"This spirit is portrayed in the countenance of Laocoon, but not in the countenance alone. Even under the most violent suffering the pain discovers itself in every muscle and sinew of his body, and the beholder, while looking at the agonised conditions of the stomach, without viewing the face and other parts, believes that he almost feels the pain himself. The pain expresses itself without any violence, both in the features and in the whole posture. Laocoon suffers, but he suffers as the Philoctetes of Sophocles. His misery pierces us to the very soul, but inspires us with a wish that we could endure misery like that great man.
"The expressing of so great a soul is far higher than the painting of beautiful nature. The artist must feel within himself that strength of spirit which he would imprint on his marble. Greece had philosophers and artists in one person. Philosophy gave her hand to art, and inspired its figures with no ordinary souls."
The above remarks are founded on the argument that "the pain in the face of Laocoon does not show itself with that force which its intensity would have led us to expect." This is correct. But I confess I differ from Winkelman as to what, in his opinion, is the basis of this wisdom, and as to the universality of the rule which he deduces from it. I acknowledge I was startled, first by the glances of disapproval which he casts on Virgil, and, secondly, by the comparison with Philoctetes. From this point I shall begin, writing down my thoughts as they were developed in me.
"Laocoon suffers as does the Philoctetes of Sophocles." But how does this last suffer? It is curious that his sufferings should leave such a different impression behind them. The cries and mild imprecations with which he filled the camp and interrupted the sacrifices echoed through the desolate island. The same sounds of despair fill the theatre in the poet's imitation.
A cry is the natural expression of bodily pain. Homer's wounded heroes frequently fall to the ground with cries. They are in their actions beings of higher order; in their feelings, true men.
We more civilised and refined Europeans of a wiser and later age are forbidden to cry and weep, and even our ancestors were taught to suppress lamentation at loss, and to die laughing under the bites of adders. Not so the Greeks. They felt and feared, and gave utterance to pain and sorrow, only nothing must hold them back from duty.
Now for my inference. If it be true that, a cry at the sensation of bodily pain, according to the old Greek way of thinking, is quite compatible with greatness of soul, it cannot have been for the sake of expressing such greatness that the artist avoided imitating his shriek in marble. Another reason must be found for his deviation from his rival, the poet, who has expressed it with the happiest results.
Be it fable or history, it is love that made the first essay in the plastic arts, and never wearied of guiding the hands of the masters of old. Painting now may be defined generally as "the imitation of bodies of matter on a level surface"; but the wise Greek allotted for it narrower limits, and confined it to imitations of the beautiful only; his artists painted nothing else. It was the perfection of their work that absorbed them. Among the ancients beauty was the highest law of the plastic arts. To beauty everything was subordinated. There are passions by which all beautiful physical lines are lost through the distortion of the body, but from all such emotions the ancient masters abstained entirely. Rage and despair disgrace none of their productions, and I dare maintain that they never painted a fury.
Indignation was softened down to seriousness. Grief was lessened into mournfulness. All know how Timanthes in his painting of the sacrifice of Iphigenia shows the sorrow of the bystanders, but has concealed the face of the father, who should show it more than all. He left to conjecture what he might not paint. This concealment is a sacrifice to beauty by the artist, and it shows how art's first law is the law of beauty.
Now apply this to Laocoon. The master aimed at the highest beauty compatible with the adopted circumstances of bodily pain. He must soften shrieks into sighs. For only imagine the mouth of Laocoon to be forced open, and then judge.