Letters Upon The Aesthetic Education of Man
one is compelled to appeal as frequently to feelings as to principles (2)to-process
But this very technical shape which renders truth visible to the understanding conceals it from the feelings; for, unhappily, understanding begins by destroying the object of the inner sense before it can appropriate the object. (2)to-process
Like the chemist, the philosopher finds synthesis only by analysis, or the spontaneous work of nature only through the torture of art. Thus, in order to detain the fleeting apparition, he must enchain it in the fetters of rule, dissect its fair proportions into abstract notions, and preserve its living spirit in a fleshless skeleton of words. Is it surprising that natural feeling should not recognise itself in such a copy, and if in the report of the analyst the truth appears as paradox? (2)to-process ❧ It seems like the idea of beautiful comes from the entirety of the boulderness, so by dissecting it, not only is the full picture missed, the beauty within it is lacking.
For art has to leave reality, it has to raise itself bodily above necessity and neediness; for art is the daughter of freedom, and it requires its prescriptions and rules to be furnished by the necessity of spirits and not by that of matter. But in our day it is necessity, neediness, that prevails, and bends a degraded humanity under its iron yoke. Utility is the great idol of the time, to which all powers do homage and all subjects are subservient. In this great balance of utility, the spiritual service of art has no weight, and, deprived of all encouragement, it vanishes from the noisy Vanity Fair of our time. (3)to-process ❧ Art(s) is by definition not necessary, but our current society values necessity and despises whatever serves no needed utility
it is through beauty that we arrive at freedom (3)to-process
But the very fact that constitutes him a man is, that he does not remain stationary, where nature has placed him, that he can pass with his reason, retracing the steps nature had made him anticipate, that he can convert the work of necessity into one of free solution (3)to-process ❧ Man is different from the other works of nature in that it becomes free, and, as a result/prerequisite, artistic