ABSTRACT
The study of Aesthetics presents difficult problems and the solution of them is made more arduous if the field of observation is unduly constricted. This chapter highlights a possible genetic connection between the pain due to destructive impulses and the paramount need to create lasting goodness and wholeness from what had been in phantasy injured and rendered bad. The urge to Reparation is, owing to the strange nature of human mental development, probably an integral part of creative activity. The horror of the ugly and the wish to change it is that vis a tergo which thrusts us into constructive work in art, in science and even in the humble tasks of our daily round. 'Ugly' is used as a judgement upon an object or as the expression of an emotional response to it, and always denotes a disturbance, present or latent, of equanimity in the presence or at the thought of the object.
