ABSTRACT

the first attempt at a history of Æsthetic is the work of J. Roller (see above, p. 248) mentioned by Zimmermann (Gesch. d. Asth. pref., p. v) as being so exceedingly rare that he had never been able to see a copy of the book. We ourselves have had the good fortune to find the book in the Royal Library of Munich in Bavaria, by the help of our friend Dr. Arturo Farinelli of Innsbruck University, and to obtain the loan of it. It bears the title Entwurf | zur | Geschichte und Literatur | der A esthetik ,|von Baumgarten auf die | neueste Zeit. | Herausgegeben | von | J. Roller. | Regensburg | in der Montag und Weissischen Buchhandlung | 1799 (pp. viii-107, small 8vo); in the preface the author declares his intention of supplying young men attending Lectures on the Criticism of Taste and the Theory of the Fine Arts in the German Universities with a “lucid summary of the origin and later progress of these studies,” premising that he will treat of general theories only and that his judgements are frequently derived from reviews in literary periodicals. The introduction (§§ 1-7) treats of æsthetic theories from antiquity down to the beginning of the eighteenth century; Roller observes that “the names and form of a general Theory of Fine Art and Criticism of Taste were unknown to the ancients, whose imperfect ethical theory prevented their producing anything in this field.” He dedicates §5 to the Italians, “who have produced little in theory “; indeed the only Italian books mentioned are the Entusiasmo of Bettinelli and the small work of Jagemann, Saggio di buon gusto nelle belle arti ove si spiegano gli elementi dell’ estetica, di Fr. Gaud. Jagemann, Regente agostiniano, In Firenze, mdcclxxi, Presso Luigi Bastianelli e compagni; 60 pp. (concerning this, see B. Croce, Problemi di estetica, pp. 387-390). The section on the History and Literature of Æsthetic begins with the oft-quoted passage from Bulffinger (“Vellem existerent, etc.") and passes at once to Baumgarten: “the theoretical epoch owes its existence undeniably to Baumgarten; to him belongs the inalienable merit of having first conceived an Æsthetic founded on principles of reason and wholly developed, and of having tried to put it into practice by the means offered him by his own philosophy.” Immediately after this, Meier is mentioned, followed by the titles, accompanied by brief 476extracts and remarks—a sort of catalogue raisonné—of many German books on Æsthetic from those of K. W. Müller (1759) to one by Ramler (1799), mixed with various French and English writings under the dates of their German translations. Special emphasis is laid on Kant (pp. 64-74), with the remark that, prior to the appearance of the Critique of Judgment, æstheticians were divided into sceptics, dogmatics and empiricists: the most powerful intellects of the nation inclined towards empiricism, so much so that had Kant himself “been asked by what literature he had been most strongly influenced in the development of his own thought, he would certainly have named the acute empirical writers of England, France and Germany”; but “by no pre-Kantian method had it been possible to establish an agreement (eine Einhelligkeit) between men upon matters of taste.” The last pages call attention to the revival of interest in æsthetic studies, which nobody would now dare call a waste of time as in former days. “May Jacobi, Schiller and Mehmel soon enrich literature by publication of their theories !” (p. 104).