Critique of apparent feelings.

it is finished, experiencing, in addition to the æsthetic pleasure, that very different one which arises from the thought of self-love satisfied, or of the economic gain which will come to him from his work. Examples could be multiplied.

A category of apparent æsthetic feelings has been formed in modern Esthetic. These have

nothing to do with the aesthetic sensations of pleasure arising from the form, that is to say from the work of art. On the contrary, they arise from the content of the work of art. It has been observed that "artistic representations arouse pleasure and pain in their infinite variety and gradations. We tremble with anxiety, we rejoice, we fear, we laugh, we weep, we desire, with the personages of a drama or of a romance, with the figures in a picture, or with the melody of music. But these feelings are not those that would give occasion to the real fact outside art; that is to say, they are the same in quality, but they are quantitively an attenuation. Esthetic and apparent pleasure and pain are slight, of little depth, and changeable." We have no need to treat of these apparent feelings, for the good reason that we have already amply discussed them; indeed, we have treated of them alone. What are ever feelings that

become apparent or manifest, but feelings objectified, intensified, expressed? And it is natural that they do not trouble and agitate us passionately, as do those of real life, because those were matter, these are form and activity; those true and proper feelings, these intuitions and expressions. The formula, then, of apparent feelings is nothing but a tautology. The best that can be done is to run the pen through it.

Critique of the beautiful as that which pleases the

higher senses.

XI

CRITIQUE OF ÆSTHETIC HEDONISM

As we
are opposed to hedonism in general,
that is to say, to the theory which is based on
the pleasure and pain intrinsic to Economy
and accompanies every other form of activity,
confounding the content and that which con-
tains it, and fails to recognize any process but
the hedonistic; so we are opposed to æsthetic
hedonism in particular, which looks upon the
æsthetic at any rate, if not also upon all other
activities, as a simple fact of feeling, and con-
founds the pleasurable of expression, which is
the beautiful, with the pleasurable and nothing
more, and with the pleasurable of all sorts.

The aesthetic-hedonistic point of view has
been presented in several forms. One of the
most ancient conceives the beautiful as that
which pleases the sight and hearing, that is to
say, the so-called superior senses.
When analysis
of æsthetic facts first began, it was, in fact,

difficult to avoid the mistake of thinking that a
picture and a piece of music are impressions of
sight or of hearing: it was and is an indisputable
fact that the blind man does not enjoy the
picture, nor the deaf man the music. To show,
as we have shown, that the aesthetic fact does
not depend upon the nature of the impressions,
but that all sensible impressions can be raised
to æsthetic expression and that none need of
necessity be so raised, is an idea which presents
itself only when all the other ways out of the
difficulty have been tried.
But whoso imagines
that the æsthetic fact is something pleasing to
the eyes or to the hearing, has no line of defence
against him who proceeds logically to identify
the beautiful with the pleasurable in general, and
includes cooking in Æsthetic, or, as some positivist
has done, the viscerally beautiful.

theory of play.

The theory of play is another form of æsthetic Critique of the hedonism. The conception of play has sometimes helped towards the realization of the actifying character of the expressive fact: man (it has been said) is not really man, save when he begins to play; that is to say, when he frees himself from natural and mechanical causality and operates spiritually; and his first game is art. But since the word play also means that pleasure which

Critique of the theories of

the triumph.

arises from the expenditure of the exuberant energy of the organism (that is to say, from a practical act), the consequence of this theory has been, that every game has been called an æsthetic fact, and that the æsthetic function has been called a game, in so far as it is possible to play with it, for, like science and every other thing, Esthetic can be made part of a game. morality cannot be provoked at the intention of playing, on the ground that it does not consent; on the contrary, it dominates and regulates the act of playing itself.

But

Finally, there have been some who have tried sexuality and of to deduce the pleasure of art from the reaction of the sexual organs. There are some very modern æstheticians who place the genesis of the æsthetic fact in the pleasure of conquering, of triumphing, or, as others add, in the desire of the male, who wishes to conquer the female. This theory is seasoned with much anecdotal erudition, Heaven knows of what degree of credibility! on the customs of savage peoples. But in very truth there was no necessity for such important aid, for one often meets in ordinary life poets who adorn themselves with their poetry, like cocks that raise their crests, or turkeys that spread their tails. But he who does such things, in so far as he does