The Landscape as a Means of Culture

THE habits of civilized life tend to separate men from the charm of the world about them. The insistent activities which are the price of success, in the effort to win the harvests of an immediately profitable kind, fix the attention on certain limited fields of the environment, and necessarily exclude all recognition of the larger features of nature. Thus, the noble aspects of the sky, in the changes from dawn to dark, and from storm to fair weather, count to most of us only as the conditions of our occupations or our diversions; in themselves, they are quite without consideration. This is no new state of man ; indeed, by the demands of economic life, the primitive savage and the barbarian have ordinarily followed in the path of the prehuman species whence they came, giving no more heed to the scenes about them than their needs called for. Now and then, in moments of poetic exaltation, the beauty of the natural realm has forced itself on their attention, but only the rarer spirits see that there is here a great field to be won for the profit of man. The art of appropriating the landscape is not a lost art, but one which is yet to be invented and applied to the profit of our kind. It is likely to be a long time before we acquire the habit of attending to the expression of the world about us as we do to that of the human countenance.

It is evident that our culture is near the station where we may hope for some effort to develop the landscape sense by a systematic training in the arts which may enable us to appreciate scenery. Such a training may be regarded as a fitting supplement of that which we now devote to the purely scientific aspects of nature. It is likely that the task would long ago have been essayed in our American schools, where any pedagogic novelty commends itself, but for the evident difficulty of devising a fit system by which it can be done. The trouble is that the appreciation of scenic beauty is like the poetic sense, or the other sympathetic movements of the spirit, not only without the field of ordinary teaching, but quite beyond the reach of its methods. Every part of the movement which is required must come from within. Something can doubtless be done to favor the development of the landscape motive by the proper use of such literature as presents the beauties of nature in a way to awaken the emotions ; something also by practice in sketching, or in describing actual or pictured scenes. Still, the effective impulse must come from within.

To those who would develop their sensibility to natural beauty, the teacher can be most helpful by telling the experiences he has had in the development of his sympathy with the external world. In my own case, these tokens are not many. Their value is uncertain, for the reason that minds differ incalculably in their modes of action. Ways of looking at nature which may lead one to rich harvests may beguile another into desert places. Moreover, it is not easy even for those who are accustomed to introspection to gain an adequate notion of how their states of mind are induced. Therefore I will limit the suggestions to points which lie well in the field of my individual experience and that of others who have helped me with theirs.

The first of all the mental arts which the student of the landscape needs to acquire is that of contemplation, — the calm, affectionate forthgoing to the environment which permits the scene to enter in its fullness to the understanding and to sink quietly therein. Until this way of beholding is established, the mind can do no more than snatch fragmentary impressions of the scene, which may gratify the curiosity or awaken the pleasure of surprise, but have no relation to the higher æsthetic sense. Few persons in this day develop any capacity for the contemplative mood, — it has indeed been rare in all days ; but our time, with its crowding of people and interests, with its almost fiendish sense of duty by the moment, makes against the motive in a disastrously effective way. He who would acquire this, the very foundation of all æsthetic sense, must be prepared to set himself against the spirit of his age.

The contemplative attitude demands solitude, or at least a mental isolation from our fellow men. In this it is like the kindred poetic motive, which acts only when the mind is isolated. The isolation, indeed, in both these movements of the spirit, has to be so complete that self-consciousness is banished before the needed solitude is won. Therefore he who would become a lover of the landscape must accustom himself to seek it alone, and must learn to know that his mere presence at its doors will not make him free to its treasures. He must come to them as a worshiper, and with the spirit of devotion which befits a temple.

He who really seeks the landscape will surely find that he possesses a profitable remnant of the natural affection for the outer world that belongs in the spirit of men, but which our unhappy methods of education and of living so tend to wear away. If he has never set himself before a scene with the intention of winning all that he can gain from it, he is certain to find his first essay rather unprofitable. He will find himself in the tourist’s frame of mind, with the additional hamper of the selfconsciousness which attends any such experiment. His first task is to make himself familiar with the view, so that he may feel at home in it, so that all mere surprise is cleared away. With years of training, he will be able quickly to enter on this friendly relation with a landscape, but to the novice the relation comes slowly ; he may have to look again and again before he can begin to feel its true charm. The best plan for him is to see the place from the same point of view, and under the same conditions of hour and sky, day after day, until it becomes something like his own property.

Although the contemplative attitude may seem to those who know little about it to be one of indolent repose, it really demands all the strength the mind gives to intellectual labor. It is quite as taxing as any other form of such work. Therefore those who would view a landscape aright must see to it that they have nervous energy at their command, as they are accustomed to have it when they need to use their minds in full measure. Hurriedly to seek a view after hard climbing and in discomfort is no more reasonable than it would be to make a like preparation for other absorbing mental work. On this account it is worth the observer’s while to see to his condition, when he would appreciate a landscape, even as carefully as he would do in preparation for hearing music.

At the beginning of his study of landscapes, the observer learns that all scenes have one point of view which is for him the best, though it may not be for another. From that station the effects are evidently most harmonious, — fitting to his previously acquired motives. Therefore a certain reconnoitring of the ground is required before one determines just how one shall face the vista. Practice will in time enable the observer almost instinctively to come upon the point where the field can be best read ; he will form the habit of looking at the landscape as he has formed that of reading the printed page, limiting his attention to the few characters which he need have in eye and mind in order to go swiftly forward with the interpretation. In the larger record of the field, as in the smaller of the print, habit must guide in this necessary limitation of the attention, and in its measured ongoing from one passage to another. It is important that this habit be rationally formed, for on its guidance depends success in approaching the beautiful in nature. The application is, indeed, much wider; it includes the scientific as well as the æsthetic contact with the world about us. Answers come only to our interrogations; the supreme art is that of questioning.

Perhaps the commonest blunder, in looking upon the landscape, is found in the effort to take in at once all that a wide field contains. The tourist’s usual endeavor is to climb some hill, the higher the better for his desire, whence he can have a panorama including the largest possible number of peaks, lakes, and towns within the bewildering circle of the horizon. He willingly climbs for another half day to double his catalogue of telescopic objects. It is not too much to say that to approach the landscape in this way is to insure immunity from any spiritual contact with it. There may be creatures in other solar systems so organized that they can appropriate a panorama. If such there are, their minds must have other qualities than ours have. They must have eyes on every side, so that they are exempt from the sense of before and behind which is one of the limitations of man’s nature. With ourselves, this sense is a part of the stock inherited from our ancestors, man and brute alike ; it is dominating in all our relations to the surrounding world ; along with that of up and down, it rules our feelings in all our contacts with the environment.

If the observer has attained to some skill in approaching a landscape, he will be conscious of a certain measure of discomfort whenever he is forced to attend to a circular view; the portion of the vista which he feels to be behind him, or too far on either side to receive due attention, is in a way discomforting. Acting on this suggestion afforded by the uneasiness aroused by a panorama, the observer will find it profitable to make some experiments to determine the most advantageous limits of a view ; these limits appear to vary within a rather narrow range with different persons and perhaps in different stages of training in the landscape art. The easiest way in which to make the essay is by looking at a wide and attractive view through a doorway or a window, where there is no obstruction from the sashes. Beginning the test from a point so near the opening that its margins do not force themselves upon the eye, the observer should note, as well as he can, the measure of satisfaction which he receives from the beholding. This, if his experience is the same as that of the writer and of those who have tried like experiments for him, will be qualified by the fact that the vision cannot take in anything like as wide an angle as is offered to it. The view, in a word, is not one, but many, for the eyes have to turn in order to compass it. When this first impression has been gained, another should be sought at a distance back from the opening which will make its margins come in to limit the field of view, so that all the scene can, in a way, be compassed with one " setting ” of the eyes. At a certain point on the reduction in the angle, the observer will find that with the particular view he obtains the maximum of satisfaction.

The above described experiment, though apparently simple, is not altogether easy of trial, for the reason that the observer must have a certain capacity for valuing his impressions, such as is not commonly attained without a good deal of training in the art of seeing. With most persons the trial of the method appears to show that there is a distinct increase in the æsthetic value as the angle is diminished from say ninety degrees to about fifteen degrees or less. Much, however, depends upon the nature of the view : one in which the features are simple and there are few details which demand attention permits a wider lateral range than another where the notable details are numerous and closely interrelated. In general, the more the scene has to give, the narrower the range of vision which can profitably be applied to it.

Without resorting to deliberate experiment, which may be held as rather out of place in æsthetic inquiry, the observer can gain a fair idea of the principle that I have laid down, and at the same time determine his capacity for taking in a view, by noting his daily experience in the scenes which offer themselves to his eyes. When the houses of a street terminate in a manner to open a pleasing field, he can, as he walks toward the expanse, find the point where the vista is most satisfactory. Repeating the trial from day to day, he will perhaps be able to judge whether his sensibility to the landscape is sufficiently keen to afford him a basis for judgment ; if not, he has not become quickened to such perceptions. He has yet to make his novitiate.

Another observation, which serves to illustrate the limitation which needs to be put on the range of vision in order to obtain the best effect, may be made when we look upon a great building. In such viewing, because of the necessary concentration of the attention on details of form and proportion, the suitable angle to be included by the eyes is much smaller than in beholding a wide landscape where the features are of a broader nature. The scope fitted to give an impression of a building is probably not over five degrees ; in the appreciation of details of architecture it is yet less. As a general statement it may be said that the closest observation in vision, such as we give to a single small object, requires that there shall be practically no angle of divergence to the boundaries of the field. As the field is widened, the measure of attention given to any part of it is diminished, until at a certain point in the increase the eyes have to be turned and readjusted to another set of impressions. This change is instinctively made whenever the sense of interest in the margins of the visual area is aroused, without the perception being clear enough to satisfy the demands of the mind. When this change is made, the second view is in part superimposed on the first, and the panoramic method of observation is begun, with a resulting loss of æsthetic value.

If the reader has never criticised his ways of looking at the landscape, he will be likely to think that there can be no great difference in the mental result arising from the mere shifting of the eyes in the process of compassing a view. The shortest answer to this suggestion is the advice to try the experiment. He will perceive, after his essay, that his attention is distracted by the change, and that he has diminished the effectiveness of the impression. The conditions are much the same as those we meet in beholding pictures. We all know that a painting, especially if it be a landscape, is most advantageously seen alone ; not in a gallery, but where its effect is not overlaid by that of others, however like in motive. The only canvases which the writer vividly remembers are those seen under such circumstances, though the value of these works has not been as great as that of others exhibited in large collections. With such, the effect of the successive impressions may destroy all the æsthetic value of the noblest art. The analogy of the mind to a sensitive photographic plate, whereon one impression destroys another, though too mechanical for the exact truth, presents fairly enough the results of overlaying one mental image with another.

The sum of this plea for a singleness of impression in the effort to obtain the full æsthetic value of the landscape may be stated in a few words. It is that panoramic or even wide-angled seeing, while it gratifies the curiosity, is destructive to all valuable effects so far as the sense of beauty is concerned. The impression gained is distinct and powerful by virtue of its limitation so long as the boundaries are not so narrow that they chafe the understanding ; it is strong in proportion to its repetition from the same point of view and under the same conditions of air and light.

The next consideration for the student of the landscape to note is the relation between the purely intellectual or rational interest he may find or introduce into a view and the æsthetic impression which he seeks to gain from it. It is easily made clear to those who in any measure share in the scientific and the spiritual motives of interpreting nature, that good as these motives are in themselves, and effectively as they may be made to stimulate and reinforce one another in the general economy of the mind, they cannot at any one time be profitably associated. They are, indeed, so far antagonistic as to be mutually destructive in all but their ultimate purpose, — the comprehension of nature. The task of the æsthetic sympathies is to take the data which consciousness presents, — things seen as well as remoter knowledge, — and combine these impressions in the ideal realm so that they awaken the constructive imagination and extend the poetic fancy to the utmost. While thus acting, the mind, though advantageously it may use all its store of knowledge in building its " baseless fabrics of a vision,” cares for no rules ; construction is in large measure and necessarily emancipated from the control of facts.

There can be no doubt that knowledge may vastly enhance the intensity of æsthetic impressions. There are many landscapes in the unhistoric wildernesses, endowed with a far greater share of purely natural beauty than that of the Val d’Arno or of the plain of Marathon.

It is the light from the past which gives these scenes their abiding dignity ; but this light does not shine forth from the pages of the guidebook ; it must come from the ancient wealth of the mind. Therefore, the student who would make himself ready to bring all the value of the landscape before his spiritual understanding must be prepared to gain his knowledge of a scene some time before he seeks to turn it over to his fancy, — long enough before to have the facts become so well organized in the memory that they come forth unconsciously and without command. Otherwise, fancy, the most independent of all his powers, will deny them any place in her creations.

In beginning the study of landscapes, the novice will find it necessary slowly to acquire all the knowledge which enters into the imaginative impression the scene is to yield him. The evidence of the slow changes which have brought the bit of earth to its existing form, which have shaped the face which it turns to the eyes of man, has to be gained by deliberate inquiry, so that the reading is as that of a great volume in its difficulty and in the time it demands. This stage will pass with the increase in knowledge, and of skill in selecting from that knowledge the little yet precious share which may be used by the imagination in its constructive work. So, at least, it is true as regards the details of scientific fact. It is otherwise as regards the more general conceptions which relate to the application of the natural forces to the earth, and the larger results arising therefrom. Such truths are in their very essence so far poetic that, to the discerning eye, they shine with its light even in the grim framework of a mathematical proposition. On an ocean-beaten shore, we may feel the power of the sea in the overhanging cliffs even when there are no waves. In the river, the waterfall, or the glacier, the energy which enters into the work appeals to the informed imagination scarcely less than do its visible results. This enlarged conception is what makes the difference between the ignorant and the cultivated appreciation of the beauties of nature. With the rustic,

Knowledge it is which places the blossom in the realm of life, making us to see it as the product of the ages, in kinship with what has gone before and what is to come hereafter, and thus endows it with the dignity that thought can lend. This is as true of the earth as of its flowers. With most if not all people, the landscape gains much from its associations with mankind. Even where human life does not enter visibly or in conscious memory, it usually seeks a place shyly and as an aside, in mere spectres of the imagination which we unconsciously allow to enter on the scene. Even if the view be in desert wildernesses, the observer, if he be attentive to his thought, will remark the work of this humanizing instinct. If the scene be such as the eternal snowfields or the troops of icebergs present, excluding the conception of life, we feel that it in some way fails to awaken the mind. We do not go forth to it as its mere physical charm bids us do. On this account, the quality of the human life of a field, that which is visible or in memory, has with most men quite as much to do with its value as a landscape as its physical aspect has.

With the advance which an assiduous training of the landscape sense brings, the observer finds himself less in need of the human note in the view ; his development follows the course by which the landscape motive became established. In its earlier stages, only the regions of garden-like aspect commanded æsthetic approval ; then only so much of primitive nature as would make a foil for the culture was admitted to be good. Even the Alps, though they rise from fertile plains, in no wise charmed the ancients ; until within two centuries they were utterly repugnant to refined minds. Now those of well-trained eye find satisfaction in the wilderness, though all alike will confess that the scenes which yield the most pleasure are those which are at once humanized and historic. All this points to the conclusion that the novice will do well to begin his studies of the landscape with its more domesticated parts. Even the cities and great towns commonly afford prospects which are sufficiently gratifying to the æsthetic sense to give it nurture. The many strong impressions arising from the grouping of buildings, which even when bad in themselves often afford agreeable masses and skylines, make them profitable to the beginner by the easily acquired impressions they present. Moreover, our cities, by the very badness of their smoke and dust laden air, are richer in atmospheric effects of a striking kind than is the open country ; by them the observer may be led to note those more delicately toned qualities of atmosphere which, though they are the very flower of the landscape, are so generally overlooked.

From the limited though varied aspects of the overhumanized views in and about the town, the student should pass, in a well-devised gradation, to the scenes where pure nature, though the fields be tilled, controls the expression, and thence by a further step to the primitive lands where there is no trace of the hand of man. As he departs from the realm of excessive culture, where the expression of the earth everywhere is controlled by the artificial, the need increases of an enlargement of the conception by the understanding of how the natural forces have shaped the view. In place of the power of man which is so manifest in his seats of most dominant action, we have in the wilderness the elemental forces, those which make and unmake the lands and which rule every feature of their aspect. To have these conceptions so well in mind that they may afford even a general basis for interpreting the landscape demands a somewhat extended training in that part of geology which is included in modern geography, — a science not limited, as of old, to mere statements of facts concerning the earth forms, but going back to their causes. This schooling, which is happily becoming common, leads the student to take account of the variations of the earth’s surface, and to seek their explanation in visible processes of nature.

With some knowledge of what we may term the evolution of scenery, the observer will be led almost at a glance to create a perspective in time for the landscape he is beholding, — less vivid, of course, than that it occupies in space, but of the same mind-leading quality that takes the imagination afar. It is not to be expected that these conceptions will have scientific value, — they may indeed not rise above the plane occupied by the legends of men and their doings, —but they may well have all the truth that the poetic needs demand, for Fancy cares more that her servants are nimble than that they are scientifically accurate.

It is easy to see an historic foundation for the value which we find in the conception of the action of the forces which shape the landscape ; for the history of man’s relations to nature shows us that all the true poetry which we have from it comes out of the ineradicable idea that the natural realm is informed with a spirit like our own. To the pantheist the world is but the expression of the universal divine power. To the polytheist each entity of shape and action represents the thought or will of a god of some degree. To the monotheist all things are the work of the supreme power dwelling apart from, yet informing all things. These views, under the influence of which our minds have taken their shape, have the common quality that they have led men to see, behind the face of events and forms, the might that shaped them. One of the distressing influences of natural science upon the people of to-day — be it said of to-day, for the situation is most likely but temporary — is a crude view to the effect that the universe is a great mechanical contrivance, going like a huge clockwork moved by a power lying quite beyond the limits of our understanding. In the present state of our learning, there is no escape from this tyranny of the machine except by going so close to actual nature that we feel the currents of its life even as we do those of our own bodies, seeing how the forces have worked to produce in the end our intelligence which looks forth upon the universe and the beauty that gratifies our sympathetic desires.

While any one may feel a measure of satisfaction in the beauty of a landscape, the degree of the satisfaction is doubtless in large part determined by what we read into the scene. It is as in hearing music, where much of the pleasure comes, not from the associations of sounds, but from the thought which they excite. So, too, in a play, though the acting be bad and the ideas displeasing, the mind may be aroused to make a by-play, as it would not do but for the stimulus of the situation. Such secondary pleasures depend for their existence on the mental store which he who hears or sees brings with him to the orchestra or the stage. Unless he have a store of fit memories out of which his fancy can build its edifices, his profit is not likely to be great. The stock which the amateur of the landscape may profitably bring with him to the theatre he attends is all that relates thereto in the way of lore of earth and man.

A common error on the part of those who seek to acquire some sense of the beauty of the landscape is that its charm exists only in certain very select places, to which it is necessary to resort in order to obtain such impressions. So they hie away from the beauty which is about them, to seek, at much cost, that which is usually far less comprehensible than what they left at their doors. It may well be said that all landscapes are beautiful, and that while the harvest which may be won from them by those who know how to gather it varies greatly in kind, its value changes in no like measure. It is the part of fancy to separate the dross from the gold. This is to be done in the appreciation of the beauty of a landscape, however limited that may be, as it is in other work of the ideals. There are few, if any, scenes deserving the name of landscape so utterly ignoble that they yield nothing to such assay. They may foil the eye of the novice, but not that of the master in the art of seeing.

One of the evils which come from overmuch search after rarely composed and famous landscapes is that the memories they leave become false standards, leading their possessors to overlook the beauty which is about them, because it is other than they have had chosen for them as the proper fashion for nature to follow. One of the best results of a critical method with this art of beholding the face of the earth will be the clearing away of this false view. Every student should be on his guard against it. Let him go as far as he will, see as much of the earth as he can, but let him not forget that it is about as reasonable to go on long journeys to make human friends as it is to seek in that way for the friendship of nature. The chance for both is at its best near home.

It is often suggested that the true way to acquire a keen sense of natural beauty in any field is to practice delineation with the pencil or brush. It is clear that the ability to discern is greatly improved by such training, and in so far as seeing clearly is part of the landscape art, this training is of much value ; a share of it is indeed almost indispensable in an effective education. It appears doubtful, however, whether the drawing habit affords all that its advocates claim for it, for the reason that, when well developed, it tends so far to fix the attention on the elements of form as to separate the mind from the larger interests of the scene. If the draughtsman attain to the dignity of the true artist, so that his craft becomes the unconscious instrument of his understanding and feeling, he may use his hands to help his eyes ; but this station is won by few even among those who gain a name in the profession. The greater number do not attain to more than mere delineation ; they fail to penetrate the depths of the landscape. Their pictures, after the manner of photographs, render the facts with more or less accuracy, but they do not, in the manner of true sympathetic art, translate them into terms which arouse the emotions. The task of depicting is in itself so absorbing of the attention that the novice is likely to be diverted by it from his main end, which is to enter upon a friendly relation with the scene. His contact with it is apt to take on a businesslike character which will hinder his enlargement. Therefore it seems best for the beginner to use the pencil and the brush as he may use the field-glass, to aid his seeing and to develop the habit of looking closely, supplementing the notebook picture, when he makes it, by the photograph, which for the mere record of fact is better than any handwork can be.

Some people are likely to resent the suggestion that the instinctive pleasure which they derive from the landscape should be made the subject of a deliberate training, because it seems to them that the emotions lie beyond the field of schooling. To this objection, which at first sight appears to have some value, it may be answered that the pleasure which we have from music or from the drama is of the same primitive nature as that which the earth’s prospects afford. Yet these arts have been subjected to a process of culture, to the vast advantage of men. Even more purely instinctive actions, such as the movements of the limbs, are profitably removed from the animal plane by education, as by a training in dancing or fencing. While a novice in them, the youth is conscious of all he does, but, as is well said, the second nature stage of the culture again makes him free with a perfected freedom. He forgets the rules of the dance or the mimic combat, but his body and mind retain the alacrity and grace which they impart.

We may fairly reckon that with the landscape motive, as with other forms of the sympathetic emotions, all sound training will but serve to enlarge and emancipate the instinct, giving it a chance to attain something like the place that music and acting have won with like aid from the rational side of the mind. As regards the art of appreciating the landscape, we are at present in the state in which music and acting were before the score and the stage had been invented. Men whistled, sang, and mimicked their fellows before they brought these actions into set form. No one will doubt, however, that the higher steps have been well taken, and that the musical and dramatic motives are really finer than they were of old.

If, as seems likely, we can bring into definite shape, by educative means, the emotions which lead to pleasure in the landscape, we shall thereby add another important art to those which serve to dignify our lives. The art of seeing the landscape has a certain advantage over all the others we have invented, in that the data it uses are ever before those who are blessed with eyes. Outside of prison, a man is sure of the sky, — the largest, most varied, and in some regards the richest element of all scenes. The earth about him may be defiled, but rarely in such measure that it will not yield him good fruit. Every look abroad tempts him beyond himself into an enlarging contact with nature. Not only are the opportunities for this art ever soliciting the mind, but the practice of it demands no long and painful novitiate. There is much satisfaction at the very beginning of the practice; it grows with exercise, until it opens the world as no other art can do.

N. S. Shaler.