"Æsthetics, henceforth freed from all conjecture, will be truly established under the strict forms of a positive science."
But, as in the course of his lecture he had more than once touched the giddy regions of supernaturalism, this formula seemed a contradiction to certain minds, yet enthusiastic applause greeted the orator from all parts of the hall.
One paper, L'Union, said in this connection:
"M. Delsarte is a spontaneous soul, his mind is at once Christian and free, his only passion is the proselytism of the Beautiful, and this is the charm of his speech....I do not assert that everything in it should be of an absolute rigor of philosophy," etc.
The same paper says elsewhere:
"All these theories are new, original, ingenious, in a word, felicitous. Are they undeniably true? What I can affirm is that none doubt it who hear the master make various applications of them by examples. Delsarte is an irresistible enchanter."
The opposition of principles with which he is reproached, these doubts of the strength of his logic, will be greatly diminished if this point of view be taken: that Delsarte traced back an assured science, that he deduced from the faculties of man the hypothesis that these faculties are contained in essence and in the full power of their development, in an archetype which, to his mind, is no other than the Divine Trinity. Plato's ideal in æsthetics and in philosophy was similar although less precise.
There is a saying that Italians "have two souls." In Delsarte there were two distinct types, the theistic philosopher and the scientist.
Now, the philosopher could give himself up to the study of causes and their finality, that faculty being allotted to the mental activity; he could even, without giving the scientist cause for complaint, make, or admit, speculative theories regarding the end and aim of art, provided that the scientific part of the system was neither denied nor diminished thereby.
And is there not a certain kinship between science and hypothesis which admits of their walking abreast without conflicting?