Read Ebook: The Eagle's Nest Ten Lectures on the Relation of Natural Science to Art Given Before the University of Oxford in Lent Term 1872 by Ruskin John

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PAGE THE FUNCTION IN ART OF THE FACULTY CALLED BY THE GREEKS ????a 1

THE FUNCTION IN SCIENCE OF THE FACULTY CALLED BY THE GREEKS ????a 25

THE RELATION OF WISE ART TO WISE SCIENCE 46

THE FUNCTION IN ART AND SCIENCE OF THE VIRTUE CALLED BY THE GREEKS ????????? 74

THE FUNCTION IN ART AND SCIENCE OF THE VIRTUE CALLED BY THE GREEKS ????????? 89

THE RELATION TO ART OF THE SCIENCE OF LIGHT 114

THE RELATION TO ART OF THE SCIENCES OF INORGANIC FORM 138

THE RELATION TO ART OF THE SCIENCES OF ORGANIC FORM 161

INTRODUCTION TO ELEMENTARY EXERCISES IN PHYSIOLOGIC ART. THE STORY OF THE HALCYON 188

INTRODUCTION TO ELEMENTARY EXERCISES IN HISTORIC ART. THE HERALDIC ORDINARIES 225

THE EAGLE'S NEST.

OF WISDOM AND FOLLY IN ART.

The proper titles of these lectures, too long for page-headings, are given in the Contents.

That is your third Province. The Kingdom of Thought, or Conception.

And it is entirely desirable that you should define to yourselves the three great occupations of men in these following terms:--

SCIENCE. The knowledge of things, whether Ideal or Substantial.

ART. The modification of Substantial things by our Substantial Power.

LITERATURE. The modification of Ideal things by our Ideal Power.

Nevertheless, I must be content to-day with our old word. We cannot say 'spiriture' nor 'animature,' instead of literature; but you must not be content with the vulgar interpretation of the word. Remember always that you come to this University,--or, at least, your fathers came,--not to learn how to say things, but how to think them.

We shall discover this better by taking a simple instance of the three agencies.

Suppose that you were actually on the plain of Paestum, watching the drift of storm-cloud which Turner has here engraved. If you had occupied yourself chiefly in schools of science, you would think of the mode in which the electricity was collected; of the influence it had on the shape and motion of the cloud; of the force and duration of its flashes, and of other such material phenomena. If you were an artist, you would be considering how it might be possible, with the means at your disposal, to obtain the brilliancy of the light, or the depth of the gloom. Finally, if you were a scholar, as distinguished from either of these, you would be occupied with the imagination of the state of the temple in former times; and as you watched the thunderclouds drift past its columns, and the power of the God of the heavens put forth, as it seemed, in scorn of the departed power of the god who was thought by the heathen to shake the earth--the utterance of your mind would become, whether in actual words or not, such as that of the Psalmist:--"Clouds and darkness are round about Him--righteousness and judgment are the habitation of His throne." Your thoughts would take that shape, of their own accord, and if they fell also into the language, still your essential scholarship would consist, not in your remembering the verse, still less in your knowing that "judgment" was a Latin word, and "throne" a Greek one; but in your having power enough of conception, and elevation enough of character, to understand the nature of justice, and be appalled before the majesty of dominion.

Educational Series, No. 8, E.

Now be quite clear about this: be sure whether you really agree with me or not.

You come to the School of Literature, I say, to learn the range and dignity of conceptions.

To the School of Art, to learn the range and dignity of deeds.

To the School of Science, to learn the range and dignity of knowledges.

Do you agree to that, or not? I will assume that you admit my triple division; but do you think, in opposition to me, that a school of science is still a school of science, whatever sort of knowledge it teaches; and a school of art still a school of art, whatever sort of deed it teaches; and a school of literature still a school of literature, whatever sort of notion it teaches?

Do you think that? for observe, my statement denies that. My statement is, that a school of literature teaches you to have one sort of conception, not another sort; a school of art to do a particular sort of deed, not another sort; a school of science to possess a particular sort of knowledge, not another sort.

But, for better illustration, I will now take my own special subject out of the three;--?????. I have said that we have, for its zero, ???????, or artlessness--in Latin, 'inertia,' opposed to 'ars.' Well, then, we have, from that zero, wise art on the one side, foolish art on the other; and the finer the art, the more it is capable of this living increase, or deadly defect. I will take, for example, first, a very simple art, then a finer one; but both of them arts with which most of you are thoroughly acquainted.

If the English reader will pronounce the o in this word as in fold, and in sophia as in sop, but accenting the o, not the i, I need not any more disturb my pages with Greek types.

The supposed scene of the dance was Hell, which was painted in the background with its flames. The dancers were supposed to be demons, and wore black masks, with red tinsel for fiery eyes; the same red light was represented as coming out of their ears also. They began their dance by ascending through the stage on spring trap-doors, which threw them at once ten feet into the air; and its performance consisted in the expression of every kind of evil passion, in frantic excess.

And now I am afraid I must tease you by asking your attention to what you may at first think a vain nicety in analysis, but the nicety is here essential, and I hope throughout this course of Lectures, not to be so troublesome to you again.

Now, remember, the inertia or zero of art always involves this kind of crime, or at least, pitiableness. The want of opportunity of learning takes away the moral guilt of artlessness; but the want of opportunity of learning such arts as are becoming in given circumstances, may indeed be no crime in an individual, but cannot be alleged in its defence by a nation. National ignorance of decent art is always criminal, unless in earliest conditions of society; and then it is brutal.

Are not these, and the innumerable words like to these, which you remember as I read them, strange words, if Aristotle's statement respecting wisdom be true; that it never contemplates anything that can make men happy, "? ??? ??? ????? ????? ?????? ?? ?? ????? ???????? ????????"?

When we next meet, therefore, I purpose to examine what it is which wisdom, by preference, contemplates; what choice she makes among the thoughts and sciences open to her, and to what purpose she employs whatever science she may possess.

OF WISDOM AND FOLLY IN SCIENCE.

It is very possible that you may not often have thought of, or clearly defined to yourselves, this destructive or deadly character of some elements of science. You may indeed have recognized with Pope that a little knowledge was dangerous, and you have therefore striven to drink deep; you may have recognized with Bacon, that knowledge might partially become venomous; and you may have sought, in modesty and sincerity, antidote to the inflating poison. But that there is a ruling spirit or ????a, under whose authority you are placed, to determine for you, first the choice, and then the use of all knowledge whatsoever; and that if you do not appeal to that ruler, much more if you disobey her, all science becomes to you ruinous in proportion to its accumulation, and as a net to your soul, fatal in proportion to the fineness of its thread,--this, I imagine, few of you, in the zeal of learning, have suspected, and fewer still have pressed their suspicion so far as to recognize or believe.

"Doth the Eagle know what is in the pit, Or wilt thou go ask the Mole?"

It would be impossible to express to you in briefer terms the great truth that there is a different kind of knowledge good for every different creature, and that the glory of the higher creatures is in ignorance of what is known to the lower.

"Doth the Eagle know what is in the pit, Or wilt thou go ask the Mole?"

It is just those who grope with the mole, and cling with the bat, who are vainest of their sight and of their wings.

Indeed, it would at first seem so; nay, in the passage of the Ethics, which I proposed to you to-day for question, you are distinctly told so. There are, it is said, many different kinds of phronesis, by which every animal recognizes what is for its own good: and man, like any other creature, has his own separate phronesis telling him what he is to seek, and to do, for the preservation of his life: but above all these forms of prudence, the Greek sage tells you, is the sophia of which the objects are unchangeable and eternal, the methods consistent, and the conclusions universal: and this wisdom has no regard whatever to the things in which the happiness of man consists, but acquaints itself only with the things that are most honourable; so that "we call Anaxagoras and Thales, and such others, wise indeed, but not prudent, in that they know nothing of what is for their own advantage, but know surpassing things, marvellous things, difficult things, and divine things."

The man of science, we said, thought of the origin of the electricity; the artist of its light in the clouds, and the scholar, of its relation to the power of Zeus and Poseidon. There you have Episteme; Techne; and Nous; well, now what does Phronesis do?

Phronesis puts up his umbrella, and goes home as fast as he can. Aristotle's Phronesis at least does; having no regard for marvellous things. But are you sure that Aristotle's Phronesis is indeed the right sort of Phronesis? May there not be a commonsense, as well as an art, and a science, under the command of sophia? Let us take an instance of a more subtle kind.

Sophia is the faculty which recognizes in all things their bearing upon life, in the entire sum of life that we know, bestial and human; but, which, understanding the appointed objects of that life, concentrates its interest and its power on Humanity, as opposed on the one side to the Animalism which it must rule, and distinguished on the other side from the Divinity which rules it, and which it cannot imagine.

It is as little the part of a wise man to reflect much on the nature of beings above him, as of beings beneath him. It is immodest to suppose that he can conceive the one, and degrading to suppose that he should be busied with the other. To recognize his everlasting inferiority, and his everlasting greatness; to know himself, and his place; to be content to submit to God without understanding Him; and to rule the lower creation with sympathy and kindness, yet neither sharing the passion of the wild beast, nor imitating the science of the Insect;--this you will find is to be modest towards God, gentle to His creatures, and wise for himself.

How much of your time, scientific faculty, popular literature, has been given, since this year began, to ascertain what England can do for the great countries under her command, or for the nations that look to her for help; and how much to discuss the chances of a single impostor's getting a few thousands a year?

THE RELATION OF WISE ART TO WISE SCIENCE.

You observe, I hope, that I always use the term 'science,' merely as the equivalent of 'knowledge.' I take the Latin word, rather than the English, to mark that it is knowledge of constant things, not merely of passing events: but you had better lose even that distinction, and receive the word "scientia" as merely the equivalent of our English "knowledge," than fall into the opposite error of supposing that science means systematization or discovery. It is not the arrangement of new systems, nor the discovery of new facts, which constitutes a man of science; but the submission to an eternal system; and the proper grasp of facts already known.

Now, accepting the terms 'science' and 'art' under these limitations, wise art is only the reflex or shadow of wise science. Whatever it is really desirable and honourable to know, it is also desirable and honourable to know as completely and as long as possible; therefore, to present, or re-present, in the most constant manner; and to bring again and again, not only within the thoughts, but before the eyes; describing it, not with vague words, but distinct lines, and true colours, so as to approach always as nearly as may be to the likeness of the thing itself.

Nothing, surely, can be more simple than this; yet the sum of art judgment and of art practice is in this. You are to recognize, or know, beautiful and noble things--notable, notabilia, or nobilia; and then you are to give the best possible account of them you can, either for the sake of others, or for the sake of your own forgetful or apathetic self, in the future.

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