According to this, Sculpture should represent the divine in itself, in its infinite calm, and its eternal, immovable sublimity, without the discord of action and situation. If, afterward, affecting a more determinate mode, it represents something human in form and character, it ought still to thrust back all which is accidental and transient; to admit only the fixed, invariable side, the ground of character. This fixed element is what Sculpture should express as alone constituting the true individuality; it represents its personages as beings complete and perfect in themselves, in an absolute repose freed from all foreign influence. The eternal in gods and men is what it is called upon to offer to our contemplation in perfect and unalterable clearness.
Such is the idea which constitutes the essential content of the works of Sculpture. What is the form under which this idea should appear? We have seen, it is the body, the corporeal form. But the only form worthy to represent the spirit, is the human form. This form, in its turn, ought to be represented, not in that wherein it approximates the animal form, but in its ideal beauty; that is to say, free, harmonious, reflecting the spirit in the features which characterize it, in all its proportions, its purity, the regularity of its lines, by its mien, its postures, etc. It should express spirit in its calmness, its serenity—both soul and life, but above all, spirit.
These principles serve to determine the ideal of beauty under the physical form.
We must take care, in the works of Sculpture, not to confound this manner of looking at the perfect correspondence of the soul and bodily forms, with the study of the lineaments of the countenance, etc. The science of Gall, or of Lavater, which studies the correspondence of characters with certain lineaments of face or forms of head, has nothing in common with the artistic studies of the works of the statuary. These seem, it is true, to invite us to this study; but its point of view is wholly different; it is that of the harmonious and necessary accord of forms, from which beauty results. The ground of Sculpture excludes, moreover, precisely all the peculiarities of individual character to which the physiognomist attaches himself. The ideal form manifests only the fixed, regular, invariable, although living and individual type. It is then forbidden to the artist, as far as regards the physiognomy, to represent the most expressive and determinate lineaments of the countenance; for, beside looks, properly so-called, the expression of the physiognomy includes many things which are reflected transiently upon the face, in the countenance or the carriage, the smile and the glance. Sculpture should interdict to itself things so transient, and confine itself to the permanent traits of the expression of the spirit; in a word, it should incarnate in the human form the spiritual principle in its nature, at once general and individual, but not yet particularized. To maintain these two terms in just harmony, is the problem which falls to statuary, and which the Greeks have resolved.
The consequences to be deduced from these principles are the following:
In the first place, Sculpture is, more than the other arts, suited to the ideal, and this because of the perfect adaptation of the form to the idea; in the second place, it constitutes the centre of classic art, which represents this perfect accord of the idea and the sensuous form. It alone, in fact, offers to us those ideal figures, pure from all admixture—the perfect expression of physical beauty. It realizes, before our eyes, the union of the human and divine, under the corporeal form. The sense of plastic beauty was given above all to the Greeks, and this trait appears everywhere, not only in Greek art and Greek mythology, but in the real world, in historic personages: Pericles, Phidias, Socrates, Plato, Xenophon, Sophocles, Thucydides, those artistic natures, artists of themselves—characters grand and free, supported upon the basis of a strong individuality, worthy of being placed beside the immortal gods which Greek Sculpture represents.
2. After having determined the principle of Sculpture, Hegel applies it to the study of the beau ideal, as the master-pieces of Greek art have realized it. He examines successively and in detail the character and conditions of the ideal form in the different parts of the human body, the face, the looks, the bearing, the dress. Upon all these points he faithfully follows Winckelmann, recapitulates him, and constantly cites him. The philosopher meanwhile preserves his originality; it consists in the manner in which he systematizes that which is simply described in the History of Art, and in giving throughout, the reason of that which the great critic, with his exquisite and profound sense, has so admirably seized and undeniably proved, but without being able to unfold the theory of it. The subject gathers, henceforth, new interest from this explication. We may cite, in particular, the description of the Greek profile, which, in the hands of the philosopher, takes the character of a geometric theorem. It is at the same time an example which demonstrates unanswerably the absolute character of physical beauty. The beauty of these lines has nothing arbitrary; they indicate the superiority of spirit, and the pre-eminence of the forms which express it above those which are suited to the functions of the animal nature. What he afterwards says of the looks, of the bearing, of the postures, of the antique dress compared with the modern dress, and of its ideal character, presents no less interest. But all these details, where the author shows much of discrimination, of genius even, and spirit, escape in the analysis. The article where he describes the particular attributes and the accessories which distinguish the personages of Greek Sculpture, although in great part borrowed also from Winckelmann, shows a spirit familiarized with the knowledge of the works of antiquity.
3. The chapter devoted to the different modes of representation of the materials of Sculpture, and of its historic development, is equally full of just and delicate observations. All this is not alone from a theorist, but from a connoisseur and an enlightened judge. The appreciation of the materials of Sculpture, and the comparison of their æsthetic value, furnish also to the author some very ingenious remarks upon a subject which seems scarcely susceptible of interest. Finally, in a rapid sketch, Hegel retraces the historic development of Sculpture, Egyptian Statuary, Etruscan art, the school of Ægina, are characterized in strokes remarkable for precision.
Arrived at Christian Sculpture, without disputing the richness and the ability which it has displayed in its works in wood, in stone, etc., and its excellence in respect to expression, Hegel maintains with reason, that the Christian principle is little favorable to Sculpture; and that in wishing to express the Christian sentiment in its profundity and its vivacity, it passes its proper limits. “The self-inspection of the soul, the moral suffering, the torments of body and of spirit, martyrdom and penitence, death and resurrection, the mystic depth, the love and out-gushing of the heart, are wholly unsuited to be represented by Sculpture, which requires calmness, serenity of spirit, and in expression, harmony of forms.” Thus, Sculpture here remains rather an ornament of architecture; it sculptures saints, bas reliefs upon the niches and porches of churches, turrets, etc. From another side, through arabesques and bas reliefs, it approximates the principle of painting, by giving too much expression to its figures, or by making portraits in marble and in stone. Sculpture comes back to its true principle, at the epoch of the renaissance, by taking for models the beautiful forms of Greek art.