Rodin: The Man and His Art, with Leaves from His Note-bookCladel, Judith
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Rodin: The Man and His Art, with Leaves from His Note-book
Cladel, Judith
Rodin, Auguste, 1840-1917
We place love and sensual pleasure in the same category. Undoubtedly
it is nature herself who has led is astray in this by the instinct to
perpetuate ourselves, in youth this instinct is like an overflowing
river; it sweeps away everything, yet pleasure is everywhere about
us. I imbibe it in the forms of the clouds that build their majestic
architecture in the sky, in the rapture of this woman who holds her
child in her arms, an attitude divine, so beautiful indeed, that the
poet of the Gospels has deified it. It is the attitude of the Virgin. I
imbibe it in the atmosphere which bathes me now, and will still continue
to bless me, bringing me peace, rest, and health.
For that which is beautiful in a landscape is that which is beautiful in
architecture--the air, space. No one in these days realizes its depth.
It is this quality of depth that carries the soul where it wishes to go.
In a well-constructed monument that which enraptures us is the science
of its depths. The throngs in the churches attribute their emotion
to mysticism, to the transport of the soul toward divinity. They are
unaware that they owe their emotion to the exact knowledge of great
planes possessed by the architects of former days. Even upon the most
ignorant beholder they impose this. Man disregards that which he already
has, and longs for something else. He longs for swiftness, to have wings
like a bird. He does not know that he already enjoys this pleasure of
moving through space. He rejoices in it in his soul, which takes wing
and goes where it pleases, through the sky, on the waters, to the depths
of the forests.
All the misfortune here below arises from a lack of comprehension. We
classify our limited knowledge in narrow systems, like the card-systems
of an office, and these pitiful conventions we take seriously. They
teach us disconnected things, and we leave them disconnected. Those who
have a little patience assemble these isolated facts; but such patient
ones are rare, and nothing is so unbearable as that man who, not having
it, speaks ill of him who has a sense of the truth. To see accurately is
the secret of good design. Objects dart at one another, unite, and throw
light on one another, explain themselves. That is life; a marvelous
beauty covers all things like a garment, like an ægis.
God created the great laws of opposition, of equilibrium. Good and evil
are brothers, but we desire the good, which pleases us, and not the
evil, which seems to us error. When we consider matters from a distance,
does not evil often seem good, and good, evil? That is only because we
have judged without proper consideration. Just as white and black are
necessary in a drawing, so good and evil are necessary in life. Sorrow
ought not to be cast out. As long as we live it is as strong a part of
life as radiant joy. Without it we would be very ill trained.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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