The Philosophy of Fine Art. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel

and opposition of these two aspects of one whole, that is, objects and relating self-conscious life, is presupposed in, and indeed is an accurate definition of, this point of view.

      And, similarly, with reference to the lack of freedom in the object. Here, too, in the sphere of intelligible conception, the independence of the object is assumed, but the freedom assumed is only apparent. For it is only posited as bare objectivity without securing the presence of its notion, as the unity and universality of the conscious subject, within such objectivity. It still remains outside it. Every object thus placed external to the notion merely exists as particularity, which comes back to us in external guise together with its manifold, and is, in all the unlimited scope of its relations, through its contact with other objects, subject to the conditions of its origin, change, opposing force and final overthrow. In the practical world the dependence of the object is expressly, in this view, assumed, and the opposition of the thing is posited in definite relation to volition without possessing in itself the power of ultimate self-subsistency permitted to the latter.

      (c) The apprehension of the object as beautiful unites these two abstract points of view. It in fact annuls the one-sidedness of both whether relatively to the subject of consciousness or its object, and by doing so cancels the finitude and lack of freedom which characterize them.

Philosophically regarded199, the reason is this, that the object is not apprehended in its existence as an isolated thing whose notion as the object of human thought is removed from the objectivity which belongs to it as something outside it, and which in its particular reality extends and is dissipated in every conceivable direction as a manifold content of intelligible relations. An object which is beautiful suffers its own notion to appear as realized in its objective presence, and reveals in that appearance the unity and life inseparable from the conscious subject. For this reason the object may be conceived as sweeping back into the curve of its unity that impulse of continuous externality, cancelling its dependence on other objects, and transmuting to our vision its unfree finitude into free infinity.

      Furthermore, the Ego in its relation to the object of beauty ceases to be merely the abstract attention or sensuous perception, and the floating away of such perceptions into equally abstract reflections. Rather, it is itself concretely realized in this object, being at once the unity and reality of its notional idea, and uniting for itself in its rounded concreteness that which has hitherto remained, as abstractly perceived, apart in the Ego of the subject of perception and the thing perceived.

      Coming now to the practical import of this relation as it applies to the object of beauty, we have already drawn attention to the fact at some length, that in the contemplation of it the element of sensuous passion drops away. All personal impulse that the individual may feel toward the object is done away with through that very aesthetic contemplation, which regards it as self-subsistent in itself, in other words, its own object. For this reason, the purely finite relation of the object also disappears, the relation, that is, in which it subserved, as a means for their realization, aims which were foreign to it, and towards the fulfilment of which it was either presented as unfree or was compelled to take up, however strange, into its own existence. At the same time that relation of the Ego in the practical world which we found to be unfree disappears, inasmuch as it differentiates itself no longer in subjective motives and their means or material, remaining fixed in the finite relation of the formal "ought" for the carrying out of its subjective ends in the object, but is here confronted with the notion and its aim completely realized.

We may say, then, that the aesthetic contemplation of the beautiful is a liberal education, a portrayal of the object in its free and infinite being, with no detracting consideration of its use or employment for finite wants and purposes. Further, the object as a thing of beauty is neither under force or compulsion at our hands, nor is it in conflict with and overcome by other things outside it. It is of the essence of beauty that the notion, end and soul thereof, no less than its existent form, and variety generally, manifest themselves out of their own intrinsic wealth rather than through the energy of something outside them. The reason of this lies in the fact, already insisted upon, that their truth consists solely in the unity and harmony of their notion with their objective existence. And inasmuch as the notion is itself concrete totality, its objective reality also appears as a manifestation of the same, homogeneous in all its parts, which, as thus imbedded in the notion, appear to fall into such ideal unity and animation. For this harmony of the notion and its envisagement is nothing less than perfected suffusion200. Accordingly the exterior form and shape is manifested, not as such by its separation from other material, or as an impression mechanically related to aims which are foreign to it, but as the form of reality wherein the notion accommodates itself out of its own stuff and substance. Finally, however much the particular aspects, parts or articulations of the beautiful object are presented in the ideal unity of the notion and its unified envisagement, that harmony must be so rendered visible to sense, that in relation to one another they preserve the semblance of self-subsistent freedom; in other words they must not only possess the ideal unity of the notion as such, but must reflect back the side of a reality which is substantially objective also. Both aspects, in short, must be present in beautiful objects; for these are, on the one hand, the necessity posited through the notion and discovered in the harmonious conclusion of these particular aspects, and on the other, the envisagement of their freedom as essentially one with the whole, and not merely that of the unity which exists between the parts. Necessity in its full definition means the just relation of the two aspects, which coalesce so completely that to posit one is to posit the other. Such a necessity must unquestionably be present in beautiful objects. It is not, however, under the mode of necessity that it appears; rather it should conceal itself beneath the semblance of unintentional accident. Otherwise the particular parts of such a real presence lose the position they should occupy according to their own real existence, and only appear in the service of their ideal unity, to which they therefore remain in abstract subordination.

      In virtue of the freedom and infinitude above analysed, which is inherent in the notion of beauty, whether we view it in its objective presence as a thing of beauty, or under its aesthetic contemplation, we disengage the province of the beautiful from the relations of finite condition, to exalt it into that of the Idea and its truth.

188. This is, of course, a note of Hegel himself.

189. This, of course, has reference to Hegel's unfortunate belief in Goethe's theory of colour.

190. Mediated (vermittelt), because the concrete is first apprehended through its differences, and only after reflection do we arrive at the notional unity which transcends and unites them.

191. Momente. Phases asserted and reconciled in the evolved notional unity, organic or otherwise. The notion is subjective because it is an ideal unity.

192. The text is clearly corrupt. The full-stop after herzustellen should be a comma, and auch would be preferably changed to als die.

193. As essentially reason.

194. Not the substantive, but past participle.

195. Das sinnliche Scheinen.

196. Verstand in the technical sense of Kant's philosophy; that is, the faculty of scientific observation or ordinary perception—analytical, in contrast to reason