II

We shall now endeavour to discuss briefly how our remarks apply to photography. Any student of photographic literature is well aware that numerous papers are constantly being published by persons who evidently are not aware of this radical distinction between Science and Art.

The student will see it constantly advocated that every detail of a picture should be impartially rendered with a biting accuracy, and this in all cases. This biting sharpness being, as Mr. T. F. Goodall, the landscape-painter, says, "Quite fatal from the artistic standpoint." If the rendering were always given sharply, the work would belong to the category of topography or the knowledge of places, that is Science. To continue, the student will find directions for producing an unvarying quality in his negatives. He will be told how negatives of low-toned effects may be made to give prints like negatives taken in bright sunshine; in short, he will find that these writers have a scientific ideal, a sort of standard negative by which to gauge all others. And if these writers are questioned, the student will find the standard negative is one in which all detail is rendered with microscopic sharpness, and one taken evidently in the brightest sunshine. We once heard it seriously proposed that there should be some sort of standard lantern-slide. My allotted time is too brief to give further examples. Suffice it to say, that this unvarying standard negative would be admirable if Nature were unvarying in her moods; until that comes to pass there must be as much variety in negatives as there are in different moods in Nature.

It is, we think, because of the confusion of the aims of Science and Art that the majority of photographs fail either as scientific records or works of art. It would be easy to point out how the majority are false scientifically, and easier still to show how they are simply devoid of all artistic qualities. They serve, however, as many have served, as topographical records of faces, buildings, and landscapes, but often incorrect records at that. It is carious and interesting to observe that such work always requires a name. It is a photograph of Mr. Jones, of Mont Blanc, or of the Houses of Parliament. On the other hand, a work of Art really requires no name, - it speaks for itself. It has no burning desire to be christened, for its aim is to give the beholder aesthetic pleasure, and not to add to his knowledge or the Science of places, i.e. geography. The work of Art, it cannot too often be repeated, appeals to man's emotional side; it has no wish to add to his knowledge - to his Science. On the other hand, topographical works appeal to his intellectual side; they refresh his memory of absent persons or landscapes, or they add to his knowledge. To anticipate criticism, I should like to say that of course in all mental processes the intellectual and emotional factors are inseparable, yet the one is always subordinated to the other. The emotional is subordinate when we are solving a mathematical problem, the intellectual is decidedly subordinate when we are making love. Psychologists have analyzed to a remarkable extent the intellectual phenomena, but the knowledge of the components of the sentiments or the emotional phenomena is, as Mr. Herbert Spencer says, "altogether vague in its outlines, and has a structure which continues indistinct even under the most patient introspection. Dim traces of different components may be discerned; but the limitations both of the whole and of its parts are so faintly marked, and at the same time so entangled, that none but very general results can be reached."

The chief thing, then, that I would impress upon all beginners is the necessity for beginning work with a clear distinction between the aims and ends of Science and Art. When the art-student has acquired enough knowledge - that is, Science - to express what he wishes, let him, with jealous care, keep the scientific mental attitude, if 1 may so express it, far away. On the other hand, if the student's aim is scientific, let him cultivate rigidly scientific methods, and not weaken himself by attempting a compromise with Art. We in the photographic world should be either scientists or artists; we should be aiming either to increase knowledge, - that is, science, - or to produce works whose aim and end is to give aesthetic pleasure. I do not imply any comparison between Science and Art to the advantage of either one. They are both of the highest worth, and I admire all sincere, honest, and capable workers in either branch with impartiality. But I do not wish to see the aims and ends of the two confused, the workers weakened thereby, and, above all, the progress of both Science and Art hindered and delayed.