avoid the temptation to illicit belief\nso constantly presented by it need find such utterances \u2018meaningless.\u2019\nBut the wrong approach is easy and far too often pressingly invited\nby the speakers, labouring themselves under misconceptions. To\nexcite a serious and reverent attitude is one thing. To set forth\nan explanation is another. To confuse the two and mistake the\nincitement of an attitude for a statement of fact is a practice\nwhich should be discouraged. For intellectual dishonesty is an\nevil which is the more dangerous the more it is hedged about\nwith emotional sanctities. And after all there is another explanation,\nwhich would long ago have been quietly established to the world\u2019s\ngreat good had men been less ready to sacrifice the integrity\nof their thought and feeling for the sake of a local and limited\nadvantage.\n\n\n\n\n\n\nThe last movement of this machine to think with is now completed.\nI am too well acquainted with it, and have spent too many hours\nputting it together to suppose that it can be worked equally\nwell by every reader. Half these hours have in fact been spent\nin simplifying its structure, in taking out reservations and\nqualifications, references to other views, controversial matter,\nand supernumerary distinctions. From one point of view, it would\nbe a better book with these left in, but I wished to make it\nmanageable by those who had not spent a quite disproportionate\namount of energy in reflection upon abstract matters. And if\nto some readers parts of it appear unnecessary\u2014either _irrelevant_,\nin the one case; or _over-obvious_ in the other\u2014I have nothing\nto add which would make them change their opinion. The first\nI can only ask to look again, with the hope that a connection\nwhich has been missed will be noticed. The second, I would remind\nthat I write in an age when, in the majority of social circles,\nto be seriously interested in art is to be thought an oddity.\n\n[100] No merit, that is, _in this connection_. There may be\nsome exceptions to this, cases in which the explicit recognition\nof the truth of a statement as opposed to the simple acceptance\nof it, is _necessary_ to the full development of the further\nresponse. But I believe that such cases will on careful examination\nbe found to be very rare with competent readers. Individual differences,\ncorresponding to the different degrees to which individuals have\ntheir belief feelings, their references, and their attitudes\nentangled, are to be expected. There are, of course, an immense\nnumber of scientific beliefs present among the conditions of\nevery attitude. But since acceptances would do equally well in\ntheir place they are not _necessary_ to it.\n\n[101] In view of a possible misunderstanding at this point, compare\nChapter X, especially the final paragraph. If a belief in Retributive\nJustice, for example, is fatal to _Prometheus Unbound_,\nso in another way is the belief that the Millennium is at hand.\nTo steer an unperplexed path between these opposite dangers is\nextremely difficult. The distinctions required are perhaps better\nleft to the reader\u2019s reflection than laboured further in the\nfaulty terminology which alone at present is available.\n\n[102] Cf. Gurney, _The Power of Sound_, p. 126. \u201cA splendid melodic\nphrase seems continually not like an object of sense, but like an\naffirmation; not so much prompting admiring ejaculation as compelling\npassionate assent.\u201d His explanation, through association with speech,\nseems to me inadequate. He adds that the use of terms such as\n\u201c_expressiveness_ and _significance_, as opposed to meaninglessness and\ntriviality, may be allowed, without the implication of any reference to\ntranscendental views which one may fail to understand, or theories of\ninterpretation which one may entirely repudiate.\u201d\n\n[103] Percy Dearmer, _The Necessity of Art_, p. 180.\n\n[104] A.W. Pollard, _ibidem_, p. 135.\n\n\n\n\nAPPENDIX A. On Value\n\n\nA friendly reviewer, Mr. Conrad Aiken, complains that my theory\nof value is not sufficiently relativistic, that it inevitably\ninvolves the surreptitious re-entrance of the \u2018absolute\u2019 value\nwhich we had been at such pains to exclude. Except for the word\n\u2018surreptitious\u2019 and the suggestion that the \u2018absolute\u2019 value\nwe arrive at is the same thing as the ultimate idea discussed\nin Chapter VI., I agree to this. The purpose of the theory is\njust to enable us to compare different experiences in respect\nof their value; and their value, I suggest, is a quantitative\nmatter. To put it briefly the best life is that in which as much\nas possible of our possible personality is engaged. And of two\npersonalities that one is the better in which there is more which\ncan be engaged without confusion. We all know people of unusually\nwide and varied possibilities who pay for their width in disorder,\nand we know others who pay for their order by narrowness. What\nthe theory attempts to provide is a system of measurement by\nwhich we can compare not only different experiences belonging\nto the same personality but different personalities. We do not\nyet know how to make the measurements required. We have to use\nthe roughest kinds of estimates and very indirect indications.\nBut to know at least what would have to be measured if we were\nto reach precision and how to make the comparison is a step towards\nthe goal. The parallel, though I am not fond of it, between the\nnew absolutism which Relativity has reached and this quantitative\nway of comparing the experiences and preferences of individuals\nmay perhaps be helpful. But whereas the physicist has measurements\nto work from, the psychologist as yet has none. And further,\nit is likely that modes of mental organisation which are at present\nimpossible or dangerously unstable may become possible and even\neasy in the future with changes in social structure and material\nconditions. This last consideration might give any critic a nightmare.\nNothing less than our whole sense of man\u2019s history and destiny\nis involved in our final decision as to value.\n\n\n\n\nAPPENDIX B.\n\nTHE POETRY OF T. S. ELIOT\n\n\nWe too readily forget that, unless something is very wrong with\nour civilisation, we should be producing three equal poets at\nleast for every poet of high rank in our great-great-grandfathers\u2019\nday. Something must indeed be wrong; and since Mr. Eliot is one\nof the very few poets that current conditions have not overcome,\nthe difficulties which he has faced, and the cognate difficulties\nwhich his readers encounter, repay study.\n\nMr. Eliot\u2019s poetry has occasioned an unusual amount of irritated\nor enthusiastic bewilderment. The bewilderment has several sources.\nThe most formidable is the unobtrusiveness, in some cases the\nabsence, of any coherent intellectual thread upon which the items\nof the poem are strung. A reader of \u2018Gerontion,\u2019 of \u2018Preludes,\u2019\nor of \u2018The Waste Land,\u2019 may, if he will, after repeated readings,\nintroduce such a thread. Another reader after much effort may\nfail to contrive one. But in either case energy will have been\nmisapplied. For the items are united by the accord, contrast,\nand interaction of their emotional effects, not by an intellectual\nscheme that analysis must work out. The value lies in the unified\nresponse which this interaction creates in the right reader.\nThe only intellectual activity required takes place in the realisation\nof the separate items. We can, of course, make a \u2018rationalisation\u2019\nof the whole experience, as we can of any experience. If we do,\nwe are adding something which does not belong to the poem. Such\na logical scheme is, at best, a scaffolding that vanishes when\nthe poem is constructed. But we have so built into our nervous\nsystems a demand for intellectual coherence, even in poetry,\nthat we find a difficulty in doing without it.\n\nThis point may be misunderstood, for the charge most usually\nbrought against Mr. Eliot\u2019s poetry is that it is overintellectualised.\nOne reason for this is his use of allusion. A reader who in one\nshort poem picks up allusions to _The Aspern Papers_, _Othello_,\n\u2018A Toccata of Galuppi\u2019s,\u2019 Marston, _The Ph\u0153nix and the Turtle_,\n_Antony and Cleopatra_ (twice), \u2018The Extasie,\u2019 _Macbeth_,\n_The Merchant of Venice_, and Ruskin, feels that his wits\nare being unusually well exercised. He may easily leap to the\nconclusion that the basis of the poem is in wit also. But this\nwould be a mistake. These things come in, not that the reader\nmay be ingenious or admire the writer\u2019s erudition (this last\naccusation has tempted several critics to disgrace themselves),\nbut for the sake of the emotional aura which they bring and the\nattitudes they incite. Allusion in Mr. Eliot\u2019s hands is a technical\ndevice for compression. \u2018The Waste Land\u2019 is the equivalent in\ncontent to an epic. Without this device twelve books would have\nbeen needed. But these allusions and the notes in which some\nof them are elucidated have made many a petulant reader turn\ndown his thumb at once. Such a reader has not begun to understand\nwhat it is all about.\n\nThis objection is connected with another, that of obscurity.\nTo quote a recent pronouncement upon \u2018The Waste Land\u2019 from Mr.\nMiddleton Murry: \u2018The reader is compelled, in the mere effort\nto understand, to adopt an attitude of intellectual suspicion,\nwhich makes impossible the communication of feeling. The work\noffends against the most elementary canon of good writing: that\nthe immediate effect should be unambiguous.\u2019 Consider first this\ncanon. What would happen, if we pressed it, to Shakespeare\u2019s\ngreatest sonnets or to _Hamlet_? The truth is that very\nmuch of the best poetry is necessarily ambiguous in its immediate\neffect. Even the most careful and responsive reader must reread\nand do hard work before the poem forms itself clearly and unambiguously\nin his mind. An original poem, as much as a new branch of mathematics,\ncompels the mind which receives it to grow, and this takes time.\nAnyone who upon reflection asserts the contrary for his own case\nmust be either a demigod or dishonest; probably Mr. Murray was\nin haste. His remarks show that he has failed in his attempt\nto read the poem, and they reveal, in part, the reason for his\nfailure\u2014namely, his own overintellectual approach. To read it\nsuccessfully he would have to discontinue his present self-mystifications.\n\nThe critical question in all cases is whether the poem is worth\nthe trouble it entails. For \u2018The Waste Land\u2019 this is considerable.\nThere is Miss Weston\u2019s _From Ritual to Romance_ to read,\nand its \u2018astral\u2019 trimmings to be discarded\u2014they have nothing\nto do with Mr. Eliot\u2019s poem. There is Canto xxvi of the _Purgatorio_\nto be studied\u2014the relevance of the close of that canto to the\nwhole of Mr. Eliot\u2019s work must be insisted upon. It illuminates\nhis persistent concern with sex, the problem of our generation,\nas religion was the problem of the last. There is the central\nposition of Tiresias in the poem to be puzzled out\u2014the cryptic\nform of the note which Mr. Eliot writes on this point is just\na little tiresome. It is a way of underlining the fact that the\npoem is concerned with many aspects of the one fact of sex, a\nhint that is perhaps neither indispensable nor entirely successful.\n\nWhen all this has been done by the reader, when the materials\nwith which the words are to clothe themselves have been collected,\nthe poem still remains to be read. And it is easy to fail in\nthis undertaking. An \u2018attitude of intellectual suspicion\u2019 must\ncertainly be abandoned. But this is not difficult to those who\nstill know how to give their feelings precedence to their thoughts,\nwho can accept and unify an experience without trying to catch\nit in an intellectual net or to squeeze out a doctrine. One form\nof this attempt must be mentioned. Some, misled no doubt by its\norigin in a Mystery, have endeavoured to give the poem a symbolical\nreading. But its symbols are not mystical, but emotional. They\nstand, that is, not for ineffable objects, but for normal human\nexperience. The poem, in fact, is radically naturalistic; only\nits compression makes it appear otherwise. And in this it probably\ncomes nearer to the original Mystery which it perpetuates than\ntranscendentalism does.\n\nIf it were desired to label in three words the most characteristic\nfeature of Mr. Eliot\u2019s technique, this might be done by calling\nhis poetry a music of ideas. The ideas are of all kinds, abstract\nand concrete, general and particular, and, like the musician\u2019s\nphrases, they are arranged, not that they may tell us something,\nbut that their effects in us may combine into a coherent whole\nof feeling and attitude and produce a peculiar liberation of\nthe will. They are there to be responded to, not to be pondered\nor worked out. This is, of course, a method used intermittently\nin very much poetry, and only an accentuation and isolation of\none of its normal resources. The peculiarity of Mr. Eliot\u2019s later,\nmore puzzling, work is his deliberate and almost exclusive employment\nof it. In the earlier poems this logical freedom appears only\noccasionally. In \u2018The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock,\u2019 for example,\nthere is a patch at the beginning and another at the end, but\nthe rest of the poem is quite straightforward. In \u2018Gerontion,\u2019\nthe first long poem in this manner, the air of monologue, of\na stream of associations, is a kind of disguise, and the last\ntwo lines,\n\n Tenants of the house,\n Thoughts of a dry brain in a dry season,\n\nare almost an excuse. The close of \u2018A Cooking Egg\u2019 is perhaps\nthe passage in which the technique shows itself most clearly.\nThe reader who appreciates the emotional relevance of the title\nhas the key to the later poems in his hand. I take Pipit to be\nthe retired nurse of the hero of the poem, and _Views of the\nOxford Colleges_ to be the, still treasured, present which\nhe sent her when he went up to the University. The middle section\nof the poem I read as a specimen of the rather withered pleasantry\nin which contemporary culture has culminated and beyond which\nit finds much difficulty in passing. The final section gives\nthe contrast which is pressed home by the title. Even the most\nmature egg was new laid once. The only other title of equal significance\nthat I can recall is Mrs. Wharton\u2019s _The Age of Innocence_,\nwhich might well be studied in this connection. \u2018The Waste Land\u2019\nand \u2018The Hollow Men\u2019 (the most beautiful of Mr. Eliot\u2019s poems,\nand in the last section a new development) are purely a \u2018music\nof ideas,\u2019 and the pretence of a continuous thread of associations\nis dropped.\n\nHow this technique lends itself to misunderstandings we have\nseen. But many readers who have failed in the end to escape bewilderment\nhave begun by finding on almost every line that Mr. Eliot has\nwritten\u2014if we except certain youthful poems on American topics\u2014that\npersonal stamp which is the hardest thing for the craftsman to\nimitate and perhaps the most certain sign that the experience,\ngood or bad, rendered in the poem is authentic. Only those unfortunate\npersons who are incapable of reading poetry can resist Mr. Eliot\u2019s\nrhythms. The poem as a whole may elude us while every fragment,\nas a fragment, comes victoriously home. It is difficult to believe\nthat this is Mr. Eliot\u2019s fault rather than his reader\u2019s, because\na parallel case of a poet who so constantly achieves the hardest\npart of his task and yet fails in the easier is not to be found.\nIt is much more likely that we have been trying to put the fragments\ntogether on a wrong principle.\n\nAnother doubt has been expressed. Mr. Eliot repeats himself in\ntwo ways. The nightingale, Cleopatra\u2019s barge, the rats, and the\nsmoky candle-end, recur and recur. Is this a sign of a poverty\nof inspiration? A more plausible explanation is that this repetition\nis in part a consequence of the technique above described, and\nin part something which many writers who are not accused of poverty\nalso show. Shelley, with his rivers, towers, and stars, Conrad,\nHardy, Walt Whitman, and Dostoevski spring to mind. When a writer\nhas found a theme or image which fixes a point of relative stability\nin the drift of experience, it is not to be expected that he\nwill avoid it. Such themes are a means of orientation. And it\nis quite true that the central process in all Mr. Eliot\u2019s best\npoems is the same; the conjunction of feelings which, though\nsuperficially opposed,\u2014as squalor, for example, is opposed to\ngrandeur,\u2014yet tend as they develop to change places and even\nto unite. If they do not develop far enough the intention of\nthe poet is missed. Mr. Eliot is neither sighing after vanished\nglories nor holding contemporary experience up to scorn.\n\nBoth bitterness and desolation are superficial aspects of his\npoetry. There are those who think that he merely takes his readers\ninto the Waste Land and leaves them there, that in his last poem\nhe confesses his impotence to release the healing waters. The\nreply is that some readers find in his poetry not only a clearer,\nfuller realisation of their plight, the plight of a whole generation,\nthan they find elsewhere, but also through the very energies\nset free in that realisation a return of the saving passion.","title":"Principles of literary criticism","tradition":"philosophy-ethics","translated_text":null,"word_count":83863}