This is not all: even in the serious and the tragic there are certain places where the low element can be brought into play. But in this case the affair must pass into the _terrible_, and the momentary violation of our good taste must be masked by a strong impression, which brings our passion into play. In other words, the low impression must be absorbed by a superior tragic impression. _Theft_, for example, is a thing absolutely _base_, and whatever arguments our heart may suggest to excuse the thief, whatever the pressure of circumstances that led him to the theft, it is always an indelible brand stamped upon him, and, æsthetically speaking, he will always remain a base object. On this point taste is even less forgiving than morality, and its tribunal is more severe; because an æsthetical object is responsible even for the accessory ideas that are awakened in us by such an object, while moral judgment eliminates all that is merely accidental. According to this view a man who robs would always be an object to be rejected by the poet who wishes to present serious pictures. But suppose this man is at the same time a murderer, he is even more to be condemned than before by the _moral_ law. But in the æsthetic judgment he is raised one degree higher and made better adapted to figure in a work of art. Continuing to judge him from the æsthetic point of view, it may be added that he who abases himself by a _vile_ action can to a certain extent be raised by a _crime_, and can be thus reinstated in our _æsthetic_ estimation. This contradiction between the moral judgment and the æsthetical judgment is a fact entitled to attention and consideration. It may be explained in different ways. First, I have already said that, as the æsthetic judgment depends on the imagination, all the accessory ideas awakened in us by an object and naturally associated with it, must themselves influence this judgment. Now, if these accessory ideas are base, they infallibly stamp this character on the principal object. In the second place, what we look for in the æsthetic judgment is _strength;_ whilst in a judgment pronounced in the name of the moral sense we consider _lawfulness_. The lack of strength is something contemptible, and every action from which it may be inferred that the agent lacks strength is, by that very fact, a contemptible action. Every cowardly and underhand action is repugnant to us, because it is a proof of impotence; and, on the contrary, a devilish wickedness can, æsthetically speaking, flatter our taste, as soon as it marks strength. Now, a theft testifies to a vile and grovelling mind: a murder has at least on its side the appearance of strength; the interest we take in it æsthetically is in proportion to the strength that is manifested in it.