The situation expressed in general terms is in one aspect of it the circumstance particularized to the point of definite character, and under this characterization it is, to put it another way, the stimulating impulse to a particular expression of content, which it is the function of artistic presentation to transmute into a specific form of existence. Looked at from this latter point of view especially the situation offers a wide field for contemplation, inasmuch as it has ever been one of the most essential objects of art to discover situations of real interest, that is to say, of such a kind as will present to us the profound and weighty interest, the truest content of spiritual life. The requirements of the several arts in this respect no doubt differ. Sculpture, for example, is pre-eminently limited in its reference to the inwardly detailed variety of situations. Painting and music are already operative in a freer and more comprehensive medium. Finally, we are least able among them all to exhaust the possibilities of poetry in this respect.
Since we have not yet arrived at that portion of our subject where we deal directly with the specific arts, it will be sufficient here to draw attention to a few of the most general aspects of that inquiry, which we may subdivide in the following manner.
First, we would observe that the situation still retains the form of universality and thereby of indeterminacy, so long as it is undeveloped and without definite characterization; we have, consequently, at first present before us a situation which is without situation. For the form of indeterminacy is itself only one form as opposed to its contradiction of determinacy, and is shown to be, by virtue of this very contrast, a one-sided aspect which as such possesses a determinate relation.
Secondly, however, the situation passes in separation away from this universality, and becomes certainly determinate to that extent, but at first with a determinacy which produces no destructive consequences, that is to say, it is one which offers no stimulus to active opposition and its necessary resolution.
Thirdly, we find the element of disunion in all its vigour creating by the definition of its opposed characteristics the essence of the situation, which thereby is carried into a collision, which again proceeds to reactions, and, as such, forms the point of departure to the conception of artistic action properly so called.
We may, in fact, characterize the situation generally as the intermediate plane between the universal world-condition still in a state of equilibrium, and the concrete action unfolded in all its tendency to movement and reaction, a position which gives to it the characteristics of both extremes, and enables us to pass over from the one to the other.
(a) The Absence of Situation[315]
We passed from the notion of the universal world-condition in presenting to ourselves the form of it as essentially individual self-subsistency. Self-subsistency, however, regarded simply in its essential form, presents to us in the first instance merely the secure repose upon its own resources in its bare tranquillity. The form as thus defined is carried into no relation with another, but remains at one with itself in inclusion with its unity both, within and without. This presents us with the situation which is without situation, an illustration of which we may take those ancient types of temple-building dating from the earliest days of art, whose character of profound immutable seriousness, of tranquil, nay even of austere and grandiose, dignity has been the object of imitation even in more recent times proceeding on lines of a similar type. The Egyptian and most ancient Greek sculptures will further illustrate for us the same kind of indeterminate situation. In the plastic art of Christianity, especially if we consider particular examples of early bust-sculpture, we shall find both God the Father and Christ are presented in a similar spirit. Indeed, such a mode of delineation is peculiarly adapted to present us with the secure substantiality of the Divine, whether such be apprehended as a definite and particular Godhead, or is grasped as essentially absolute personality; and this is so in virtue of the very defect of such a representation, that it gives us portraits of persons of middle-age which are without any trace of definite situations, in which the character of the individual as such can reveal itself, and only the attempt is made to express the entirety of determinate character in its quality of stability[316].
(b) The Situation defined in its Harmlessness[317]
The second point to emphasize is, inasmuch as the situation generally is reached in the definition of form, the passage from this tranquillity and blessed repose, or from the unbroken severity and force of self-consistency, forms which subsist in unfeatured equilibrium, that is to say, immutable both within and without, have to be set in motion and surrender their undressed simplicity. This bare progression to a more specific manifestation in some particular mode of expression is what we may describe certainly as definite situation, but a situation which has not yet asserted conflicting elements in itself, and is fully ripe for collision.