We have just seen how æsthetic activity arose, and how humble was its origin. Another question still remains in debate: Why was it evolved? In fact, by its nature, by its definition, it seems to have had no utility as a stimulant, since it springs from superfluous activity and is not bound to the conditions of individual existence. The persistence and development of the individual social, moral, and religious emotions explain themselves through utility. The intellectual or scientific emotion, also, was at first entirely practical, and therefore useful: knowledge is power. The case of æsthetic emotion stands alone. How, amid the rough struggle for life in which humanity was involved, was it able, not merely to blossom, but to live and prosper? It is no answer to say that it resisted and grew, because rooted in an instinct, a craving; for this instinct, by reason of its biological uselessness, might have become atrophied, or disappeared, like functionless organs, and it is the contrary that has happened. Darwin’s well-known explanation based on sexual selection, the preference of the females for the most skilful, the most graceful, the most brilliantly coloured, or the best singers among the males, is only partial, available for certain species of animals, not for all. More than this, the tendency dominant of late years to deny absolutely the heredity of acquired modifications cuts us off from the hypothesis of the transmission, consolidation, and increase of the æsthetic instinct in the course of generations. Hence the great embarrassment in which Weismann, Wallace, and all others who take this negative view, find themselves. They admit variation and selection only—not the fixing of variations by heredity. The first factor is sufficient to explain the appearance of the æsthetic activity, but the other two, selection and transmission, have nothing to do with it; so that, however frequently we may suppose this creative instinct to appear, it would always have to begin again at the beginning. The two above-mentioned writers have been much exercised on this point.[point.] How could the aptitudes for mathematics, music, and art in general, so rudimentary in primitive man, take so marvellous a flight? “In the struggle for life these mental gifts may very possibly have proved serviceable from time to time, and even of decisive importance; but in most cases they are not so, and no one will pretend that a gift for music or poetry, ever, in primitive times, increased the chances of founding a family.... These are not qualities which favour the preservation of the species; they could not, therefore, have been formed by natural selection.”[[207]]
There is only one possible answer: æsthetic activity, at its origin, had some indirect utility as regards conservation, being based on directly useful forms of activity to which it was auxiliary. Besides, to connect art with play, itself connected with an excess of nervous and muscular energy, is to place it in mediate relation with the vital functions. We have still to define the nature and the measure of its utility.
The arts which aim at motion, at their first appearance consisted entirely of dancing, accompanied by song. Weismann tells us that the musical sound is the complement of the sense of hearing, which itself is connected with natural selection, because it is not a matter of indifference, either for animals or men, that they should clearly hear and rightly distinguish the sounds of inanimate or animate nature, so as to act accordingly. This, however, explains nothing, acuteness of hearing and musical ear being two entirely distinct mental states, each requiring distinct cerebral and psychic conditions. It is in the dance accompanied by song and gesture that we must seek for the explanation; it had a social utility, it favoured concerted movements and common action, it gives unity, and the consciousness and visual perception of unity, to an assemblage of men; it is a discipline, a preparation for corporate attack or defence, a school of war. Hence the capital importance of time. The Kaffirs, in immense numbers, sing and dance with such precision as to resemble a huge machine in motion. Among several tribes the rhythm must be perfect, and any one who makes a mistake is punished with death.[[208]]
In the case of the arts whose result is repose, the explanation is more difficult. We have seen that there is a possible transition from one group to the other,—dancing being a living picture,—but what utility is there in the ornamentation of utensils, in drawing, in sculpture? Wallaschek (op. cit.) supposes that savages drew or carved horrible figures on their weapons in order to frighten the enemy, as is still seen among the Dyaks. I prefer Grosse’s explanation, as being at the same time more positive and more general.[[209]] In the first place, ornaments are signs, and have as such a social value. Besides, and more especially, primitive plastic art supposes two factors whose development must be favoured among savages by the struggle for existence: good visual memory and great manual skill. They are, like children, very acute observers; they do not pass beyond the narrow limit of their sensations; but within that limit they see, hear, feel, and smell with extreme precision; their existence depends on it. They have (as can be proved by numerous instances) an excellent memory for forms and figures. Lastly, they have few tools, but they know how to use them; they are skilful because their life also depends on their skill. The distance, therefore, between the practice of arts serviceable to life and the primitive practice of art is not so very great after all.
In the beginning, art is dependent on and auxiliary to the useful; the æsthetic activity is too wide to subsist by its own strength; but it will be emancipated later on. We shall return to the old question of the “relations between the beautiful and the useful,” which cannot be cleared up unless we turn our attention from civilised ages and countries—where the divorce is already accomplished—to the remote epoch of their origin.
II.
Let us now, starting from its source, see how the æsthetic sentiment has, in the course of ages, come to specialise and differentiate itself. Its evolution presents two aspects—one sociological, the other anthropomorphic—which in the nature of things are inseparable, but which, for the sake of clearness in exposition, we shall study separately.
1. The æsthetic feeling, of a strictly social character in its origin, tends progressively towards individualism. A division of labour takes place in it, rendering its manifestations more numerous and more complex.
2. The æsthetic sentiment, of a strictly human character at its origin, gradually loses this in order to embrace the whole of nature. It passes from human beauty in its organic form to abstract beauty, loved for its own sake.
Let us consider its developmental progress under this double aspect: