The different types of unity are by no means exclusive of each other and are usually found together in any complex work of art. Symmetry usually involves a combination of harmony and balance. The symmetrical halves of a Greek vase, for example, are harmonious in so far as their size and shape are the same, yet balanced as being disposed in opposite directions, right and left. Rhythm is temporal symmetry, and so also represents a combination of harmony and balance. Static rhythm is only apparent; for in every seeming case, the rhythm really pervades the succession of acts of attention to the elements rather than the elements themselves; a colonnade, for example, is rhythmical only when the attention moves from one column to another. There is harmony in rhythm, for there is always some law—metrical scheme in poetry, time in music, similarity of column and equality of interval between them in a colonnade—pervading the elements. But there is also balance; for as the elements enter the mind one after the other, there is rivalry between the element now occupying the focus of the attention and the one that is about to present an equal claim to this position. Because of its intrinsic value, we tend to hold on to each element as we hear or see it, but are forced to relinquish it for the sake of the one that follows; only for a moment can we keep both in the conscious span; the recurrence and overcoming of the resulting tension, as we follow the succession through, creates the pulsation so characteristic of rhythm. The opposition of the elements as in turn they crowd each other out does not, however, interfere with the harmony, for they have an existence all together in memory, where the law binding them can be felt,—a law which each element as it comes into consciousness is recognized as fulfilling. Since we usually look forward to the end of the rhythmical movement as a goal, rhythm often exists in combination with evolution, and is therefore the most inclusive of all artistic structural forms. In a poem, for example, the metrical rhythm is a framework overlying the development of the thought. Dramatic unity is found combined with balance even in the static arts, as, for example, in the combination of blue and gold, where the balance is not quite equal, because of a slight movement from the blue to the more brilliant and striking gold. I have already shown how harmony, opposition, and evolution may be combined in a melody. In the drama, also, all three are present. There is a balance of opposing and conflicting wills or forces; this is unstable; whence movement follows, leading on to the catastrophe, where the problem is solved; and throughout there is a single mood or atmosphere in which all participate, creating an enveloping harmony despite the tension and action. And other illustrations of combinations of types will come to the mind of every reader.
Each form of unity has its difficulties and dangers, which must be avoided if perfection is to be attained. In harmony there may be too much identity and too little difference or variety, with the result that the whole becomes tedious and uninteresting. This is the fault of rigid symmetry and of all other simple geometrical types of composition, which, for this reason, have lost their old popularity in the decorative and pictorial arts. In balance, on the other hand, the danger is that there may be too great a variety, too strong an opposition; the elements tend to fly apart, threatening the integrity of the whole. For it is not sufficient that wholeness exist in a work of art; it must also be felt. For example, in Pre-Raphaelite paintings and in most of the Secession work of our own day, the color contrasts are too strong; there is no impression of visual unity. In the dramatic type of unity there are two chief dangers—that the evolution be tortuous, so that we lose our way in its bypaths and mazes; or, on the other hand, that the end be reached too simply and quickly; in the one case, we lose heart for the journey because of the obstacles; in the other, we lose interest and are bored for want of incidents.
We come now to the second great principle of aesthetic structure— Dominance.[Footnote: Cf. Lipps: Aesthetik, Bd. I, S. 53, Viertes Kapitel] In an aesthetic whole the elements are seldom all on a level; some are superior, others subordinate. The unity is mediated through one or more accented elements, through which the whole comes to emphatic expression. The attention is not evenly distributed among the parts, but proceeds from certain ones which are focal and commanding to others which are of lesser interest. And the dominant elements are not only superior in significance; they are, in addition, representative of the whole; in them, its value is concentrated; they are the key by means of which its structure can be understood. They are like good rulers in a constitutional state, who are at once preeminent members of the community and signal embodiments of the common will. Anything which distinguishes and makes representative of the whole serves to make dominant. In a well-constructed play there are one or more characters which are central to the action, in whom the spirit and problem of the piece are embodied, as Hamlet in Hamlet and Brand in Brand; in every plot there is the catastrophe or turning point, for which every preceding incident is a preparation, and of which every following one is a consequent; in a melody there is the keynote; in the larger composition there are the one or more themes whose working out is the piece; in a picture there are certain elements which especially attract the attention, about which the others are composed. In the more complex rhythms, in meters, for example, the elements are grouped around the accented ones. In an aesthetic whole there are certain qualities and positions which, because of their claim upon the attention, tend to make dominant any elements which possess them. In space-forms the center and the edges are naturally places of preeminence. The eye falls first upon the center and then is drawn away to the boundaries. In old pictures, the Madonna or Christ is placed in the center and the angels near the perimeter; in fancy work it is the center and the border which women embroider. In time, the beginning, middle, and end are the natural places of importance; the beginning, because there the attention is fresh and expectant; towards the middle, because there we tend to rest, looking backward to the commencement and forward to the end; the end itself, because being last in the mind, its hold upon the memory is firmest. In any process the beginning is important as the start, the plan, the preparation; the middle as the climax and turning point; the end as the consummation. Of course by the middle is not meant a mathematical point of division into equal parts, but a psychological point, which is usually nearer the end, because the impetus of action and purpose carry forward and beyond. Thus in a plot the beginning stands out as setting the problem and introducing the characters and situation; then the movement of the action, gathering force increasingly as it proceeds, breaks at some point well beyond the middle; in the last part the problem is solved and the consequences of the action are revealed. Large size is another quality which distinguishes and tends to make dominant, as in the tower and the mountain. In one of Memling's paintings, "St. Ursula and the Maidens," which, when I saw it, was in Bruges, the lady is represented twice as tall as the full grown girls whom she envelops in her protecting cloak; yet, despite the unnaturalness, we do not experience any incongruity; for it is rational to our feeling. Intensity of any sort is another property which creates dominance—loudness of sound in music; concentration of light in painting, as in Rembrandt; stress in rhythm; depth and scope of purpose and feeling, as in the great characters of fiction. The effectiveness of intensity may be greatly increased through contrast—the pianissimo after the fortissimo; the pathos of the fifth act of Hamlet set off by the comedy of the first scene. Sometimes all the natural qualifications of eminence are united in a single work: in old paintings, for example, the Christ Child, spiritually the most significant element of the whole, will be of supernatural size, will occupy the center of the picture, will have the light concentrated upon him, and will be dressed in brightly gleaming garments.
As I have already indicated, there may be more than one dominant element; for instance, two or more principal characters in a novel or play—Lord and Lady Macbeth, Sancho and Don Quixote, Othello and Desdemona, Brand and his wife. In this case, there must be either subordination among them, a hierarchical arrangement; or else reciprocity or balance, as in the illustrations cited, where it is difficult to tell which is the more important of the two; otherwise they would pull the whole apart. The advantage of several dominant elements lies in the greater animation, and when the work is large, in the superior organization, which they confer. In order that there may be perspicuity, it is necessary, when there are many elements, that they be separated into minor groups around high points which individualize and represent them, and so take their place in the mind, mediating between them and unity when a final synthesis of the whole is to be made.
The third great principle of aesthetic structure is equilibrium or impartiality. This is a principle counteracting dominance. It demands, despite the subordination among the elements, that none be neglected. Each, no matter how minor its part in the whole, must have some unique value of its own, must be an end as well as a means. Dominance is the aristocratic principle in art, the rule of the best; this is the democratic principle, the demand for freedom and significance for all. Just as, in a well-ordered state, the happiness of no individual or class of individuals is sacrificed to that of other individuals or classes; so in art, each part must be elaborated and perfected, not merely for the sake of its contribution to the whole, but for its own sake. There should be no mere figure-heads or machinery. Loving care of detail, of the incidental, characterizes the best art.
Of course this principle, like the others, is an ideal or norm, which is only imperfectly realized in many works of art. Many a poet finds it necessary to fill in his lines and many a painter and musician does the like with his pictures or compositions. There is much mere scaffolding and many lay-figures in drama and novel. But the work of the masters is different. There each line or stroke or musical phrase, each character or incident, is unique or meaningful. The greatest example of this is perhaps the Divine Comedy, where each of the hundred cantos and each line of each canto is perfect in workmanship and packed with significance. There is, of course, a limit to this elaboration of the parts, set by the demands for unity and wholeness. The individuality of the elements must not be so great that we rest in them severally, caring little or nothing for their relations to one another and to the whole. The contribution of this principle is richness. Unity in variety gives wholeness; dominance, order; equilibrium, wealth, interest, vitality.
The structure of works of art is even more complicated than would appear from the description given thus far. For there is not only the unity of the elements among themselves, but between the two aspects of each element and of the whole—the form and content. This—the unity between the sense medium and whatever of thought and feeling is embodied in it—is the fundamental unity in all expression. It is the unity between a word and its meaning, a musical tone and its mood, a color and shape and what they represent. Since, however, it is indispensable to all expression, it is not peculiar to art. And to a large extent, even in the creative work of the artist, this unity is given, not made; the very materials of the artist consisting of elementary expressions—words, tones, colors, space-forms—in which the unity of form and content has already been achieved, either by an innate psycho-physical process, as is the case with tones and simple rhythms, or by association and habit, as is the case with the words of any natural language, or the object-meanings which we attach to colors and shapes. The poet does not work with sounds, but with words which already have their definite meanings; his creation consists of the larger whole into which he weaves them. Of course, even in the case of ordinary verbal expression, the thought often comes first before its clothing in words, when there is a certain process of choice and fitting; and in painting there is always the possibility of varying conventional forms; yet even so, in large measure, the elements of the arts are themselves expressions, in which a unity of form and content already exists.
In art, however, there are subtler aspects to the relation between form and content, and these have a unique aesthetic significance. For there, as we know, the elements of the medium, colors and lines and sounds, and the patterns of these, their harmonies and structures and rhythms, are expressive, in a vague way, of feeling; hence, when the artist employs them as embodiments of his ideas, he has to select them, not only as carriers of meaning, but as communications of mood. Now, in order that his selection be appropriate, it is clearly necessary that the feeling tone of the form be identical with that of the content which he puts into it. The medium as such must reexpress and so enforce the values of the content. This is the "harmony," as distinguished from the mere unity, of form and content, the existence of which in art is one of its distinguishing properties. I have already called attention to this in our second chapter. It involves, as we observed, that in painting, for example, the feeling tone of the colors and lines should be identical with that of the objects to be represented; in poetry, that the emotional quality of meter and rhythm should be attuned to the incidents and sentiments expressed. Otherwise the effect is ugly or comical.
When we come to the work of art, this harmony is already achieved. But for the artist it is something delicately to be worked out. Yet, just as in ordinary expression form and content often emerge in unison, the thought itself being a word and the word a thought; so in artistic creation, the mother mood out of which the creative act springs, finds immediate and forthright embodiment in a congenial form. Such a spontaneous and perfect balance of matter and form is, however, seldom achieved without long and painful experimentation and practice, both by the artist himself in his own private work, and by his predecessors, whose results he appropriates. Large traditional and oftentimes rigid forms, such as the common metrical and musical schemes and architectural orders, into which the personal matter of expression may aptly fall, are thus elaborated in every art. As against every looser and novel form, they have the advantages first, of being more readily and steadily held in the memory, where they may gather new and poignant associations; second, of coming to us already freighted with similar associations out of the past; and last, of compelling the artist, in order that he may fit his inspiration into them, to purify it of all irrelevant substance. Impatient artists rebel against forms, but wise ones either accommodate their genius to them, until they become in the end a second and equally spontaneous nature, or else create new forms, as definite as the old.