The Psychology of Nations / A Contribution to the Philosophy of History

by G. E. Partridge

CHAPTER IV[ToC]

AESTHETIC ELEMENTS IN THE MOODS AND IMPULSES OF WAR

That experiences and motives which belong to the field of the aesthetic play an important part in war can hardly be doubted. The whole history of war shows this, and even in the beginning war seems to be an activity carried on in part for its own sake, and not entirely for its practical results, and thus has qualities which later are explicitly aesthetic. We cannot of course separate sharply the aesthetic motive from everything else in studying so highly complex an object as war, but that war does partake of the nature of what we call the beautiful, and that the craving for the beautiful is a factor in the causes of war seem to be certain. The relation of art to war is of course no new theme. War has often been praised because of its aesthetic nature, and its dramatic features. It is called a beautiful adventure. It is reproduced in pictorial art, represented in music, and thus glorified and adorned, showing at least that it can readily be made to appear beautiful if it does not in itself possess beauty. Those who think of war as related to play also connect it with art. Nicolai (79), who condemns war, says that it is when war as an instinctive action is no longer useful, but is performed for its own sake that it becomes beautiful.

We cannot undertake to enumerate all the aesthetic qualities of war, or to show all the relations of the aesthetic aspects to other motives of war in detail, since to do so would mean to work out some of the fundamental principles of aesthetics. We may begin, however, by saying that war as a whole, as a movement in which there is complete organization of social forces shows already the marks of aesthetic experience and of art. As such a unification of interest in a strong and uninhibited movement, as a coördinated expression of deep desires, a multiplicity of action with a unity of purpose, so to speak, war is aesthetic in form although to mention such very general qualities does not go very far toward characterizing an object.

In its meaning as tragedy war contains and exerts a strong aesthetic appeal. With all its horrors, war fascinates the mind. As fate, death, history it inspires awe, and creates a sense of the inevitableness of events and of the play of transcendental and inexorable forces in human life. When, under any influence, these feelings appear as an accepting and willing of evil, we have the tragic movement as we find it in art. The death motif in war is the center of a variety of states which are ecstatic and have aesthetic quality. The religion of valor, the passion that is aroused by abandoning oneself to fate, the absolute devotion of service are aesthetic in form as experience, whatever else they may be. The relation of these motives to love and to the reproductive impulses has often been noticed. Devotion and death appear as beautiful; their representation in art is in part a recognition of this fact; in part it is an effort to transform them into the forms of the aesthetic. Art celebrates, but also creates, this luxury of feeling, and war also in its own dramatic movement transforms ugly and plain facts of life by including them in ecstatic states, and surrounding them with glory.

The ideal of glorified death plays a large part in the spirit of war. In war the fear of death is not only in great part stilled, but there is a longing to tempt fate and also to experience death itself, and this desire may become ecstatic. Here we see in effect one of the most important functions of the aesthetic, which is to carry on a drama of the will in which something that is in itself painful becomes pleasant and desired. The desire for war is to some extent a desire for death, a longing for a form of euthanasia in which the individual dies but in a sense lives—lives as glorified in death, and also in the continuance of the life of the group and of the country into which he has been absorbed. It is of course its relation to death that more than anything else has made it necessary that war should appeal to art, and take an aesthetic form, and without the aid of the aesthetic, war could not maintain itself in the world. As a sheer fulfillment of duty war could not survive. By the strength of its aesthetic appeal war must control and overcome the instinct of self-preservation.

War appeals to the human mind as the great adventure of life. To the healthy normal man this appeal, under certain circumstances, may be compelling in its power. Man feels the call of adventure in his blood. War may seem at times the natural expression of what is most real and most essentially masculine in human nature. War is the essence of all the dramatic and heroic story of the world. The past lives most vividly in this theme of war, and the sense of remoteness in time lends an aesthetic coloring to all the story of war, and is in part its fascination. The dead heroes of to-day are glorified by linking their names with the great heroes of the past.

To the glory of the individual, which is an aesthetic appeal, is added the still stronger appeal of the ideal of national glory. The image created in the mind which sustains the devotion of the individual is also an aesthetic form. It is the idea of a nation transformed by story, symbol and eloquence that is established. The dimness and mysticism of the long ago, all dramatic scenes of the national life, the forms of royalty are used in transforming reality into an ideal. The consciousness of a nation is indeed an artist which creates an ideal nation, glorifying and transforming the past, and painting a vivid picture of the empire that is to be. No little part in the German idea of the fatherland has been taken by the revived image of the old German Empire, and the story of Charlemagne, the Ottonides, the Hohenstaufen and the Hohenzollern which has been woven into the life of the present and has become an aesthetic setting for the idea of future greatness.

In the religion of valor, also, we may find aesthetic elements. Valor represents in this cult the spirit of the superior man. It is an aristocratic idea. Military life is full of this theme. The ideals of noblesse oblige, honor, the spirit of sportsmanship, enter into it, and all these concepts are in part aesthetic in nature. It is neither as moral nor as practical ideas that they have so deeply influenced society, but because of their appeal to the sense of the beautiful. All this aspect of war and military life, both in its motives and in its forms, is closely related to the pure beauty of art. The play spirit also, which in some of its developments at least is aesthetic, enters into the motives of war. War, we say, is the great adventure. It is the realization of power. It is an expression of the love of the sense of freedom. It is the great game, in which everything is staked. The love of danger and the love of gambling with life that it contains have roots that are also roots of various forms of art.

Another element, aesthetic in motive and form, obviously related to the reproductive functions of the individual, is the display motive. This motive of display is concerned especially with the idea of courage. It is of course a deep desire of the male to display courage before the female. This display motive must be the main motive of the uniform and all the other ornamental aspects of military life. Rank, titles and decorations belong to the same movement. They are indications of the advancement of the man in those essential qualities of the soldier, the chief of which is courage. The aesthetic forms in which courage is represented help to sustain it, and are an important element in morale, and they also serve a purpose in creating or adding to the allurement of the service and the fascination of war. It is the craving for the display of courage, the desire of the man "to show the stuff that is in him," that gives to war some of its most persistent aesthetic forms, and these aesthetic forms help both to make the display of courage effective and to create courage.