ethics and art

8/12/2019 Ethics and Art

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Ethics--Apollonian and DionysianAuthor(s): Mary L. CoolidgeSource: The Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 38, No. 17 (Aug. 14, 1941), pp. 449-465Published by: Journal of Philosophy, Inc.Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2018260.

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VOLUME XXVIII, No. 17 AUGUST 4, 1941

THE JOURNAL FPHILOSOPHYETHICS-APOLLONIAN AND DIONYSIAN

IFORhe logical positivist, ". . . ethics, as a branch of knowledge,is nothing more than a department of psychology and sociol-ogy." ' By such statements as this the logical positivists mean, ofcourse, that to the social sciences belongs the task of assembling andsorting the facts concerning what human beings have thought andfelt, and do think and feel, about what are ordinarily called moralproblems, and concerning human behavior in making moral choices.And they mean also that anything to be found in ethical discus-sions and theories over and above such tabulation of facts can beallowed no standing as science, or as philosophy in the traditionalsense-i.e., it can make no valid claim to be or to yield truth orknowledge-but must be accepted as mere "expressions and exci-tants of feeling." 2Now when language is used not to convey information but to ex-press or excite feeling the result is commonly accepted as being nota bit of science but a bit of art. Thus ethics, in so far as it is any-thing more than a statement of the facts about thinking, feeling,and behavior, becomes, according to the analysis of the logical posi-tivists, an art. Various members of this group have suggested thatthis is the case, and the conclusion is an obvious one if the priorconclusions concerning the nature of knowledge, the meaningless-ness of the propositions of traditional metaphysics and value theory,etc., are accepted.That the traditional philosophical view of the nature of ethicsdiffers sharply from that just described would not, I believe, bedoubted by anyone. The difference lies not in any denial in thetraditional accounts that an ethical theory is in some sense a workof art but in the positive claim made in these accounts that it isalso something more. The reinterpretations of ethics which havebeen important in the history of thought have always been ex-pressions of the fused thought and feeling of one person or of agroup of persons, and they have always had in greater or less degree

1 Alfred J. Ayer, Language, Truth and Logic (1936), p. 168. A similaraccount of ethical statements may be found in Rudolf Carnap 's Philosophyand Logical Syntax (1935). See Chapter I, Section 4.2 Op. cit., p. 163.449

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450 THE JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHYthe power to arouse similar fusions of thought and feeling in otherpersons. No reasonably sensitive student of Socratic, or Aris-totelian, or Spinozistic, or Kalntian, or Spencerian ethical systems-however unsympathetic or even antagonistic his own responseto one or all of these systems may be-can fail to recognize thateach is the embodiment of a certain emotional attitude on thepart of its author and that each has been the means of transmit-ting the emotion expressed to countless other individuals and ofpersuading them to adopt the attitude recommended. But it isclear that neither Socrates, nor Aristotle, nor Spinoza, nor Kant,nor Spencer thought of himself as merely transmitting an emotionor bringing about the duplication of an attitude. On the contraryeach believed that he was offering a true account of the nature ofmoral values and of the basis of moral judgments. And each alsoundertook to relate his ethical conclusions to the general conclu-sions of a wider philosophical system which dealt with metaphysicaland epistemological matters as well as with ethical ones.The historically important interpretations of Christianity havea like character. In them also the ethical teachings are presentedas authoritative. And while one can not extract from the Gos-pels statements on metaphysical and epistemological matters sophrased that they are readily matched with the statements ofGreek or later European philosophers, yet assumptions and asser-tions concerning the nature of God, the nature of man, and man'sability to know good and evil are essential parts of New Testa-ment teachings; and these doctrines are accepted as having a verydefinite relationship to the ethical conclusions.Thus the orthodox, traditional view of philosophers and theo-logians has been one according to which an ethical theory gives aknowledge of values and is accepted as being logically allied to,if not explicitly deduced from, a metaphysical theory or a theol-ogy. If one looks in the past for exemplifications of a point ofview towards ethics not unlike that of the logical positivists, onefinds them at times when older interpretations of the tradition havecome to seem inadequate and newer ones are not yet available. Insuch periods men have wearied of metaphysical and theologicalspeculations and have been content to accept their ethical beliefsas relatively detached accounts of human wishes and hopes, oftenas more or less moving and more or less persuasive descriptionsof the life that "our fathers" or "the wise" have led and that wesuppose it might be well for us and our children to lead. Thewritings of some of the Latin authors of Cicero's time and later,when the ideals of the Stoics and the Epicureans were being mergedand the original metaphysical bases of the two systems were for-



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ETHICS-APOLLONIAN AND DIONYSIAN 451gotten or deliberately rejected, have this character. And Chris-tian ethical theory has also at times slipped its metaphysical ortheological moorings and drifted with the tide of inherited senti-ment.There is, however, nothing that suggests weariness or drift inthe writings of the contemporary logical positivists. On the con-trary there is a crisp and positive incisiveness about them. Theysuggest that the writers have little interest in the conclusions ofthe past and appeal to the thinking of the present and the future-a thinking envisaged as essentially scientific and logical-forconfirmation of the rightness and fruitfulness of their contentions.And it is clear that this is the proper, and indeed the inevitable,testing ground. Fundamental criticism-either sympathetic oradverse-of their theories must in the end concern itself with thelogical assumptions on which the theories are based and the argu-ments by which they are supported. It is not such criticism,however, that will be presented in this paper. There is room andneed, also, I believe, for another sort of investigation, i.e., for anexamination of the implications of the assumptions made and theconclusions drawn. And the task to be undertaken here is that ofan inquiry as to what ethical discussion is likely to be if it isunderstood to have the character and the limitations that the log-ical positivists ascribe to it. We shall, in other words, accept pro-visionally the logical positivists' summary account of what ethicscan be and then attempt to make clear to ourselves how, withinthe bounds prescribed, it might be expected to develop. I shallassume that there is no need to consider what may, and should,be done by psychologists, anthropologists, sociologists, etc., in col-lecting facts about moral beliefs and the feelings, emotions, andreactions connected with them. The methods to be used, and thelimitation of the ends that can be reached by these methods, areclear and generally recognized. What will be considered is theresidual talk about ethical matters, and specifically such talk aspurports to be not about facts but about values and ultimate ends.I understand that the logical positivists agree that such talk isbound to go on, and that they have no wish to discourage it solong as it is recognized as laying no claim to be asserting truthsor extending knowledge. As an "emotive" use of language it isheld to have the character of art; and it is as such that I proposeto consider it. II

If we are to expect ethical discussion to have the character notof theory purporting to give knowledge but of art, an obvious firststep in inquiry is to ask what character is to be ascribed to art and



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452 THE JOURNAL OPFPHILOSOPHYwhat has been found to be the most generally useful classificationof the arts.

Historically, of course, all sorts of answers have been given tothe question, "What is art?" But most of these answers we neednot in our present discussion consider. We need not, for example,consider interpretations in which a claim is made that art revealsIdeal beauty, or the character of the universe as a whole, or theAbsolute, or the nature of Spirit, etc. We can disregard suchinterpretations because we are attempting to confine our discus-sion within the bounds set by the logical positivists, and since theyassert that we can never know anything about Platonic Ideas, orthe universe as a whole, or the Absolute, or Spirit, etc., we cannot be expected to entertain theories of art according to which artis said to yield such knowledge. This means that we can disre-gard all the generally idealistic theories of art from that of Platoto those of Bosanquet and Croce-and their number is very large.Other theories which might not ordinarily be regarded as ideal-istic but in which similar claims are made that art gives a "visionof reality" or reinforces ultimate ethical or religious truths-thoseof Bergson and Tolstoi, for example-may be eliminated on muchthe same ground; they presuppose that we can have a sort ofknowledge which the logical positivists deny that anyone can everhave.One may put the matter in a somewhat different way by point-ing out that the logical positivists deny the validity of a normativeesthetics just as they deny that of a normative ethics. And theinterpretations of the nature of art which we have just said thatwe can disregard are ones in which the claim is made that estheticnorms do exist and that good art is good in so far as it exemplifiesthem. Since we are attempting to ascertain what ethical discus-sion can be within the limits prescribed by logical positivist doc-trine, we can-and indeed must-refrain from translating it intothe terms of an esthetic theory which the upholders of such a doc-trine would regard as itself invalid.

The interpretations of the nature of art which we have left toconsider, after the eliminations of which we have spoken have beenmade, are ones in which art is accepted as the expression of hu-man feeling and emotion in some form by means of which thisfeeling or emotion can, under favorable conditions, be transmittedto others. There are variations in the formulation of interpreta-tions having this general character. In some accounts emphasisfalls on the expression itself, in others on the transmission of it.In some accounts works of art are thought of as reflecting theemotions of an individual, in others as expressions of a social or



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ETHICS-APOLLONIAN AND DIONYSIAN 453group consciousness. But the accounts are alike in differentiatingart from science and from strictly utilitarian activities as beingimmediately "expressive." The sciences of psychology, sociology,etc., give us knowledge about human wishes, feelings, and emotions.The practical, utilitarian crafts procure for us things that satisfythem. The arts express them directly in some "emotive" language-for example, in sound, line, color, words, etc.3The commonest and most generally accepted classification ofthe arts is that based on the differences in the media used in thedifferent arts. Croce has denied that these differences have anyreal significance. But the fact remains that artists, critics, andmembers of the general public do constantly take for granted thatthere is an obvious and significant distinction between the art ofthe painter who uses color and line, that of the sculptor who usesthree dimensional forms, that of the musician who uses tones intemporal sequences, that of the writer who uses words, etc. Therewould seem to be no doubt that "ethical emotions"-i.e., the emo-tions experienced in connection with situations involving moralchoices or moral judgments-are more often and more clearly ex-pressed in words than in the fine arts or music. Thus ethical dis-course as art is more nearly related to literature than to other formsof art. Both can manage to convey incidentally a good deal ofinformation and to include an examination and analysis of ideas;but neither has as its chief function the giving of knowledge or theanalysis of ideas. As a matter of fact it is difficult to see how ifethical discussion is developed and accepted as an art any sharpdistinction can be drawn between it and "pure" literature except onsome arbitrary basis. Since ethical writers are in general willingto be more directly hortatory than literary ones, we might find itconvenient to rule that a work is to be considered ethical if it hasa given degree of hortatoriness, and literary if it has not. It isclear that on the basis of any such distinction there would be doubt-ful, borderline cases; but there were, for that matter, doubtful,borderline cases in the past when ethical writers who believed theirproper task was to deal with norms made use in formulating themof literary techniques, and men of letters incorporated in theirworks-and that quite without apology-the normative and meta-physical conclusions of philosophers.Thus a brief preliminary consideration as to what according tothe view of the logical positivists ethical discourse will be leads tothe conclusion that it will resemble literature in being an expres-sion of human wishes, feelings, and desires, but that it will be in

3 Carnap's acceptance of a theory about art such as that outlined isshown on pages 28 and 29 of Philosophy and Logical Syntax.



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454 THE JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHYtypical cases distinguishable from "pure" literature in being moredirectly hortatory. It will doubtless exhibit the influence of thetimes and places in which it is produced; and it will be the taskof the historians to note, and in so far as possible to explain interms of psychological, social, economic, political, and other causalfactors, the differences between given examples. This will, ofcourse, be no new task for critics and historians to undertake, sinceany history of ideas has always offered some analysis of this sort.There remains one general classification of the arts-over andabove those already noted-the importance of which has beenstressed in countless critical and historical treatments of the artswhich would seem to be quite applicable, although not heretoforevery often actually applied, in an analysis of types of ethicaltheory. This is the classification of art as classic or romantic, orin Nietzschean terms as Apollonian or Dionysian. For this is aclassification that cuts across and beneath the distinction betweenone literary form and another, and across and beneath the distinc-tion between one form of art and another, and deals with funda-mental differences in human wishes, desires, and feelings. It ex-hibits the latter as springing from two different sources and aspressing for expression in two widely diverging directions.It is, of course, possible to treat the cont-rastbetween the classicand the romantic in art in various ways. One may define classicart literally and historically as that produced at a certain time ortimes in the Graeco-Roman world. Or one may, widening the con-cept to some extent, accept as "classics' all art whenever andwherever produced which appears to be like that of Greece and Romein spirit or in execution. When such characterizations of "classic'"art are adopted, the term "romantic 'is left to cover, often rathervaguely, the art of other places and periods in which there aresigns of a revolt against the established classic tradition. Orsome such formula as that of "unity in variety" may be used todefine art; and one may distinguish classic forms of drama orsculpture as those in which the emphasis is placed on the unityof the whole from romantic forms in which the emphasis is placedon the variety of interests displayed or details elaborated. Butwhile all these distinctions have some usefulness, there is a deeperand more significant one; and it is this distinction that Nietzschehas made clear in his account of the difference between the Apol-lonian and the Dionysian sources of artistic expressioii.Nietzsche, it will be remembered, speaks of Apollonian art asthat of the dream. It is an art of "fair appearance," of fantasyand image; and it has always its "measured limitation" and "free-dom from the wilder emotions. " It is a shaped and individualized



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ETHICS-APOLLONIAN AND DIONYSIAN 455art with "all the joy and wisdom of 'appearance' together withits beauty." Dionysian art on the other hand is that of drunken-ness. It is an art of enchantment, of self-forgetfulness, of ecstaticrevelry; it celebrates a breaking of bonds and forms, a limitless andexuberant vitality. It rejoices in the expression of mysteriousdepths of primitive, non-individualized feeling, feeling that belongsto many men together or to man and nature when the two are feltto be one.4There is, of course, exaggeration in Nietzsche's vivid descriptionof the classic-romantic antithesis. But his description has hauntedthe imagination of the critics ever since The Birth of Tragedy waspublished. It is true, their attention to his theory goes to showthat there are two very different drives or sets of impulses atwork in man, the one seeking expression that is orderly, beautiful,serene, the other finding its only possible outlet in the mysterious,the passionate, and the tumultuous. The development of romanticart is not for Nietzsche simply a pleasant excursion into new coun-try, an experimenting with new forms by those who have becomesomewhat tired of the old. It is an expression of forces at workin the depths of human nature. And in these depths one findsnot only the traditionally recognized desire for pleasure and se-curity but "the longing for the ugly, the good resolute desire . . .for pessimism, for tragic myth, for the picture of all that is terrible,evil, enigmatical, destructive, fatal at the basis of existence. . . . 5If with this description of the two sources of art in mind weturn, not as Nietzsche himself did to an interpretation of literatureand music, but to an examination of ethical writings, we shall findthe clearest examples of an Apollonian treatment of the good forman in the Utopias. For these are descriptive not of any worldthat does exist or that has existed but of an ideal world. Someaccounts of Utopia have been fantastic in the extreme, and even thecommunities described by such relatively sober thinkers as Platoand Bacon belong clearly among the dream worlds. They differfrom the real world in being more orderly, more beautiful, andmore cheerful. If the beings who inhabit them are like enough toourselves to be recognizably human-and this is usually the case,-they are generally healthier, wiser, more virtuous, and happier.Plato, whose interests were moral and political, implied in his twodescriptions of Utopian communities, The Reputblic and The Laws,that their superiority had been brought about by education andby the use of the right legal, political, and economic organization.

4 Friedrich Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy (3rd ed. of Eng. translation;N. Y.: Macmillan, 1924), pp. 22-28.5 Ibid., p. 7.



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456 THE JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHYBacon, whose interests were scientific, put more stress upon the ad-vantages to be obtained by an increase of scientific knowledge andinvention. The Utopias of other writers have usually been builtupon one or the other of these models. A curious modern versionof a conspicuously Apollonian Utopia is to be found in the forecastsof those Marxist thinkers who look forward to a time when, afterclass struggles have ended and classes have been abolished, themillennium of a peaceful anarchy will at last pervade the earth.(Of course a description of Utopia-as The Republic-may be morethan an artistic description of a dream world. It may include acomplete metaphysics or a theology. But as a description-andit is as such that we are interested in it here-it is a bit of Apol-lonian art.)During the latter half of the last century and the first decadesof this one, a wide-spread acceptance of doctrines of evolution madethe projection of Utopian dreams into a not-too-distant "real"future a common habit of mind with many men of the westernworld. Bacon's faith that when man understood nature he coulduse her to make his own life continually safer, fuller, and richerseemed to be rapidly justifying itself. And had not Nature her-self been discovered to be furthering man's highest hopes in a man-ner which Bacon himself had not anticipated but which Spencerconfidently explained to a countless number of attentive readers?This optimistic belief in progress was found particularly congenialby persons living in the United States. The wealth of an undevel-oped country made the prophecies of unprecedented abundance ofmaterial goods to be enjoyed in the near future seem far morepossible of fulfillment in America than in the poorer countries ofthe old world. And Plato's faith in the power of education to re-make human society and to improve human nature itself has beenwidely and continuously preached in this country from Jefferson'sday to that of John Dewey. If descriptions of Utopia, labelled assuch, have not been especially numerous among American literaryand ethical writings, the general temper of many of the most im-portant works on ethical and social theory produced here has beenwithout question optimistic and Apollonian.The ideal worlds of different writers are, of course, different-Apollonian art is an individualized art. But these worlds are alikein exhibiting order, harmony, and "fair appearance." And thelives that men lead in them are lives of order, peace, and pleasant-ness, although the necessity for discipline and for self-sacrifice incertain cases need not be denied. If these descriptions are accepted-as ethical discourse on the logical positivist premises must beaccepted-as expressive only and without reference to any norma-



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ETHICS-APOLLONIAN AND DIONYSIAN 457tive or absolute presuppositions, they can be judged solely on thebasis of their persuasiveness. Since the Apollonian artist is char-acteristically optimistic, he seldom lacks confidence in his ownpowers of persuasion. "This is the world of my dreams. Cananyone fail to find it beautiful ?" He waits for no negative reply.If he heard one he could do nothing about it. He has not pre-sented an argument but has attempted to move mankind by theportrayal of what is pleasant to himself.The sketch of the good life presented by the logical positivist,Moritz Schlick, in Problems of Ethics seems to me typical of thekind of Apollonian ethical discourse just described. Much of thisvolume is devoted to an exposition of the general position of logicalpositivism and to a criticism of older ethical theories. The restof it consists of an account of the satisfactoriness of a life of kindlyhappiness. This is a sort of life to secure, we are told, for it is away of life in harmony with natural desires for what is pleasant.Thus one has a description running true to the pattern of tradi-tional egoistical hedonism, a description which when offered aswithout metaphysical or theological implications and when advo-cated by a person of a naturally optimistic temperament yields atypically Apollonian picture of man and society.Dionysian ethical theories are less easily recognized than areApollonian ones. This is the case because they express impulsesthat are more primitive and chaotic and hence less readily organ-ized and made articulate. Nietzsche suggests that in the realm ofpure art the most natural outlet for Dionysian emotion is music,while the most natural embodiment of Apollonian dreams is in pic-tures. And music is less readily translated into verbal descrip-tion than are pictures. We can not, therefore, expect to find assystematic a working-out of the romantic view of life in ethicaldiscourse as we did of the classic view in the case of the Utopias.Fragmentary expressions of the Dionysian view can, however,be found in many places. If, for example, we turn to the OldTestament writings, the existence of a great variety of teachings,and the contradictions that are easily pointed out between theteachings of one book and that of another, will suggest that we havein the Old Testament neither the systematic development of a singleline of philosophical-ethical argument nor the unified presentationof a world-dream. And an outpouring of primitive desires andfeelings similar to that which, as Nietzsche pointed out, appear inthe Greek choruses is to be found in many parts of many books.There are romantic stories, as that of Belshazzar's feast; passionatebursts of oratory, as Ezekiel's discourse on the sword of the Lord;mysterious references to the Strange Woman even in the midst of



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458 THE JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHYadvice to be wise; and countless vivid descriptions of battles, ofplagues, and of doomed cities. The emotion displayed is not thatof an individual but that of a people whose ties are the deep andat times the secret ones of a common blood and a common devotionto special rites and special holy places. Exhortation is sometimesfor one and sometimes for another sort of action: for courage inbattle, for rejection of alien customs, for expiatory suffering, forparticipation in national repentance or national rejoicing. But ineach case the presupposition is that the action will be the resultof feelings and hopes that belong to the deep under-currents of acommon life. No one could, of course, wish to deny that there is agreat deal more in the ethical teaching of the Old Testament thanan expression of the romantic side of human nature. There arebooks, or at least parts of books, which show something like a classi-cal serenity and love of order. And in the chronologically laterwritings "righteousness" has an absolute and eternal validity andthe account of it yields a normative ethics logically bound up witha theology. Even in the earlier books it is probably true that onecould always trace some connection between the ethical teachingand a taken-for-granted-theology. But in so far as one can sort outthe non-normative and non-theological elements they would appear tobe more often Dionysian than Apollonian.The more important interpretations of Christian ethics havebeen, as we have already noted, essentially normative. Specificallyit is the concept of sin-really a theological concept but one with-out which an ethical system is not Christian-that can not be re-duced to purely esthetic or expressive terms. But Christian ethicaltheories have not infrequently shown the influence of classic or ro-mantic ideals. In accounts of either the Garden of Eden or the King-dom of Heaven it has always been easy to incorporate Utopian-Apol-lonian elements. St. Augustine, Dante, and Milton are amongthose who have seized and exploited this opportunity. Whenwriters have been impressed by the importance in human nature ofits Dionysian elements, they have been called upon to use somewhatmore ingenuity to make this fact apparent within the frameworkof a Christian theology or metaphysics. But it has proved quitepossible to give romantic passions in the shape of vices to the Devilor the damned, and romantic passions in the shape of heroic virtuesto the saints in their struggle against the forces of evil.On the whole the influence on Christian teaching of the Aristo-telian doctrine that man is a rational being-and the influence hasbeen a strong one-has tended to an emphasis on an Apollonianrather than a Dionysian interpretation of the good life. A Utopiandream appears more rational than ecstasy. The result has been



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ETHICS-APOLLONIAN AND DIONYSIAN 459that writers who have recognized most strongly the non-rational,romantic impulses at work in human nature, and who did not wishto break entirely with the Christian tradition, have often producedethical theories exhibiting strange compromises between conflict-ing ideals. In this group I should include Hobbes, Rousseau, andSchopenhauer. Another example of compromise-in this instanceone between the Apollonian ideal of Greek rationalism and a deeplyinherent sense of the dark and mysterious forces in nature and inman-can be found in the writings of Lucretius.In the case of the writers just mentioned, as well as in that ofthe more orthodox upholders of a Christian interpretation of ethics,the ethical theories are parts of wider metaphysical or theologicalsystems and offer definite, normative accounts of ethical good. Ihave referred to them here because they illustrate the fact thateven when the general current of thought and feeling runs stronglyin the direction of a normative or an Apollonian ethics there arethose who see life and human nature as Dionysian or romantic.And it has also seemed to me important to note the fact that thecombined influence of Greek rationalism and Christian dogma uponEuropean thought tended to make any open expression of a thor-oughly Dionysian ethics difficult, if not impossible, before the timeof Nietzsche.

Before taking up Nietzsche's case, however, it may be as wellto look briefly at that of Schopenhauer. Schopenhauer did notbreak entirely with traditional Christian ethics but his reinterpre-tation of this ethics is unorthodox in the extreme. His doctrine ofthe existence of an underlying blind will would seem entirely com-patible with a Dionysian ethics, but his ethical ideal of completeand final asceticism is not. Some of the ideas borrowed by himfrom eastern philosophies show his own strong inclination to ac-cept life as a Dionysian phenomenon. But in the end he alignshimself with those in the group of eastern thinkers who reject allpositive, earthly values. It is for this refusal to accept life thatNietzsche, who in his youth was strongly influenced by Schopen-hauer, in the end denounces him.Nietzsche also interprets human life in terms of will. But unlikeSchopenhauer he rejoices in the multifold manifestations of this will.

And this secret spoke Life herself unto me. "Behold," said she, "I amthat which must ever surpass itself."To be sure, ye call it will to procreation, or impulse towards a goal,towards the higher, remoter,more manifold: but all that is one and the same8ecret.



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460 THE JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHY"That I have to be struggle, and be coming, and purpose, and cross pur-pose-ah, he who divineth my will, divineth well also on the crooked paths itbath to tread"Whatever I create, and however much I love it,-soon must I be adverseto it, and to my love: so willeth my will.

"Thus did Life once teach me: and thereby, ye wisest ones, do I solveyou the riddle of your hearts."Verily, I say unto you: good and evil which would be everlasting-itdoth not exist Of its own accord must it ever surpass itself anew. " 6The exultantly romantic character of Nietzsche 's ethics is so wellrecognized that it needs no stressing or elaboration. There is noattempt to compromise with Christian or rational presuppositions.The ethical theory has little connection with any metaphysical orepistemological doctrine. It is offered as a call to a new attitudetoward life and makes little pretense at being based on argumentor defended by other than a poetic and oratorical logic. Those whorefuse to acknowledge its importance do so on the ground that itis the expression of the abnormal feeling and imagination of a manof unbalanced mind. If we are to accept it as an outstanding ex-ample of ethical discourse regarded as romantic art-and I believeit must be so accepted,-it is necessary to give some considerationto this criticism. The point of the criticism seems to be thatNietzsche's feeling and thinking was as a result of his ill healthso a-typical that (1) the study of it yields little useful informationabout how ordinary-and healthier-people feel and think, and(2) that few persons are likely to be interested in or influenced byit. My own view is that neither of these conclusions is legitimate.As for the first contention, the very principle implied in it caneasily be seen to be false. There is no field of natural or socialscience in which we have not learned much about usual occurrencesfrom a study of unusual ones. The astronomer does not refuse totake eclipses seriously because they are unusual, nor the politicalscientist revolutions. In Nietzsche's case the very peculiarities of

his physical and mental make-up render him and his work anespecially useful subject for study. It is certainly no accident thatit was he who interpreted the antithesis between the classic andthe romantic in such a way as to throw new light on an old andmuch discussed theme. He was temperamentally sensitive to someof the factors involved in the artistic expression of emotion thathad escaped the attention of other critics. If in expressing hisviews on life in general this sensitiveness makes his reactions seem6 Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spake Zarathustra (3rd ed. of Eng. transla-tion; N. Y.: Macmillan, 1911), pp. 136, 137.



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ETHICS-APOLLONIAN AND DIONYSIAN 461exaggerated in comparison with those of others, can one not saythe same of the reactions of many romantic artists? And if oneis engaged in an examination of romantic art as such, is it not clearthat the most romantic examples are especially worthy of study?Moreover the anti-rationalism that underlies Nietzsche's repu-diation first of orthodox normative ethics and secondly of the Apol-lonian ideal of the good life, is no isolated phenomenon. On thecontrary his insistence that all life and all human conduct can benothing but an expression of will, either free and exultant orthwarted and perverted, is only one instance of an anti-rationalismthat is typical of much European thinking in the last one hundredyears. Schopenhauer 's preceded it, and Bergson 's followed it.And the anti-rationalism of the psychologists and the psycho-analysts who have explored the phenomena of the unconsciousis especially interesting in its connection with contemporarydiscussions of ethical problems. The conclusions of this groupof writers are complex, and not infrequently conflicting. Butthere is general agreement among them that much of man'sthinking, feeling, and conduct is the result of strong, primitive, im-pulses and emotions the expression of which is varied, highlycharged, and often characterized by a mysterious symbolism of itsown. In other words, they are at one with Nietzsche in giving usa Dionysian rather than an Apollonian picture of human nature.And it would seem to me impossible for anyone who has examinedthis picture with care to assert dogmatically that the picture drawnearlier by Nietzsche is too exaggerated to be worth attention. Imay add that while I spoke earlier of the generally Apolloniantemper of most American thinking on ethical matters, I also believethat the Dionysian point of view of the psycho-analysts representsa cross current in thought and feeling of no little significance.In commenting upon the first of the criticisms which we notedas having been made by Nietzsche's critics, some points have beensuggested that are relevant also to the second criticism-that,namely, that few persons are likely to be interested in it or influ-enced by it. But it is when we approach this second criticismfrom another side that its weakness becomes most obvious. Thethinking of the contemporary upholders of Nazi and Fascist doc-trines has been influenced by it. Just how extensive and how di-rect the influence has been is a matter of dispute among the inter-preters of the movements in question. All that I wish to makeclear is the falseness of the contention that the extravagance andso-called "abnormality" of Nietzsche's teaching is such that it isunlikely to be accepted or reproduced. In the light of the events



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462 THE JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHYof the last two decades it seems unnecessary to labor this point.There are no extravagances about the supremacy of the will topower in any of Nietzsche's statements that can not be matchedby similar extravagances in the utterances of men of standing inNazi and Fascist circles. In the philosophies of these men we havethe assumption that the assertion of the will is itself a good of thehighest order. The point is not argued; we are presented withaccounts of strong men asserting their wills and told to admirethem. (When there is argument it centers around the questionof the relation of the individual to the state and is, of course,Hegelian rather than Nietzschean in character.) The qualitieswhich it is taken for granted we will admire in a Nazi leader arethose which Nietzsche gave to his Supermen-loyalty to those towhom one is bound by ties of race, native habitation, and shareddesires for overlordship, and a passion to live dangerously andheroically rather than safely and pleasantly. That we have here aDionysian ideal is evident; and that this romantic ideal is differentfrom other romantic ideals-for example, from that of Rousseau-is also clear.It has seemed to me that only by the citation of a number ofethical theories could one expect to establish directly the fact thatwhen ideals of conduct and of life are presented to individuals tobe judged on expressive principles only, that is, as persuasive orcompelling simply as presented, some of these individuals will findan Apollonian ideal more sympathetic and some a Dionysian. Butthis result is what we might well have expected in advance fromobservations of different people's attitudes towards works of art.There are those whose emotional response to classic art is muchstronger and more favorable than their response to romantic art,and vice versa. It is also, of course, true that as one may preferone or another type of either classic or romantic art so one mayprefer one or another interpretation of either an Apollonian or aDionysian account of the good life. However, differences withinthe two groups seem to me far less important in the case of ethicalideals than the differences between them.

IIIThe thesis of The Birth of Tragedyis that the highest form oftragedy was the result of the synthesis of Apollonian and Dionysianelements. And a question that naturally presents itself to anyonefollowing the outline of Nietzsche's argument is to what extent simi-

lar syntheses may be supposed to have existed in the past, and maybe expected in the future. If one's interest is in the expression



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ETHICS-APOLLONIAN AND DIONYSIAN 463of ethical ideals it is clearly especially necessary to inquire whetheranything like a stable synthesis of the classical and the romantic isto be hoped for. For a continuing conflict in ethical ideals is ob-viously more likely to lead to confusion and ineffectiveness in thelife of an individual or to the disruption of a society than is sucha conflict in the realm of esthetics. The evidence available wouldseem to imply that synthesis is likely to be temporary and-evenwhen temporarily prevailing-more apparent than real. If thefeelings and emotions that underlie the expression, either in artor in interpretations of life, of Apollonian and Dionysian idealsare as different from one another as Nietzsche himself suggests-and the exposition of the preceding section of this paper has givenus reason to suppose that this is the case-the a priori presumptionagainst the possibility of a stable and lasting synthesis is great.

It is moreover a commonplace of art history that there is a cyclein esthetic preferences. The flowering of a period of classic artis followed-often after a period of artistic confusion and decay-by a renewal of interest in romantic art; and this interest again,in due course of time, exhausts itself and is replaced by a swingback to the ideals of classicism. It is very generally assumed thatthis cycle will continue; it is supposed by many critics to be theresult of a precarious balance characteristic of life in all its mani-festations, a balance involving a continuous alternation of periodsof relaxation and of tension. If ethical interpretations of life areaccepted and judged as expressive phenomena, it would seem onlyreasonable to suppose that the appreciation of them will exhibitthe same alternations found in the history of artistic expression.Furthermore it would seem clear that the constantly recurringattempts which countless philosophers through the centuries havemade to establish a normative ethics is evidence that they havebelieved that any ethics that was not normative was bound to beunstable. The distrust which such philosophers have shown of therelativistic tendencies in the thought of their contemporaries isusually made very plain. Thus Socrates considered the ideals ofthe sophists unstable and Kant held the same view of those of the"anthropologists."On the other hand, there have, of course, been and there noware philosophers and others who believe that a non-normative ethicscan be a reasonably stable one. So far as I have been able to dis-cover those who hold this view are themselves upholders of an Apol-lonian interpretation of the good life. And a little reflection sug-gests that this must be the case. A disciple of Dionysius is notinclined to view stability as natural or desirable. It is the classicist



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464 THE JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHYwho finds such balance and harmony as make for permanence andpeace good. The romanticist, on the contrary, is wearied ratherthan pleased by them. An individual who like Schopenhauer feelsat one and the same time that life is essentially Dionysian and thatit is as such distasteful, would seem to be driven as he was to preachannihilation as the ultimate good. But such a view is a perverseand inverted romanticism and can not be regarded as typical. Onemay put the whole matter in a somewhat different way by point-ing out that whereas the strong defender of classical principles inart or life may claim to be able to assimilate and preserve-albeitusually in some transmuted form-the values dear to the roman-ticist, the romanticist himself has only a passing interest-all hisinterests being indeed passing-in the values of the classicist.

A balanced satisfaction of man 's instincts and interests-in-cluding the sympathetic ones because man is by nature a socialanimal-resulting in an orderly and pleasant life, is the generalideal of an Apollonian ethics. The ideal is presented and thepresenter of it assumes that if his account is sufficiently vivid hishearers will see that it is without question the most persuasive ofall possible ideals and will decide to act in accordance with it. Afollower of Apollo is naturally optimistic. The upholder of suchan ethics argues that since the ideal presents each individual witha portrait of himself leading an orderly life in which he enjoys themaximum number of satisfactions that could be obtained by him,it will appeal to everyone. This seems to me to be the tenor ofthe argument of the book by Schlick referred to above. That ex-amples of it could be found among the traditional theories of ego-istical hedonism is clear. It is quite possible to include in theaccount given-as Schlick does in his exposition-explanationstending to show that even lives conspicuous for heroism and self-sacrifice can be interpreted as conforming to the pattern described.It would seem as if in such a theory everything that could be donehas been done to give an account of the good life that offers allthings to all men. But can such an account ever really be given?The answer would seem to me to be an unquestionable "No."

In the first place no one account ever has proved so universallypersuasive-both advocates of a different and more romantic ideal,and persons not willing to be satisfied with anything less than agenuinely normative ethics, having constantly revolted against it.And, in the second place,-to repeat what has been said above-ifthe Dionysian elements in human nature are as deep seated andas stubbornly untransmutable as our examination of them has sug-gested, no single account ever can be universally persuasive.



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ETHICS-APOLLONIAN AND DIONYSIAN 465The inevitable conclusion would seem to be that any attempt ata synthesis of Apollonian and Dionysian ideals resolves itself into

an attempt on the part of the upholders of the Apollonian idealto incorporate in it the alien elements of the Dionysian ideal, andthat such an enterprise can never be more than partially and tem-porarily successful. Was not the synthesis in literature whichNietzsche recognized in the greatest Greek tragedies just such anattempted incorporation of romantic ideals within an essentiallyclassic pattern? And is not Nietzsche's lament a lament for thelack of stability in the synthesis? If ethical discourse is expres-sive only, it seems bound to exhibit the characteristics of estheticcreation and appreciation, i.e., a continuous replacement of oneideal by the other with intervals of active strife between the twowhenever the forces supporting them are more or less evenlymatched.

Nietzsche complained that the perfection and harmony of Greektragedy was broken in upon and destroyed by Socratic moralizing.What seems likely to break in upon all attempts to develop a purelypersuasive ethics is the conviction held strongly by many persons-some learned and some very simple-that ethics must be morethan persuasive. Such individuals will be content with nothingless than an ethical theory which is an integral part of a meta-physical or theological system, one in which the good for man isinterpreted in connection with an account of the nature of man andof the universe. At least some members of the human race refuseto be content either with an Apollonian dream, be it ever so charm-ing, or with a Dionysian revel, be it ever so exuberant, or evenwith an alternation between the one and the other. They insistupon asking what in real life is really good.The logical positivist's answer is, of course, that they can neverknow. Scientific knowledge about facts is possible, artistic crea-tion and esthetic enjoyment are possible, but any further knowl-edge as to what is good in itself is impossible. I have not in thispaper attempted in any way either to expound or to criticize thesefundamental logical positivist doctrines. The single task under-taken has been that of pointing out some of the consequences thatseem to follow in the field of ethics if the doctrines are true. Nodoubt an attentive reader, who reads between the lines, would beaware that the writer's conviction is that they are not true.

MARY L. COOLIDGE.WELLESLEY COLLEGE.

ethics and art

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