The Elements Of Art.

The True, the Good, the Beautiful.

Though Delsarte be acknowledged the discoverer of the law of aesthetics, he may have held points in common with many who before him had had presentiments of its coming and had instinctively experienced its force.  Premonitions precede the discovery as complements should follow.

The True, the Good, the Beautiful, constituent elements of aesthetics, have been diversely interpreted.  From his intellectual observatory, a zenith whence the artist-philosopher viewed clearly the whole and the details, he may be supposed to have gained light beyond any which could have come to his predecessors.

I will, then, resume my parallel from this point of view.

The True, the Good and the Beautiful were not made, in the school of Delsarte, objects of special teaching.  By definitions, reflections and illustrations of the master, they were shown to enter fully into the science and method—­a part of it distinguishable and inseparable.  The master, in his demonstrations, commonly employed various well-known maxims which were always accredited to their authors.  Thus, from Plato:  “The Beautiful is the splendor of the True.”  From St. Thomas Aquinas, in regard to science:  “In creation all is done by number, weight and measure.”  From St. Augustine (for he often quoted from sacred works):  “Moral beauty is the brilliancy of the Good.”

But I must proceed in order.  I owe it to the sincerity of my endeavor to explain first the aesthetic work of Delsarte as shown me by his own teachings.

The True.

The True Illuminates the Thought.

To determine the signification of the True, we must first ask what is truth? It has been defined as:  “A fixed principle, an axiom.”  The term truth has been applied to such or such maxims; but there are few assertions not subject to discussion or which would be accepted as decisive without comment.  They have not that piercing clearness which determines conviction by simple apprehension or at first sight.

The dictionary of the Academy is more explicit in its statement:  “Truth is the conformity of the idea to its object.”  But a preferable definition is that of Madame Clemence Royer:  “Truth is the concept of the spirit in regard to the reality of things and the laws which govern them.”  This philosophical statement is readily adapted to the True in the arts, which is acquired by the observation of nature and adaptation of the lawful ideal.

How, then, may we recognize the True in aesthetics according to this definition?  The artist, first and above all, should disregard no law of nature, but when he aspires to great works, “the concept of his spirit in regard to the reality of things and their laws” should lead him to idealize what he sees, translating his personal conception of the Beautiful and the Sublime, if his flight carry him so far.