The Philosophy of Fine Art, volume 2 (of 4): Hegel's Aesthetik
Georg Hegel · en
[Footnote 182: By "absolute" I presume Hegel means here absolute in
the sense of predominant, masterful--activity such as the Greek artist
possessed.]
[Footnote 183: "Iliad," I, vv. 9-12.]
[Footnote 184: _Ibid._ vv. 94-100.]
[Footnote 185: "Odyssey," XXIV, vv. 41-63.]
[Footnote 186: That is, Thetis.]
[Footnote 187: _Bestimmte sittliche Substanz._]
[Footnote 188: _Das reine Insichseyn._]
[Footnote 189: _Ein ewiger Ernst._]
[Footnote 190: I presume this refers to some drapery or curtains round
the bust as exhibited.]
[Footnote 191: This is the meaning of _Heiterkeit_ here rather than
"cheerfulness," though _Seligkeit_ is the usual word.]
[Footnote 192: _Göttliche Universum._ A rather curious expression for,
I presume, the ideal totality of the Divine Being.]
[Footnote 193: _Der geistigen absoluten Innerlichkeit._ Lit., "the
spiritual and absolute mode of the inward life." He refers, of course,
to Christianity, with its life of the pure in heart and the pure
reason.]
[Footnote 194: _Besonnenheit._]
[Footnote 195: "Iliad," XVI, vv. 783-849.]
[Footnote 196: I very much doubt whether the words _Sondern das Gerede
allein_ can have this meaning, but the obvious meaning, "but only the
gossip," hardly makes sense. I think the sentence requires revision.]
CHAPTER III
THE DISSOLUTION OF THE CLASSICAL TYPE OF ART
The gods of classical art contain in themselves the germ of their
overthrow; consequently, when this fatal defect which they include is
brought to consciousness through the elaboration of art itself, they
bring about the dissolution of the classical Ideal at the same time.
We established as the principle of this, so far as we have here to
deal with it, that kind of spiritual individuality which secures in
every respect an adequate expression in bodily or external existence
immediate to our senses. This individuality was enclosed within a
complex of divine personalities, whose definition is not essentially
and withal from the first given up to the contingent condition in which
the everlasting gods receive the appearance of dissolution for man's
conscious life no less than for his artistic creation.
1. FATE OR DESTINY