(4.) Another reversal of the relations, which derives the Holy Ghost from the Father, the Father from the Son, and the Son from the Holy Ghost.
Passion Of Signs. Signs of Passion.
These two terms at first sight seem very similar. It is not so. They express two wholly distinct things. Therefore to know the meaning of words by no means proves one capable of finding words and fitting them to the meaning.
It is clearly easier to translate a language than to write it, and just as we must learn to translate before we can compose, so we must become thoroughly familiar with semeiotics before trying to work at æsthetics; and, as the science of semeiotics is still wholly incomplete, it is, therefore, absolutely impossible that that which is called æsthetics should in the least resemble the science which I have just defined.
I have shown you æsthetics as a science. I have given you its definition. I have fixed its special part in the sum total of knowledge which goes to make up art; moreover, I have pointed out what this science is intended to teach you. I have, by so doing, assumed serious obligations toward you. I must needs produce under this title something more than mere fantastic reflections upon works of art, or more or less attractive stories about their authors and the circumstances in which they lived. It will not be so amusing, but assuredly it will be more profitable, and that is all for which I aspire.
Art, then, is an act whose semeiotics characterizes the forms produced by the action of powers, which action is determined by æsthetics, and the causes of which are sought out by ontology.
| Art. | { | Ontology examines the constituent virtues of the being. |
| Æsthetics examines its powers. | ||
| Semeiotics characterizes its forces. | ||
| Art. | { | Inherent form of sentiments . . . . . . Æsthetics. |
| Metaphysical form of the principles . . Ontology. | ||
| Organic form of signs . . . . . . . . . Semeiotics. |
The object of art, therefore, is to reproduce, by the action of a superior principle (ontology), the organic signs explained by semeiotics, and whose fitness is estimated by æsthetics.