SOME PHASES OF MUSICAL AESTHETICS 23 



referring to this department of musical literature. HansKck explains 

 that — 



the tendency in science to study, as far as possible, the objective aspect of 

 things could not but affect researches into the nature of beauty. A satisfactory 

 result, however, is only to be attained by relinquishing a method which starts 

 from subjective sensation, only to bring us face to face with it once more, after 

 taking us for a poetic ramble over the surface of the subject. Any such investiga- 

 tion will prove utterly futile, unless the method obtaining in natural science be 

 followed at least in the sense of dealing with the things themselves, in order to 

 determine what is permanent and objective in them, when dissociated from the 

 ever- varying impressions which they produce. 



And again: 



Beauty in music is still as much as ever viewed only in connection with its 

 subjective impressions, and books, critiques and conversations continually remind 

 us that the emotions are the only aesthetic foundation of music, and that they 

 alone are warranted in defining its scope. 



More than thirty years after the publication of Hanslick's book, 

 Dr. Hugo Riemann (afterward professor in the University of Leipzig) 

 published a Catechism of Musical Aesthetics in which he attempted to 

 reconcile the views of Hanslick and those of his opponents. It is 

 needless to say that this book from the pen of so profound a musical 

 scholar was a valuable addition to the literature of musical aesthetics. 

 As to the matter of the reconciliation the results may well be ques- 

 tioned. The scientific mind recognizes that when science leaves off 

 art begins — a truth well expressed by Helmholtz in the following: 



A work known and acknowledged as the product of mere uiteUect, will never 

 be accepted as a work of art, however perfect be its adaptation to its end. 



The psychology of music is a subject which has thus far been 

 but glanced at, and will remain so until there is a unified effort on 

 the part of psychologists and musicians to investigate it. Whatever 

 has been accomplished by the physicists and the psychologists leaves 

 almost untouched the subject of music as an art, the recorded experi- 

 ments being as a rule limited to the mere sensation of tone or a few 

 tones, and hence the results are as far removed from an understanding 

 of music as the knowledge of the anatomist is from explaining the soul 

 of man. Nevertheless these experiments have had their influence in 



