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ON TRUTH AND PROBABILITY IN WORKS OF ART

A Dialogue

(1798)

In a certain German theatre there was represented a sort of oval amphitheatrical structure, with boxes filled with painted spectators, seemingly occupied with what was being transacted below. Many of the real spectators in the pit and boxes were dissatisfied with this, and took it amiss that anything so untrue and improbable was put upon them. Whereupon the conversation took place of which we here give the general purport.

The Agent of the Artist. — Let us see if we cannot by some means agree more nearly.

The Spectator. — I do not see how such a representation can be defended.

Agent. — Tell me, when you go into a theatre, do you not expect all you see to be true and real?

Spectator. — By no means! I only ask that what I see shall appear true and real.

Agent. — Pardon me if I contradict even your inmost conviction and maintain this is by no means the thing you demand.

Spectator. — That is singular! If I did not require this, why should the scene painter take so much pains to draw each line in the most perfect manner, according to the rules of perspective, and represent every object according to its own peculiar perfection? Why waste so much study on the costume? Why spend so much to insure its truth, so that I may be carried back into those times? Why is that player most highly praised who most truly expresses the sentiment, who in speech, gesture, delivery, comes nearest the truth, who persuades me that I behold not an imitation, but the thing itself?

Agent. — You express your feelings admirably well, but it is harder than you may think to have a right comprehension of our feelings. What would you say if I reply that theatrical representations by no means seem really true to you, but rather to have only an appearance of truth?

Spectator. — I should say that you have advanced a subtlety that is little more than a play upon words.

Agent. — And I maintain that when we are speaking of the operations of the soul, no words can be delicate and subtle enough; and that this sort of play upon words indicates a need of the soul, which, not being able adequately to express what passes within us, seeks to work by way of antithesis, to give an answer to each side of the question, and thus, as it were, to find the mean between them.

Spectator. — Very good. Only explain yourself more fully, and, if you will oblige me, by examples.

Agent. — I shall be glad to avail myself of them. For instance, when you are at an opera, do you not experience a lively and complete satisfaction?

Spectator. — Yes, when everything is in harmony, one of the most complete I know.

Agent. — But when the good people there meet and compliment each other with a song, sing from billets that they hold in their hands, sing you their love, their hatred, and all their passions, fight singing, and die singing, -can you say that the whole representation, or even any part of it, is true? or, I may say, has even an appearance of truth?

Spectator. — In fact, when I consider, I could not say it had. None of these things seems true.

Agent. — And yet you are completely pleased and satisfied with the exhibition?

Spectator. — Beyond question. I still remember how the opera used to be ridiculed on account of this gross improbability, and how I always received the greatest satisfaction from it, in spite of this, and find more and more pleasure the richer and more complete it becomes.

Agent. — And you do not then at the opera experience a complete deception?

Spectator. — Deception, that is not the proper word, — and yet, yes! — But no —

Agent. — Here you are in a complete contradiction, which is far worse than a quibble.

Spectator, — Let us proceed quietly; we shall soon see light.

Agent. — As soon as we come into the light, we shall agree. Having reached this point, will you allow me to ask you some questions?

Spectator. — It is your duty, having questioned me into this dilemma, to question me out again.

Agent. — The feeling you have at the exhibition of an opera cannot be rightly called deception?

Spectator. — I agree. Still it is a sort of deception; something nearly allied to it.

Agent. — Tell me, do you not almost forget yourself?

Spectator. — Not almost, but quite, when the whole or some part is excellent.

Agent. — You are enchanted?

Spectator. — It has happened more than once.

Agent. — Can you explain under what circumstances?

Spectator. — Under so many, it would be hard to tell.

Agent. — Yet you have already told when it is most apt to happen, namely, when all is in harmony.

Spectator. — Undoubtedly.

Agent. — Did this complete representation harmonize with itself or some other natural product?

Spectator. — With itself, certainly.

Agent. — And this harmony was a work of art?

Spectator. — It must have been.

Agent. — We have denied to the opera the possession of a certain sort of truth. We have maintained that it is by no means faithful to what it professes to represent. But can we deny to it a certain interior truth, which arises from its completeness as a work of art?

Spectator. — When the opera is good, it creates a little world of its own, in which all proceeds according to fixed laws, which must be judged by its own laws, felt according to its own spirit.

Agent. — Does it not follow from this, that truth of nature and truth of art are two distinct things, and that the artist neither should nor may endeavor to give his work the air of a work of nature?

Spectator. — But yet it has so often the air of a work of nature.

Agent. — That I cannot deny. But may I on the other hand be equally frank?

Spectator. — Why not? our business is not now with compliments.

Agent. — I will then venture to affirm, that a work of art can seem to be a work of nature only to a wholly uncultivated spectator; such a one the artist appreciates and values indeed, though he stands on the lowest step. But, unfortunately, he can only be satisfied when the artist descends to his level; he will never rise with him, when, prompted by his genius, the true artist must take wing in order to complete the whole circle of his work.

Spectator. — Your remark is curious; but proceed.

Agent. — You would not let it pass unless you had yourself attained a higher step.

Spectator. — Let me now make trial, and take the place of questioner, in order to arrange and advance our subject.

Agent. — I shall like that better still.

Spectator. — You say that a work of art could appear as a work of nature only to an uncultivated person?

Agent. — Certainly. You remember the birds that tried to eat the painted cherries of the great master?

Spectator. — Now does not that show that the cherries were admirably painted?

Agent. — By no means. It rather convinces me that these connoisseurs were true sparrows.

Spectator. — I cannot, however, for this reason concede that this work could have been other than excellent.

Agent. — Shall I tell you a more modern story?

Spectator. — I would rather listen to stories than arguments.

Agent. — A certain great naturalist, among other domesticated animals, possessed an ape, which he missed one day, and found after a long search in the library. There sat the beast on the ground, with the plates of an unbound work of Natural History scattered about him. Astonished at this zealous fit of study on the part of his familiar, the gentleman approached, and found, to his wonder and vexation, that the dainty ape had been making his dinner of the beetles that were pictured in various places.

Spectator. — It is a droll story.

Agent. — And seasonable, I hope. You would not compare these colored copperplates with the work of so great an artist.?

Spectator. — No, indeed.

Agent. — But you would reckon the ape among the uncultivated amateurs?

Spectator. — Yes, and among the greedy ones! You awaken in me a singular idea. Does not the uncultivated amateur, just in the same way, desire a work to be natural, that he may be able to enjoy it in a natural, which is often a vulgar and common way?

Agent. — I am entirely of that opinion.

Spectator. — And you maintain, therefore, that an artist lowers himself when he tries to produce this effect?

Agent. — Such is my firm conviction.

Spectator. — But here again I feel a contradiction. You did me just now the honor to number me, at least, among the half-cultivated spectators.

Agent. — Among those who are on the way to become true connoisseurs.

Spectator. — Then explain to me, Why does a perfect work of art appear like a work of nature to me also?

Agent. — Because it harmonizes with your better nature. Because it is above natural, yet not unnatural. A perfect work of art is a work of the human soul, and in this sense, also, a work of nature. But because it collects together the scattered objects, of which it displays even the most minute in all their significance and value, it is above nature. It is comprehensible only by a mind that is harmoniously formed and developed, and such an one discovers that what is perfect and complete in itself is also in harmony with himself. The common spectator, on the contrary, has no idea of it; he treats a work of art as he would any object he meets with in the market. But the true connoisseur sees not only the truth of the imitation, but also the excellence of the selection, the refinement of the composition, the superiority of the little world of art; he feels that he must rise to the level of the artist, in order to enjoy his work; he feels that he must collect himself out of his scattered life, must live with the work of art, see it again and again, and through it receive a higher existence.

Spectator. — Well said, my friend, I have often made similar reflections upon pictures, the drama, and other species of poetry, and had an instinct of those things you require. I will in future give more heed both to myself and to works of art. But if I am not mistaken, we have left the subject of our dispute quite behind. You wished to persuade me that the painted spectators at our opera are admissible, and I do not yet see, though we have come to an agreement, by what arguments you mean to support this license, and under what rubric I am to admit these painted lookers-on.

Agent. — Fortunately, the opera is repeated to-night; I trust you will not miss it.

Spectator. — On no account.

Agent. — And the painted men.?

Spectator. — Shall not drive me away, for I think myself something more than a sparrow.

Agent. — I hope that a mutual interest may soon bring us together again.