affect us so beneficently, nay, so magically? Further, that the stranger
or the mere passing traveller feels the picturesque or poetical effect of
objects which are unable to produce this effect upon those who live among
them may be explained from the fact that the novelty and complete
strangeness of the objects of such an indifferent, purely objective
apprehension are favourable to it. Thus, for example, the sight of an
entirely strange town often makes a specially agreeable impression upon
the traveller, which it by no means produces in the inhabitant of it; for
it arises from the fact that the former, being out of all relation to this
town and its inhabitants, perceives it purely objectively. Upon this
depends partly the pleasure of travelling. This seems also to be the
reason why it is sought to increase the effect of narrative or dramatic
works by transferring the scene to distant times or lands: in Germany, to
Italy or Spain; in Italy, to Germany, Poland, or even Holland. If now
perfectly objective, intuitive apprehension, purified from all volition,
is the condition of the _enjoyment_ of æsthetic objects, so much the more
is it the condition of their _production_. Every good picture, every
genuine poem, bears the stamp of the frame of mind described. For only
what has sprung from perception, and indeed from purely objective
perception, or is directly excited by it, contains the living germ from
which genuine and original achievements can grow up: not only in plastic
and pictorial art, but also in poetry, nay, even in philosophy. The
_punctum saliens_ of every beautiful work, of every great or profound
thought, is a purely objective perception. Such perception, however, is
absolutely conditioned by the complete silence of the will, which leaves
the man simply the pure subject of knowledge. The natural disposition for
the predominance of this state is genius.