Now the case which I have called an error of taste, namely, where the
actual qualities we admire (whether possessed by the ‘object’ or not)
are ugly, can in any case have no value, except such as may belong
to the emotion _by itself_; and in most, if not in all, cases it is
a considerable positive evil. In this sense, then, it is undoubtedly
right to think that seeing beauty in a thing which has no beauty is
inferior in value to seeing beauty where beauty really is. But the
other case is much more difficult. In this case there is present all
that I have hitherto mentioned as necessary to constitute a great
positive good: there is a cognition of qualities really beautiful,
together with an appropriate emotion towards these qualities. There
can, therefore, be no doubt that we have here a great positive good.
But there is present also something else; namely, a belief that these
beautiful qualities exist, and that they exist in a certain relation
to other things--namely, to some properties of the object to which
we attribute these qualities: and further the object of this belief
is false. And we may ask, with regard to the whole thus constituted,
whether the presence of the belief, and the fact that what is believed
is false, make any difference to its value? We thus get three different
cases of which it is very important to determine the relative values.
Where both the cognition of beautiful qualities and the appropriate
emotion are present we may _also_ have either, (1) a belief in the
existence of these qualities, of which the object, _i.e._ that they
exist, is true: or (2) a mere cognition, without belief, when it is
(_a_) true, (_b_) false, that the object of the cognition, _i.e._ the
beautiful qualities, exists: or (3) a belief in the existence of the
beautiful qualities, when they do not exist. The importance of these
cases arises from the fact that the second defines the pleasures of
imagination, including a great part of the appreciation of those
works of art which are _representative_; whereas the first contrasts
with these the appreciation of what is beautiful in Nature, and the
human affections. The third, on the other hand, is contrasted with
both, in that it is chiefly exemplified in what is called misdirected
affection; and it is possible also that the love of God, in the case of
a believer, should fall under this head.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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