on the subject, in spite of the satire to which the more prosaic

Anglo-Saxon has subjected it, is peculiarlyapplicable there.



To call a Japanese cook, for instance, an artist would be but the

barest acknowledgment of fact, for Japanese food is far more



beautiful to look at than agreeable to eat; while Tokio tailors are

certainly masters of drapery, if they are sublimely oblivious to the



natural modelings of the male or female form.

On the other hand, art is sown, like the use of tobacco, broadcast



among the people. It is the birthright of the Far East, the talent

it never hides. Throughout the length and breadth of the land, and



from the highest prince to the humblest peasant, art reigns supreme.

Now such a prevalence of artistic feeling implies of itself



impersonality in the people. At first sight it might seem as if

science did the same, and that in this respect the one hemisphere



offset the other, and that consequently both should be equally

impersonal. But in the first place, our masses are not imbued with



the scientific spirit, as theirs are with artistic sensibility.

Who would expect of a mason an impersonal interest in the principles



of the arch, or of a plumber a non-financial devotion to hydraulics?

Certainly one would be wrong in crediting the masses in general or



European waiters in particular with much abstract love of mathematics,

for example. In the second place, there is an essential difference



in the attitude of the two subjects upon personality. Emotionally,

science appeals to nobody, art to everybody. Now the emotions



constitute the larger part of that complexbundle of ideas which we

know as self. A thought which is not tinged to some extent with



feeling is not only not personal; properlyspeaking, it is not even

distinctively human, but cosmical. In its lofty superiority to man,



science is unpersonal rather than impersonal. Art, on the other hand,

is a familiar spirit. Through the windows of the senses she finds



her way into the very soul of man, and makes for herself a home there.

But it is to his humanity, not to his individuality, that she



whispers, for she speaks in that universal tongue which all can

understand.



Examples are not wanting to substantiate theory. It is no mere

coincidence that the two most impersonal nations of Europe and Asia



respectively, the French and the Japanese, are at the same time the

most artistic. Even politeness, which, as we have seen,



distinguishes both, is itself but a form of art,--the social art of

living agreeably with one's fellows.



This impersonality comes out with all the more prominence when we

pass from the consideration of art in itself to the spirit which



actuates that art, and especially when we compare their spirit with

our own. The mainsprings of Far Eastern art may be said to be



three: Nature, Religion, and Humor. Incongruous collection that

they are, all three witness to the same trait. For the first



typifies concreteimpersonality, the second abstractimpersonality,

while the province of the last is to ridiculepersonality generally.



Of the trio the first is altogether the most important. Indeed, to

a Far Oriental, so mental" target="_blank" title="a.基本的 n.原理">fundamental a part of himself is his love of



Nature that before we view its mirrored image it will be well to

look the emotion itself in the face. The Far Oriental lives in a



long day-dream of beauty. He muses rather than reasons, and all

musing, so the word itself confesses, springs from the inspiration



of a Muse. But this Muse appears not to him, as to the Greeks,

after the fashion of a woman, nor even more prosaically after the



likeness of a man. Unnatural though it seem to us, his inspiration

seeks no human symbol. His Muse is not kin to mankind. She is too



impersonal for any personification, for she is Nature.

That poet whose name carries with it a certain presumption of



infallibility has told us that "the proper study of mankind is man;"

and if material advancement in consequence be any criterion of the



fitness of a particular mentalpursuit, events have assuredly

justified the saying. Indeed, the Levant has helped antithetically



to preach the same lesson, in showing us by its own fatal example

that the improper study of mankind is woman, and that they who but



follow the fair will inevitably degenerate.

The Far Oriental knows nothing of either study, and cares less.



The delight of self-exploration, or the possibly even greater delight

of losing one's self in trying to fathom femininity, is a sensation



equally foreign to his temperament. Neither the remarkable

persistence of one's own characteristics, not infrequently matter of



deep regret to their possessor, nor the charmingly unaccountable

variability of the fairer sex, at times quite as annoying, is a



phenomenon sufficient to stir his curiosity. Accepting, as he does,

the existing state of things more as a material fact than as a phase



in a gradual process of development, he regards humanity as but a

small part of the great natural world, instead of considering it the



crowning glory of the whole. He recognizes man merely as a fraction

of the universe,--one might almost say as a vulgarfraction of it,



considering the low regard in which he is held,--and accords him his

proportionate share of attention, and no more.



In his thought, nature is not accessory to man. Worthy M. Perichon,

of prosaic, not to say philistinic fame, had, as we remember, his



travels immortalized in a painting where a colossal Perichon in

front almost completely eclipsed a tiny Mont Blanc behind. A Far



Oriental thinks poetry, which may possibly account for the fact that

in his mind-pictures the relative importance of man and mountain



stands reversed. "The matchless Fuji," first of motifs in his art,

admits no pilgrim as its peer.



Nor is it to woman that turn his thoughts. Mother Earth is fairer,

in his eyes, than are any of her daughters. To her is given the



heart that should be theirs. The Far Eastern love of Nature amounts

almost to a passion. To the study of her ever varying moods her



Japanese admirer brings an impersonaladoration that combines oddly

the aestheticism of a poet with the asceticism of a recluse. Not



that he worships in secret, however. His passion is too genuine

either to find disguise or seek display. With us, unfortunately,



the love of Nature is apt to be considered a mental extravagance

peculiar to poets, excusable in exact ratio to the ability to give

• atmosphere [´ætməsfiə] n.大气；空气；气氛 (初中英语单词)