The philosophy of life, and philosophy of language, in a course of lectures

by Friedrich von Schlegel

Now, while the aspirates form the spiritual element in the whole system of elementary sounds, in the vowels, on the other hand, predominates the soul-full voice of song. These, in short, form the musical ensouling principle of language. The less a language is overladen with consonants, and the more fully the simple vowels sound out, the better adapted is it for music and songs. The consonants, on the other hand, which only in part imitate sound, make up the material element of language. They are, no doubt, necessary to the richness of a language, and its variety of expression; nevertheless, when they greatly predominate, they render it corporeal and heavy.

Now this remarkable analogy between this division of the alphabet into aspirates, vowels, and consonants, and the triple principle of human life and operation, as consisting of spirit, of soul, and of body, or of bodily exterior, I could not but notice in passing, and throw out as distinctly as possible.

But now this analogy and parallel between speech and consciousness presents another view of the matter, which it appears desirable to consider. In the alphabet of the human consciousness, which furnishes the several elements out of which syllables and then words are framed, which again form the first elements of all man’s higher knowledge, I would pre-eminently consider as its vowels those eternal feelings of the Godlike which have their foundation in the very nature of man. Now it is usual to designate these fundamental feelings of man as faith, hope, and love (charity). But, however customary it may be to class the three together, the intrinsic connection between them is not easily pointed out. And yet, perhaps, if we have recourse to another analogy with the visible world, it will help us to trace this bond of union. This method will probably be both easier and simpler than a direct refutation of erroneous views on the subject, or any critical enumeration of elements which in the psychological apprehension are incorrectly associated with them. Now, these three feelings or properties, or states of the consciousness, may be regarded as so many organs for the cognition or the perception, or, if the term be preferred, for the suggestion of the divine. In this respect, then, and relatively to their different modes of apprehension, we may compare them with the external senses and their organs. Thus love, in its first soul-exciting contact, abiding attraction, and finally complete union, strikingly corresponds to the external sense of feeling. Faith is the inner ear of the spirit which is open to, catches up, and retains the imparted word of a higher revelation. Hope, however, is the eye, whose clear vision discerns, even in the remote distance, the objects of its profound and ardent longing. The latter brings us to a thoroughly vivid idea (or, rather, presupposes the existence) of faith, according to which it is no arbitrary and artificial idea, but one real throughout and vital. Although intelligent and spiritual, it is still a feeling, and ultimately rests also on a feeling, that, viz., of love, out of which, as its root and foundation, it arises. Indeed, faith is nothing else than love, through a pure will, maintained with consistency of character; and this applies to it even in its nobler relations among human things, and does not apply to it merely in a higher and divine reference.

In the last age (if it be not also in the present), the notion of faith was taken in a very different sense, and the phraseology arising from that view is, in part, at least, still prevalent. On this account a few explanatory words are necessary for the sake of caution and distinction. The following is the historical occasion or scientific origin of this other notion of faith. At a late period of so-called enlightenment, in the midst of which, however, many grave misconceptions prevailed, reason was set up as the sole authority. As the highest and greatest of man’s endowments, it was almost deified, whatever did not appear at once and easily explicable by reason, being forthwith and indiscriminately pronounced a prejudice, and, as such, to be got rid of with all diligence. In this state of things, modern German philosophy commenced its career with attempting to show that this sovereign reason, which had set itself forth as the first and highest in man, is extremely defective, and comes far short of the requisitions both of science and life. The position was honestly and earnestly maintained, and the proof worked out with tolerable completeness. Subsequently, however, its validity has been questioned, or only admitted under many limitations and qualifications. But even this modified praise can not be bestowed on the scientific remedy with which men hoped to supply the defects of reason, and to cure the old and universal evils of rationalism. For, in fact, the method by which they sought to get rid of this great and manifest deficiency was simply by suddenly opening an unlimited credit for the reason, which going beyond all actual need, and based either on arbitrary assumption, or a confiding generosity, should be sufficient for all emergencies. But this expedient, in the existing state and panic of the rational market, could not remove the evil; it only exaggerated it. In a word, it was the same old reason which (its claim to supersensible honors having been rejected) had been just thrust out of the temple of science by the front entrance, that, under the disguise of faith, was now being smuggled in by the postern. It was but a mere arbitrary substitute for reason that had assumed this new name. Now such a faith as this requires to be carefully distinguished from that living faith which springs from and is founded on love. For this purpose I have attempted to show, from the very outset, the great difference between the two.

Now, if occasionally I have felt myself called upon to set bounds to and to protest against the illimitable requirements and assumptions of reason in science, my remarks have been directed, not against reason itself, but chiefly against that absoluteness with which it pretends to reign paramount. In our German tongue—and since the comparative parallel of thought and language is a part of the general plan of our present exposition, this trifling but not insignificant philological remark will not here be inappropriate—in our vernacular tongue, the close limitation of the thing is furnished by the term itself. For as understanding [Verstand] comes from the verb to understand [verstehen], and implies the existence of an object which stands before the mind, to be penetrated and searched through by it, so reason [Vernunft] implies a Vernehmen, a perception or apprehension, and is itself nothing else than the organ of spiritual perception, which is threefold: 1st, of a higher law and rule above us and given to us; 2d, of the inward voice of conscience and the pure self-consciousness within us; and, 3d, of other rational thought around and beside itself. Now it is only against that reason which is unwilling to perceive any thing, or, at least, any thing beside or above itself, that all my objections are directed. For when the reason refuses to acknowledge aught above itself, but absolutely rejects it, then will it estimate but little whatever is beside itself. At any rate it will never be eminently successful in its attempts to comprehend or understand it. In this case, it will continually make the greatest mistakes and blunders in its views and conceptions of that even which it really finds and perceives, or at least believes to discover within itself. Reason, in itself, and in its due limits, is, indeed, but one of man’s various fundamental powers; still, in the present state of his divided and discordant consciousness, it is a highly essential faculty. Like all the others, consequently, which severally do but present so many different aspects of man’s external and internal life, reason, when it oversteps its due limits, is liable to great, nay, the greatest of aberrations. But it might here be asked, are not the possible aberrations of fancy still more dangerous? We must answer, Without doubt they are; and this is the only answer we can give to the question put thus generally. But in the special reference to our own age, there is far greater and more frequent occasion to call attention at present to the evils produced by the errors of reason, than to warn men anxiously against the possible abuses of fancy. And this for the simple fact, that of all the powers of the human mind, which, when isolated, are, more or less, destructive in their action, reason has, in the later ages, and in our times, especially, been decidedly predominant. Consequently, we have on all sides before our eyes obvious and instructive examples of the mazes and abyss of error, fatal no less to science than to morals, into which reason not only falls herself, but hurries all that come within her influence, when, having once started from a false position, she has followed out this wrong tendency with full rigor of consequence. We see in it the cause of all the catastrophes of the age, and the fearful struggle of party. The dangers which might arise from the exclusive ascendency of fancy are, in our generation, less likely to be general, and they are less threatening, less urgent. And the explanation of this fact is equally simple. The occurrence of lofty and genius-gifted powers of imagination is extremely rare; and, at any rate, many instances are seldom met with at one and the same time. Here, therefore, it is often a false alarm; the threatening clouds quickly disperse, the blue heavens again shine forth, and the wide horizon of the all-spanning reason once more becomes bright, and even clearer than we had ever known it before. And if occasionally an overabundance of genius-gifted power does manifest itself in the domain of fancy, the general effect that results from it is, at most, a recognition of its excellence, which, however, only slowly and with difficulty gains possession of men’s minds. This feeling may, no doubt, sometimes amount to a profound admiration, whose language, sparkling with the exquisite ornaments and flowery tropes of exaggeration, may seem to border closely on a deification of its object; still this feeling, however great and universal it may appear, is very far from that height of enthusiasm which wholly engrosses and carries the mind along with it. Indeed, for the most part, it carefully avoids and keeps aloof from such a state.

In short, however much any particular age may admire or even worship great powers of genius or art, it is very rarely indeed, if ever, carried away by its partial and erroneous tendencies, or its arbitrary and quaint peculiarities. At least, the same party zeal is not to be witnessed here that divides both science and life between the rival systems of absolute reason. However, the consideration of the prejudicial effects of the despotic ascendency of the reason has, almost of necessity, brought before us the somewhat connected topic of the hinderances which art may occasion to the pursuit of the highest truth and certainty. We will, therefore, now examine the evils which arise whenever art, as the executive power in the region of fancy, usurps an undue authority over the rest of the consciousness, and when, in its judgment of things, taking an undue position in some merely poetical or artistic view, it assumes a reality that belongs not to it, and dreams of finding in itself the final cause and firm basis of all existence.

For the right exposition of that notion of faith, hope, and love, which we made the foundation of the knowledge of all higher truth, it was, above all things, necessary that we should carefully and accurately discriminate between the true living faith which is grounded on and springs out of love, and that spurious faith which reason arbitrarily devises to cover its own weakness and deficiencies. In the same way it remains for us to point out the true end of hope, establishing the internal foundation of its idea, and making out, at the same time, its intimate relation to art, as it arises from its connection therewith and with time. Now, as all high hope stands in close union with man’s inmost character, and forms a principal element of his being, his whole life and activity being based on hope, so likewise in art—so faithful a mirror is it of human nature—man’s holiest hopes form the chief aim and the animating soul of its representations. A perfectly faithful, though artistically expressed, imitation of a love higher than any actual manifestation of the feeling (of whatever nature it be), may simply, of itself, constitute a work of art, and, indeed, is its natural object-matter. But still, isolated and by itself, it would furnish but a fragmentary feeling for the fancy, without a true beginning, and without end or aim, or proper conclusion. Faith is but, as it were, a straight line—the rule of sentiment for this life, of expectation for the other. But now, in the mind of man, above every actual love and every definite faith, there is a superabundance—if we may so speak—of feelings, thoughtfully forecasting, ardently loving, and hoping, even beyond hope itself—of thoughts, dreaming, at least, of a higher truth than is to be met with on earth.

And this divine superabundance in the human soul, if I may be allowed this bold expression, is properly the sublime matter, the invisible object and spiritual essence of true art and poetry. Not that this inner soul, this vital breath of high art and poetry, must, even in the outward form, invariably express itself (as it does in music generally) as a feeling of longing. Neither must it in its definite direction to the future, always manifest itself externally in the form of hope; and, consequently, speak only in lyrical strains, as the music of enthusiasm. Such a limitation would, indeed, have a most monotonous effect. On the contrary, even in a highly-finished picture of some actual and present scene, this idea of hope, as the soul which animates the whole, may be present, and like an invisible thread of higher life, be interwoven in it. And this envelopment, or, rather, this veiled manifestation and indirect revelation of spirit, is often to be found, not only in creations which are permanently artistic, but also in those that are profoundly poetical and enthusiastic. Even the sorrowful remembrance of a by-gone foretime of infantine innocence, and of sublime grandeur, is properly nothing but a reflection of this divine hope, and, in a free and comprehensive sense, which thus combines poetry and art, may be even counted as a part of it. And if ancient art and ancient poetry especially, with their mournful back-glances at the olden majesty long past and gone, come over us with emotions something like those of eventide, when the last parting gleam of the brilliant sun is fast setting behind the distant hills, so in their opposite aspect, as hope, turning its bold, enthusiastic eye toward the future, they may smile upon us as the rosy dawn which runs before the rising sun of truth, and that new time which is to shine and glow in its beams—or as the first beautiful ray of enthusiastic promise. Such, in all probability, seems the position most suitable to art in our own days. Now, with respect to this peculiar position of art relatively to hope, and their intimate affinity, and their relation to the present age and to the two other elements of the harmonic scale of human life, viz., love and faith, the frequent and expressive sentiment of a poet whose intimate friendship it is my privilege to enjoy, will convey most forcibly the conclusion which I would wish to enforce upon your minds. Although his remark with regard to the harmony and union which ought to prevail between the true elements of higher feeling was addressed primarily to the present generation, it admits of application to every age. He asks—

“The age has neither faith nor love;
How, then, for such should hope remain?”[72]

This voice first sounded forth in fateful days, when danger and alarm were so instant and threatening as almost to cut off and extinguish hope; but the storm so dark and menacing passed away. A new prospect has since opened upon us, and all is changed. As a just estimate of our own times, however, it appears to me, in its present unqualified form, too sweeping and severe. The age is not so entirely without hope as the poet here asserts. No doubt we have been somewhat lukewarm, inconstant, and unsteady in this respect. Or, more correctly to express the real state of the case: in itself and in that faith in itself which, as it was overhastily embraced, was set up without limit or condition, and generally in all faith, from its highest degree down to that lowest grade of it which moves within the ordinary pursuits and relations of life, it has been somewhat confused and wandering; nay, at times it has proved somewhat forgetful, not only of the old and transitory, but also of what is modern, and even what was most recent and within its own experience. Accordingly, to the eye of the observer, it appears, on the whole, to be devoid of all ruling principle, and to be still in search of some regulative standard within itself. If, in this search after faith, some few have taken up too quickly, and rested satisfied with that arbitrary expedient and device of a faltering and meager reason, this was, no doubt, a symptom of a partially sickly state, but by no means such as to justify us in passing a sweeping sentence on the whole age, as totally unsound and diseased. For in all human affairs and relations, such a profound longing as this, when it is lasting, and generally whenever it does not proceed solely and entirely from some want or defect, invariably presupposes some natural disposition and capacity, though it may be one which is neither rightly cultivated, nor as yet expanded to full vigor and stability.