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Notes:
YOU ARE RIGHT IN SAYING THAT THERE ARE MANY CONTRADICTORY OPINIONS on
this subject. Does not that alone prove that people do not know the
truth? Where truth is, there cannot be many different opinions.
In antiquity that which is now called art served the aim of
objective knowledge. And as we said a moment ago, speaking of
dances, works of art represented an exposition and a record of
the eternal laws of the structure of the universe. Those who
devoted themselves to research and thus acquired a knowledge
of important laws, embodied them in works of art, just as is
done in books today.… This art did not pursue the aim either of
“beauty” or of producing a likeness of something or somebody.
For instance, an ancient statue created by such an artist is neither
a copy of the form of a person nor the expression of a subjective
sensation; it is either the expression of the laws of knowledge,
in terms of the human body, or a means of objective transmission
of a state of mind. The form and action, indeed the whole expression,
is according to law.
To see a world in a grain of sand, / And a heaven in a wild flower, / Hold infinity in the palm of your hand, / And eternity in an hour. -William Blake, poet, engraver, and painter (1757- ~ • ~