Æsthetic as science of expression and general linguisticCroce, Benedetto
Philosophy
Æsthetic as science of expression and general linguistic
Croce, Benedetto
Aesthetics; Language and languages -- Philosophy; Philosophy
The _juridical_ fact, for example, considered as what is called
objective law, is derived both from the economic and from the logical
activities. Law is a rule, a formula (whether oral or written matters
little here) in which is fixed an economic relation willed by an
individual or by a community, and this economic side at once unites it
with and distinguishes it from moral activity. Take another example.
Sociology (among the many meanings the word bears in our times) is
sometimes conceived as the study of an original element, which is
called _sociability._ Now what is it that distinguishes sociability,
or the relations which are developed in a meeting of men, and not in a
meeting of sub-human beings, if it be not just the various spiritual
activities which exist among the former and which are supposed not to
exist, or to exist only in a rudimentary degree, among the latter?
Sociability, then, far from being an original, simple, irreducible
conception, is very complex and complicated. A proof of this would
be the impossibility, generally recognized, of enunciating a single
law which could be described as purely sociological. Those that are
improperly so called are shown to be either empirical historical
observations, or spiritual laws, that is to say judgements into which
the conceptions of the spiritual activities are translated, when
they are not simply empty and indeterminate generalities, like the
so-called law of evolution. Sometimes, too, nothing more is understood
by "sociability" than "social rule," and so law; thus confounding
sociology with the science or theory of law itself. Law, sociability,
and similar concepts, are to be dealt with in a mode analogous to that
employed by us in the consideration and analysis of historicity and
technique.
[Sidenote: _Religion._]
It may seem that _religious_ activity should be judged otherwise.
But religion is nothing but knowledge, and does not differ from its
other forms and sub-forms. For it is in turn either the expression of
practical aspirations and ideals (religious ideals), or historical
narrative (legend), or conceptual science (dogma).
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