The Psychology of Beauty | Page 5

characterization,-- to create a lyric of criticism out of the unique
pleasure of an aesthetic hour. The stronghold of the scientist, on the
other hand, is the doctrine of literary evolution, and his aim is to show

the history of literature as the history of a process, and the work of
literature as a product; to explain it from its preceding causes, and to
detect thereby the general laws of literary metamorphosis.
Such are the two great lines of modern criticism; their purposes and
ideals stand diametrically opposed. Of late, however, there have not
been wanting signs of a spirit of reconciliation, and of a tendency to
concede the value, each in its own sphere, of different but
complementary activities. Now and again the lion and the lamb have
lain down together; one might almost say, on reading a delightful paper
of Mr. Lewis E. Gates on Impressionism and Appreciation,<1> that the
lamb had assimilated the lion. For the heir of all literary studies,
according to Professor Gates, is the appreciative critic; and he it is who
shall fulfill the true function of criticism. He is to consider the work of
art in its historical setting and its psychological origin, "as a
characteristic moment in the development of human spirit, and as a
delicately transparent illustration of aesthetic law." But, "in regarding
the work of art under all these aspects, his aim is, primarily, not to
explain, and not to judge or dogmatize, but to enjoy; to realize the
manifold charms the work of art has gathered unto itself from all
sources, and to interpret this charm imaginatively to the men of his own
day and generation."
<1> Atlantic Monthly, July, 1900.
Thus it would seem that if the report of his personal reactions to a work
of literary art is the intention of the impressionist, and its explanation
that of the scientist, the purpose of the appreciative critic is fairly
named as the illuminating and interpreting reproduction of that work,
from material furnished by those other forms of critical activity. Must,
then, the method of appreciation, as combining and reconciling the two
opposed views, forthwith claim our adherence? To put to use all the
devices of science and all the treasures of scholarship for the single end
of imaginative interpretation, for the sake of giving with the original
melody all the harmonies of subtle association and profound meaning
the ages have added, is, indeed, a great undertaking. But is it as
valuable as it is vast? M. Brunetiere has poured out his irony upon the

critics who believe that their own reactions upon literature are anything
to us in the presence of the works to which they have thrilled. May it
not also be asked of the interpreter if its function is a necessary one?
Do we require so much enlightenment, only to enjoy? Appreciative
criticism is a salt to give the dull palate its full savor; but what literary
epicure, what real boo-lover, will acknowledge his own need of it? If
the whole aim of appreciative criticism is to reproduce in other
arrangement the contents, expressed and implied, and the emotional
value, original and derived, of a piece of literature, the value of the end,
at least to the intelligent reader, is out of all proportion to the
laboriousness of the means. Sing, reading's a joy! For me, I read.
But a feeling of this kind is, after all, not a reason to be urged against
the method. The real weakness of appreciative criticism lies elsewhere.
It teaches us to enjoy; but are we to enjoy everything? Since its only
aim is to reveal the "intricate implications" of a work of art; since it
offers, and professes to offer, no literary judgments,--having indeed no
explicit standard of literary value,--it must, at least on its own theory,
take its objects of appreciation ready-made, so to speak, by popular
acclaim. It possesses no criterion; it likes whate'er it looks on; and it
can never tell us what we are not to like. That is unsatisfactory; and it is
worse,-- it is self-destructive. For, not being able to reject, appreciation
cannot, in logic, choose the objects of its attention. But a method which
cannot limit on its own principles the field within which it is to work is
condemned from the beginning; it bears a fallacy at its core. In order to
make criticism theoretically possible at all, the power to choose and
reject, and so the pronouncing of judgment, must be an integral part of
it.
To such a task the critic may lend himself without arousing our
antagonism. We have no pressing need to know the latent possibilities
of emotion for us in a book or a poem; but whether it is excellent or the
reverse, whether "we were right in