151. Excessive talk is
another manifestation of centrifugal objectivity, albeit more on the primitive
divine side of the dualistic equation on account of its spiritual or, at any
rate, intellectual nature.
Physical abuse or force would be its relatively diabolic counterpart,
always bearing in mind, however, that the body is more
worldly, or of the world, than either diabolic or divine. Certainly the more subjective a person is,
the less he either talks or employs physical force. I say nothing of sex.
152. Seeing corresponds to
the primitive Divine - a passive, almost centripetal phenomenon, whereas
looking corresponds to the primitive Diabolic on account of its strongly
centrifugal and objective nature. Some people are more biased towards seeing
than looking, others more biased towards looking than seeing, while still
others remain approximately balanced between the two. And yet, compared with inward looking and
seeing, all such optical activity is alpha stemming in character and therefore
not strictly relevant to or characteristic of an omega-aspiring age, in which
the inward, or subjective, tends to predominate over the outward, or objective.
153. Yet the inward is also divisible between more
evolved divine and diabolic extremes, with insight corresponding to the former
on account of its relatively passive nature, and rational cogitation
corresponding to the latter on account of its relatively active nature - a kind
of poetic/philosophic distinction paralleling a State/Centre dichotomy. The goal of psychic evolution is to maximize
insight through infused contemplation of a non-verbal and wholly transcendent
order. Needless to say, all seeing and
looking, together with their aural correlations (of hearing and listening),
will eventually wither away. For the
objective must ultimately be superseded by the subjective, if true divinity is
to be achieved.
154. To distinguish between the false divinity of
the alpha absolute, viz. the Father, which is centrifugal and
proton-constituted, and the true divinity of the omega absolute, viz. the Holy
Spirit, which is centripetal and electron-constituted. Objective and subjective,
beginning and ending. The central
star of the Galaxy, corresponding to the alpha absolute, is a unity in
proton-proton reactions. The ultimate
'globe' of pure spirit, corresponding to the omega absolute (of transcendent
futurity), will be a unity in electron-electron attractions. No small distinction!
155. Strictly speaking, divine and diabolic extremes
correspond to the head in its mind/brain dichotomies, i.e. subconscious
mind/old brain, conscious mind/mid-brain, superconscious
mind/new brain, and therefore cannot be applied to the body, which, unlike the
head, corresponds to the planet and is consequently a kind of diluted diabolic/divine
compromise. Sex is not so much diabolic
or divine (on primitive alpha-stemming levels) as ... of a worldly primitivity with positive sensation as its inducement,
making for a divinely-biased worldliness overall. Sex is accordingly the religion of the
masses, who, especially in a primitive or decadent
age, are rooted in the body, not in the head.
One recalls Baudelaire's phrase about sex being the 'lyricism of the
masses'. And yet, just as the masses
evolve from one level of worldliness to another, so sex evolves with them,
becoming at length more artificial and transcendent than natural and
mundane. Eventually, as the People
assume divinity, it will be eclipsed by the spirit. For sex is ever rooted in the flesh.
156. Social Democracy - Social Theocracy (Social
Transcendentalism); Democratic Socialism - Theocratic Socialism (Transcendental
Socialism). Hence Social Democracy is to
Democratic Socialism what Social Theocracy or, rather, Social Transcendentalism
is to Transcendental Socialism: a white-collar biased politics paralleling a
blue-collar biased politics within a specific ideological framework, i.e.
democratic and hence relativistic in the one case; theocratic and hence
absolutist in the other. Indeed, it is
almost as though Social Transcendentalism and Transcendental Socialism were
absolutist extrapolations from Social Democracy and Democratic Socialism
respectively, extrapolations pertinent to a transcendental rather than to a
Christian age or society. Which is doubtless true to a degree. But if Social Democracy and Democratic
Socialism are rivals for the working-class vote within the same society, i.e. a
democratically relativistic one, then Social Transcendentalism and
Transcendental Socialism could only be rival working-class ideologies within
separate societies, as befits the more absolutist nature of a transcendental,
and therefore properly theocratic, stage of evolution. In other words, whereas rival democratic
parties can co-exist within a realistic context or stage of evolution, there
can be no question of alternative theocratic parties doing so within the more
evolved context of a truly idealistic stage of evolution, where absolutist
criteria increasingly prevail.
157. Alternative types of People's theocratic
salutes, depending on the ideological bias: open-hand raised arm Fascist
salute, comparable to a synthesizer or a streamlined scooter; closed-hand
raised arm Social Transcendentalist salute, comparable to a guitar synthesizer
or a stripped-down scooter; closed-hand bent arm Communist salute, comparable
to a Stratocaster-styled guitar or a plain motorbike; open-hand bent arm
Transcendental Socialist salute, comparable to a synthesized Stratocaster-style
guitar or a streamlined motorbike.
Therefore one has a progression, paradoxically, from wavicle
idealism to particle idealism on the theocratic Left, and from particle realism
to wavicle realism on the theocratic Right. And yet, only Social Transcendentalism is
capable of expanding, in due course, towards a more idealistic orientation ...
in supertheocracy, which would entail a new wavicle idealism
commensurate with an unequivocally transcendental orientation. Thus an open-hand raised arm salute with a
kind of Y-like divide in the fingers, not to be confused with the more conventional
and easier two-finger 'victory' salute which, in any case, is quite common
these days ... in an informal and hence popular kind of way - probably
Ecological in character, since suggesting a compromise between Communist and
Fascist saluting, with greater or lesser degrees of idealism, depending on the
position of the arm.
158. Generally speaking, women tolerate men for the
sake of their children; men tolerate children for the sake of their women; and
children tolerate parents for their own sake.
159. In relation to the act of coitus, the penis is
a wavicle, or idealistic, equivalent, and the vagina
is a particle, or materialistic, equivalent, the combination thereof
constituting a worldly realism. For sex
is of the world - bone, muscle, and flesh surrounding and entrapping the
blood-engorged penis, which ejaculates semen into the womb like a volcano
erupting its molten lava into the void. An atomic fusion, with primitive soulful idealism subservient to a
no-less primitive natural materialism.
160. The Irish Republic is the political equivalent
of man breaking free of female sexual domination, though not necessarily of
fellow males.
161. With the establishment of the Free State, the
Catholic Irish liberated themselves from British political domination, the
Irish penis breaking free of the British vagina, so that it was at last
possible for the Irish male to become self-serving. Hitherto,
162. If the British are, and
have long been, deeply mired in sex, it is because of their essentially
feminine, materialist nature, which takes worldly criteria for granted, though
traditionally rather more from a vaginal than a phallic point-of-view.
163. Materialistic reaction - naturalistic inaction
- realistic action - idealistic attraction.
The four stages of evolution and their qualitative
correlations. Thus while reaction
corresponds to the objective, attraction, its antithesis, corresponds to the
subjective, with atomic inaction and action respectively corresponding to
subjective objectivity and objective subjectivity, approximately analogous to
Church and State.
164. Reaction is a materialistic attribute
corresponding to the Strong; inaction is a naturalistic attribute corresponding
to the Beautiful; action is a realistic attribute corresponding to the Good;
and attraction is an idealistic attribute corresponding to the True. Reaction and action correspond to the
particle side of the atom, albeit within the framework of proton/electron
distinctions. Conversely, inaction and
attraction correspond to the wavicle side of the
atom, likewise within the framework of proton/electron distinctions. Kingdom and State on the one hand, Church and Centre on the other hand.
165. Theory concerning the evolution of love from
materialistic beginnings to idealistic endings: reactive love for a person of
the opposite sex; inactive love of man in notions of Christian brotherhood or
of the personal self; active love of selves in socialistic change; attractive
love of the self in spiritual contemplation.
Thus a progression from the objective to the
subjective via naturalistic and realistic, subjectively objective and
objectively subjective, intermediate stages. Needless to say, such stages correspond to
historical as well as to class-evolutionary patterns. The highest love is not only the most
idealistic but also the most proletarian.
And its intensive realization necessarily excludes lower forms of love,
particularly the materialistic and naturalistic. He who is the most self-centred in spiritual
love is the most divine, the closest to omega divinity and furthest from the
alpha-stemming centrifugal. His
subjectivity has eternal validity.
166. In addition to the above and coming in-between
active and attractive love, one could cite unattractive love, which, as a
hard-line Socialist/Communist phenomenon, may be regarded as embracing anything
from homosexuality to TV addiction. Such
'love' is therefore the missing link in the chain of loves stretching from
reactive beginnings to attractive endings, and can be accorded a hard-line
electron-particle equivalent beyond the liberal atomicity, or proton-wavicle/electron-particle compromises, of active love.
167. Ideological periods in relation to religion and
politics: materialistic Theocratic Autocracy; naturalistic Autocratic
Theocracy; realistic Democratic Theocracy; idealistic Social Transcendentalism/Pure
Transcendentalism (supertheocracy). Materialistic Autocratic Autocracy (superautocracy)/Democratic Autocracy; naturalistic
Autocratic Democracy; realistic Democratic Democracy (superdemocracy);
idealistic Transcendental Democracy (see diagram):-
MATERIALISM NATURALISM
R. theocratic autocracy autocratic
theocracy
P. autocratic/democratic autocracy autocratic democracy
REALISM IDEALISM
R. democratic theocracy social theocracy/supertheocacy
P. superdemocracy theocratic democracy
Thus,
within the religious spectrum (R), a progression from Paganism to
Transcendentalism via Roman Catholicism and Protestantism, while, within the
political spectrum (P), a progression from Monarchism to Communism via
Constitutional Monarchism co-existent with a parliamentary democracy and
Republicanism. The distinction I draw
between autocratic autocracy (super) and democratic autocracy within the
context of materialism is between a more-or-less untrammelled monarchic tyranny
and the constitutional regulation of the monarch by his nobles, as in the
much-cited example of King John and the Magna Carta
(1215) in
168. Materialistic love pertains to the Kingdom,
idealistic love to the Centre.
Naturalistic love pertains to the Church, realistic/socialistic love to
the State. Overlappings
do of course occur, but the more idealistic the love, the less
place there can be for materialistic love. Centre and Kingdom are mutually exclusive.
169. As a rule, a man's
love is more subjective than a woman's.
Liberated women are capable of subjectivity, but the more traditional or
innately feminine a woman is, the more objective and, hence, centrifugal her
love. Her capacity for generalized love
far exceeds even the least masculine of men, who will still harbour some kind
and degree of particular bias. For, as a
rule, man seeks in woman an outer reflection of his innermost self, which is
particular, whereas woman looks to man for an inner reflection of her outermost
self, which is general, both selves tending in opposite directions - the former
centripetal and the latter centrifugal, the inevitable consequence an atomic
clash or, as some would prefer to say, fusion.
It is precisely because a man's love is particular that it is essential,
in contrast to the apparent, because generalized, love of women. In reality, women are better haters than
lovers. But superficial appearances
serve to contradict or camouflage this fact, as, from the opposite standpoint,
in the case of men, whose bites are not normally as sharp as their barks. Nevertheless a naturalistic subjectivity
vis-à-vis a particular woman is grossly inferior to an idealistic subjectivity
which transcends the physical altogether, and thus stands truly closer to the
Holy Spirit.
170. Despite appearances to the contrary, women have
traditionally been more positive than men, positive, that is to say in terms of
reflecting a proton bias, which accords with an active or practical
disposition, and doubtless many if not most of them still are ... to the
consternation and exasperation of peace-loving males, particularly the most
evolved men who, notwithstanding an ability to act, normally prefer a passive,
which is to say negative, existence ... in deference to an electron bias - the
very bias which conforms to properly masculine criteria, now more than ever
before.
171. Autocratic, democratic, and theocratic (or,
alternatively, pagan, Christian, and transcendental) types of
crossed-leg/crossed-hand sitting postures, beginning with legs crossed at
ankles and hands crossed on or between the thighs, making, in each case, for an
autocratic concession to gravitational force downwards. However, proceeding to the next level, we
shall find legs crossed on thighs and arms crossed on the chest, which
suggests, in each case, a democratic neutrality between gravitational force
both downwards and upwards, thereby constituting a worldly mean where what may
be termed middle-ground crossing procedures apply. With the third level of limb crossings,
however, we find an ankle crossed on a thigh and hands crossed behind the head,
which suggests a transcendental defiance of gravitational force both downwards
(with regard to the legs) and upwards (with regard to the arms) that may
therefore be said to constitute a theocratic ideal, closer in essence to the
Holy Spirit. Obviously, there are class
implications to the way a person sits, and if the first two positions described
above are aristocratic and bourgeois respectively, then the third position is
relatively proletarian, because symptomatic of a more evolved and, hence, transcendental
mentality. Not everyone sits in a
stylistically-integrated fashion, nor indeed in one or another of the
above-mentioned ways, but those who do are
undoubtedly more of an ideological/class piece than those who don't, evidently
being more civilized and 'together' in their heads than the rest. However, we should not overlook the fact that
while the third, or transcendental, position would be appropriate to an
omega-oriented closed society, the first and second, being relatively pagan and
Christian respectively, would be quite inappropriate and - assuming anyone were
to sit at all - therefore effectively taboo.
Sitting, no less than anything else, could only be done on a
transcendental basis, indicative of a free-electron
homogeneity. Open-society options would
cease to apply.
172. Fascist packet mash and Social
Transcendentalist crisps; in contrast to Communist thin chips and
Transcendental Socialist crinkled thin chips, which are slightly mash-like in
appearance. Hence a decrease of idealism
in the case of crisps vis-à-vis packet mash, but an increase of idealism in the
case of crinkled chips vis-à-vis plain chips.
Crisps are crispy and thus slightly materialistic, whereas crinkled
chips are soft - some would say slushy - and thus relatively idealistic, albeit
still less idealistic than crisps overall.
173. Curious how, until now, I hadn't thought of
crisps as an alternative potato food.
And yet that is precisely what they are, if more artificial, and hence
transcendental, than packet mash, not to mention chips. Consequently to buy a bag of crisps is the
Social Transcendentalist equivalent of buying a bag of chips; although if one
is to distinguish between plain and crinkled chips, it seems only fair that we
should also distinguish between plain and flavoured crisps, relegating the
former to a Fascist equivalence on a par with, if not actually below, packet
mash.
174. Considered from a transcendental perspective,
it can be seen that the relativity of underclothes and overclothes
is a bourgeois or worldly phenomenon of comparatively recent origin in the
overall history of sartorial evolution, which began rather more on the level of
overclothes or, rather, objective clothing of a
necessarily centrifugal and therefore dress-like nature, as pertinent to a
pagan and proton-biased stage of evolution.
Thus the introduction of underclothes presupposes an atomic relativity
in which the electron, or centripetal side of the human atom, is beginning to
assert itself and to establish an equality with proton precedents which cannot
but result in their modification both inwards and downwards or, to be more
specific, in terms of tightening and shortening, so that, for example,
close-fitting knee-length skirts, as relative to bourgeois criteria,
increasingly come to replace flouncy dresses, thereby
relegating such proton-biased clothing to the historical background. Trousers signify a particle-biased, or outer,
atomicity, but the use of underpants intimates of a wavicle-biased,
or inner, atomicity which accords with a more centripetal, subjective trend
away from such outer clothing towards a totally absolute transcendentalism in
which, one can only surmise, clothing extrapolated from underclothes,
particularly of the 'long-john' variety, becomes the sartorial norm, in
accordance with free-electron criteria pertaining to the ultimate stage of
human evolution - one necessarily highly centripetal and, accordingly,
intensely subjective in character. Such
clothing or, rather, superclothing would of course
take the form of one-piece synthetic zippersuits, and
would be worn without underclothes ... for the simple reason that it derived
from underclothes and was consequently equivalent, in a manner of speaking, to
them, to the extent of being intensely centripetal and therefore subjective in
character, all clothing having become the complete antithesis to the dress-like
centrifugal objectivity of alpha-stemming civilization. Thus from centrifugal beginnings to
centripetal endings, with the overclothes/underclothes
relativity coming in-between ... when worldly criteria obtained (as, to some
extent, is still the case at present).
Clearly, underclothes are a kind of ecclesiastical idealism vis-à-vis
(secular) overclothes, arguably more Protestant than
Catholic in character, and accordingly of a neutron-biased, atomic-wavicle status in harmonious contrast to the
neutron-biased, atomic-particle status of liberal trousers, particularly when
worn with a jacket (whether or not forming a suit) in the conventional
middle-class manner. On the other hand,
jeans would more conform to an electron-particle bias commensurate with a
post-liberal secular materialism, and we can take it as axiomatic that the more
left wing the jean-wearing person, the less likely he is to wear underclothes,
since too absolutist, in a materialistic kind of way, to desire any compromise
with that which pertains to an ecclesiastical bias. However, being extreme left in an extraparliamentary socialistic way and being Communist, or
extreme right-wing theocratic, are far from the same thing, so what applies to
the radical Socialist may be quite irrelevant to a Communist, particularly to
the more evolved (Transcendental Socialist) type of Communist, who may well
favour some kind of underclothing (though of a different and probably less
conventional order than that favoured by right-wing democrats and Nazi
extremists), assuming he doesn't regard the close-fitting leathers he may be
wearing as equivalent to underclothes and therefore not requiring any
additional clothing. Certainly tights,
which are rather more fascistic in character, can be regarded in such a light,
and from there to PVCs is just an ideological step
away - one bringing centripetal subjectivity to a head, which is to say to a
full-blown electron-wavicle status commensurate with
the most evolved humanity.
175. In relation to loose-fitting and/or flounced
dresses, tight-fitting dresses correspond to an inner femaleness, an
ecclesiastical redemption on the alpha-stemming level of a proton-wavicle equivalent.
Similarly, in relation to loose-fitting and/or flounced skirts,
tight-fitting skirts correspond to an inner half-femaleness or, rather, an
electron-biased androgynous compromise, a liberal redemption on the worldly
level of an atomic-wavicle equivalent. Beyond the worldly level, dresses and skirts
become taboo, as free-electron criteria, necessitating jeans, tights, leathers,
and PVCs, increasingly prevail. A truly closed free-electron society would
put all alpha-stemming and atomic clothing under ban, thereby achieving an
omega-oriented homogeneity on the level of the utmost centripetal
subjectivity. Only the inner would
prevail and, needless to say, within a radically theocratic context.
176. Generalized sense in which each of the major
arts, viz. sculpture, painting, literature, and music, may be regarded as
paralleling specific evolutionary stages from the beginnings of civilization in
materialism to its future culmination in idealism. Thus sculpture as pre-eminently appertaining
to a materialistic stage of evolution, painting as pre-eminently appertaining
to a naturalistic stage of evolution, literature as pre-eminently appertaining
to a realistic stage of evolution, and finally, music as pre-eminently
appertaining to an idealistic stage of evolution, as in the following diagram:-
MATERIALISM NATURALISM REALISM IDEALISM
------------O-------------------------------------SO--------------------------------OS------------------------------S----------
SCULPTURE PAINTING LITERATURE MUSIC
where we can distinguish between
objective beginnings (O) and subjective endings (S), with due gradations or
compromises coming in-between (SO, OS).
Clearly, sculpture is an objective art form concerned with the outer,
with form, and therefore highly materialistic in construction, particularly
when pertaining to its rightful epoch in pagan antiquity, whereas painting,
though still objective to the extent that the outer world is delineated in a
formal way, redeems and in some degree transmutes this objectivity through the
flat plane of the canvas, which attests to a certain subjectivity whereby the
human mind impinges upon external reality and establishes, in consequence, a
naturalistic perspective. Conversely,
literature is primarily concerned with the subjective, with society and/or
ideological relations between people which depend for their realization upon an
objective account of life as the necessary framework in which such relations
can be established, and is therefore pre-eminently a realistic art form,
essentially liberal in scope. But music,
being concerned with the inner, with spiritual content, extends beyond
objective subjectivity to the subjective-proper, and is accordingly an
idealistic art form - indeed, the ultimate art, particularly when conceived in
the most pitch-oriented and, hence, essential terms, as pertaining to a
transcendental age. For just as
sculpture is never more sculptural than when completely formal and therefore
soulless, as with ancient Greek 'eyeless' sculpture, so music is never more
musical than when it is entirely a matter of spiritual content and accordingly
transcends all programmatic or formal designs.
Thus while sculpture becomes less genuinely itself and more approximate
to painting, as naturalistic civilization supersedes materialistic civilization,
so, by contrast, music becomes more genuinely itself as realistic civilization,
primarily literary in character, is superseded by idealistic civilization, and
absolute criteria increasingly obtain, as pertaining to a transcendental age. From bourgeois beginnings, music grows to
full idealistic maturity within the context of proletarian civilization,
thereby becoming a channel for and vehicle of divine feelings, in antithetical
contrast to the formal concerns of pagan sculpture. From materialistic
appearances to idealistic essences, with all due gradations of art and
literature coming in between.
177. In terms of Father-oriented sculpture, it is
not the formal so much as the formless that may be accorded a strictly
alpha-stemming status, as relative to primitive divinity, and undoubtedly the
best example of such formless sculpture in the British Isles is to be found at
Stonehenge, where the circular arrangement of stone monoliths attests to pagan
religion in relation to the First Cause or Demiurge - probably the central star
of the Galaxy, a star uniquely significant of idealistic objectivity. Conversely, with omega-aspiring music, it is
the pitch-biased content that attests to a transcendental orientation, in
contrast to the sheer materialism of intensely rhythmic music, which is rather
less divine than antichristically diabolic.
178. Distinctions between teutonic Antichrist and slavic Antichrist, as between Marx and Lenin,
Democratic Socialism and Transcendental Socialism, with the latter more genuinely
Antichristic by dint of its absolutist - and
therefore theocratic - extremism. In
relation to Lenin, Marx would seem to be a worldly and, hence, democratic
Antichrist, as pertinent to teutonic
civilization.
179. Interesting how rock songs suggest a transition
between literature and music, the age of realism and the age of idealism, with
the lyrics and vocals pertaining to or, rather, stemming from the former, and
the music aspiring towards or incipiently indicative of the latter, thereby
establishing a socialist equivalent, whether on democratic or theocratic terms,
depending on the type of rock in question, i.e. hard or soft. Doubtless the contemporary importance of rock
music in the West, particularly in countries like Britain and America, is that
it signifies and reflects a sort of cultural parallel to Social Democracy,
whether in terms of Western-oriented Socialism, in which lyrics count for more
than music and the essence of the genre is accordingly democratic, or in terms
of Eastern-oriented Communism, in which music counts for more than lyrics and
the essence of the genre is accordingly theocratic, and thus closer to the
level of a People's democracy, where centralized rather than mass-participatory
criteria tend to prevail. Hence an
overall distinction between rock 'n' roll and hard rock on the one hand, and
between soft rock and jazz-rock on the other, with the latter especially
indicative of a theocratic bias, albeit more in terms of the Antichrist than of
the Second Coming, and therefore less genuinely theocratic. Even rock-jazz would be more genuinely
theocratic and, hence, jazzy ... to the extent of being above and beyond all
compromise with words, and accordingly not a matter of song but of pure music,
as germane to Social Transcendentalist criteria. And from there, the superjazz
of the purest possible music would be just a question of pitch-oriented time.
180. Certainly, in relation to literature, rock
music can be regarded as constituting an evolutionary 'fall' from (thoughtful)
reading to (vocal) singing, the centripetal to the centrifugal, the inner to
the outer, although of course inseparable from musical accompaniment, usually
of a predominantly rhythmic nature, and consequently transitional from
literature to music or, rather, supermusic ... as
relative to a theocratic age. And yet,
the word 'transitional' is itself problematic and thus not wholly convincing,
since one is obliged to admit that rock singing can be - and for many people
actually is - an end-in-itself, with no aspirations towards pure music. In short, a kind of
communistic proletarian dead-end.
Only a relatively small number of proletarian musicians are capable of
jazz-rock, and not all those who play in this highest rock-based category would
be capable of making a transformation up to rock-jazz, changing musical
spectra, so to speak, and abandoning vocals for good. Obviously, ideological, cultural,
intellectual, and even ethnic factors combine, in greater or lesser degree, to
decide who plays what and how. Yet we
have to envisage an age when, through a variety of changes, song writing no
longer prevails and only pure music exists - a synthesizer-based supermusic that truly accords with the utmost theocratic
subjectivity. Only then would idealism
be in full-flower.
181. Suggestion of an antithetical equivalence
between rock music and early paintings, or paintings encased in a large,
quasi-sculptural frame, with transitional implications between sculpture-proper
and subsequent free-hung paintings. So
that just as rock music, as described above, suggests a transitional reality
between literature-proper and pitch-biased supermusic,
a transitional reality is likewise suggested by such 'sculptural paintings',
albeit on vastly different terms.
182. In comparison to truly idealistic musicians,
sculptors are really materialistic fools.
It is difficult to conceive of a man of true spiritual insight and
intelligence becoming a sculptor, particularly in this day and age. Even art is somewhat suspect ... except when
conceived on the highest post-painterly terms - terms embracing light art and
holography.
183. If beauty is the
traditional naturalistic concern of art, then ugly paintings, or those that
distort natural phenomena, have to be regarded as a type of anti-art, and
therefore as false and degenerate.
However, this is not true of abstract art which, at its highest level,
tends to intimate of light art and thus to reflect a transvaluation
of values ... from beauty to truth, appearances to essences, becoming in the
process a kind of superart. Such 'art' is doubtless spurious when
considered from a strictly aesthetic viewpoint, but at least it signifies an
attempt to come to terms with spirit, as germane to an age of music. It is an art more musical than literary or
painterly, with, at times, a strong suggestion of musical notation ... as in Mondrian's Broadway Boogie-Woogie
and some of the works of Kandinsky, Miro, Klee, Bomberg,
et al.
184. One should distinguish between attenuated
realism or naturalism and ... abstraction.
For while some of the art in the former category may
appear abstract, it is really tail-ending the epoch of aesthetic objectivity as
a manifestation of bourgeois decadence, rather than intimating of
post-aesthetic subjectivity. This
is certainly true of Turner, particularly of his late-period
quasi-Impressionist canvases, and it is even truer of Impressionists such as
Monet, Pissarro, and Sisley,
whose works, while still objective, seem to dissolve representational
appearances in a nebulous haze of attenuated naturalism. Indeed, so hazy are the most radical examples
of their works ... that it as though an extremely myopic person had dispensed
with spectacles and painted his surrounding environment. But one thing is clear; the Impressionists
were the end of something old rather than the beginning of something new!
185. Interesting how relatively antithetical
movements in art tend to alternate between contrasting styles ... as the
following diagram (see below) attempts to demonstrate:-
A CLASSICISM NATURALISM IMPRESSIONISM
B. ROMANTICISM REALISM EXPRESSIONISM
A. CUBISM ABSTRACT
IMPRESSIONISM
B. SURREALISM ABSTRACT
EXPRESSIONISM
A. NEO-PLASTICISM MINIMALISM OP ART
B. MODERN
REALISM TACHISM PHOTO-REALISM
Observe the
progression within the top spectrum (A) from Classicism and Impressionism to
Abstract Impressionism and Minimalism on the one hand, and from Naturalism and
Cubism to Neo-Plasticism and Op Art on the other,
while within the bottom spectrum (B) a parallel progression from Romanticism
and Expressionism to Abstract Expressionism and Tachism
alternates with a progression from Realism and Surrealism to Modern Realism and
Photo-Realism. Thus, in each case, a
more radical antithesis is followed by a relatively moderate one, which in turn
gives place to a still more radical antithesis ... before a new relatively
moderate antithesis takes its place, only to be eclipsed by an even more radical
antithesis ... and so on, with God/Devil - world - God/Devil - world
implications respectively. Thus while
Classicism and Romanticism suggest a God/Devil distinction (albeit within a
circumscribed, because painterly, context), the following antithesis between
Naturalism and Realism seems comparatively worldly, i.e. less radically
antithetical, whereas the Impressionist/Expressionist dichotomy, in being more
extreme, brings us back to a painterly God/Devil distinction. Note, too, how Realism, Surrealism, Modern
Realism, and Photo-Realism constitute an evolutionary progression along the
bottom spectrum within the more moderate context of worldly antitheses,
Surrealism being to Realism what Cubism is to Naturalism, whereas Photo-Realism
brings greater technical exactitude to bear on its subject-matter - usually
facial portraits - than Modern Realism, thereby bringing Realism to a head (in
more than one sense!). Likewise, the
divinely-biased progression from Classicism and Impressionism to Abstract
Impressionism and Minimalism is cumulative in character, as is the parallel
diabolically-biased progression from Romanticism and Expressionism to Abstract
Expressionism and Tachism. In the first case,
idealism; in the second case, materialism. Other movements, such as Dada, Futurism,
Symbolism, and Kinetics, could of course be slotted into one or other of our
two spectra of art evolution, but they tend to be adjuncts of those already
listed above - Dada/Surrealism, Futurism/Cubism, Symbolism/ Impressionism,
Kinetics/Op Art - and I have accordingly dispensed with them in the interests
of a simpler, more straightforward overall progression.
186. Sense in which meditation is equivalent to
abstract art, in that it pertains to the supernaturalistic
end of a naturalistic spectrum in which prayer, comparable to representational
subject-matter, has been transcended ... in the interests of a psychic
void. Thus meditation is essentially a
petty-bourgeois ideal which, like abstract art, falls short of a true, and
hence proletarian, transcendentalism - the transcendentalism in question being
LSD tripping, which has its 'art' equivalence in the higher, more conceptual
kind of light art, both of which are truly 'turned-on' in comparison with
meditation and abstract art. Doubtless a
long-term supermeditation can and will arise, but it
will be equivalent to laser art and thus altogether freer and higher than the
kind of meditation that currently prevails among, for the most part,
petty-bourgeois avant-gardists.
187. Light - motion - heat; divine, worldly, and
diabolic distinctions, whether on the alpha-stemming objective planes or, with
more relevance to the present and future, on the omega-aspiring subjective
planes, not excepting intermediate, or atomic, planes. Light is of the mind, motion of the body, and
heat of the brain. There is subconscious
light, which is Father-stemming, and superconscious
light, which intimates of the Holy Spirit, while conscious light stands as a
sort of Christ-like compromise somewhere in between. There is old-brain heat, which is
Satan-stemming, and new-brain heat, which connotes with the Antichrist, as well
as mid-brain heat, that Antivirginal compromise
coming in-between. And, of course, there
is body motion, which is a kind of cross between heat and light, and
accordingly stands as a worldly equivalent, whether in terms of ancient
pain-biased worldliness or of contemporary pleasure-biased worldliness, war or
sport.
188. We spend our lives between light and heat, not
just in the bodily sense of motion but also in terms of daylight and fire or,
with regard to my own experience, electric light and electric fire - the former
on a higher level of radiation than the latter, a kind of divine/diabolic
distinction which typifies modern life.
Strictly speaking, the sun is a source of heat rather than light,
although the light we obtain from it is sufficient to illuminate our days. But in the winter, when its heat is reduced
by dint of greater distance, we are more apt to regard it as a source of
light. Obviously, light emits heat just
as heat emits light, but the sun is so intensely hot that the light emitted by
it suffices, as daylight, to illuminate that part of the world turned towards
it any given time. Ironically, stars
glimpsed at night do not provide sunlight, and yet we perceive light in their
twinkling which morally sets them apart from the sun by suggesting pure
light. Thus we obtain a connotation of
primitive divinity from them, even though their light fails to reach us or,
perhaps, because of this. Certainly, we
receive no light from the central star of the Galaxy, which is too far away and
obscured by too many intervening stars to be of much use to us in that respect,
although, as the Creator-equivalent star, it ought primarily to be regarded as
a source of light rather than of heat ... in contrast to the sun, and thus
stand to the latter in the manner of subconscious to old brain, primeval light
to primeval heat.... Which consideration tempts one to ascribe the greater part
of daylight to the central star of the Galaxy, as opposed to the sun, even
though there is no justification for such an ascription in concrete experience,
thereby confining it to the realm of theological subjectivity. And yet, this fact of light coming from the
sun, almost as a by-product of solar activity, in large degree explains why the
Church was not, and never could be, entirely independent of the Monarchic State
but had to co-exist with it, an institution within an institution whose
spiritual authority was to some extent a by-product of the State's secular
authority, its light indebted to the sun rather than to the central star of the
Galaxy, and therefore shining in and through the Virgin Mary instead of the
Father, with correlative subordinate and dependent status, especially in those
countries with an inveterate monarchic tradition, though, to a certain extent,
elsewhere too. Doubtless the attempts by
mystic elites to transcend the false, dreamy light of the Virgin and achieve a
psychic approximation to the Father or, rather, His divine Son, conceived in
infantile terms, met with only very occasional and partial success, given the
actual state-of-affairs, and we may ascribe to natural visionary experience of
an hallucinatory order the quality of a more genuinely divine light,
commensurate with the upper reaches of the subconscious, and therefore relative
to an alpha-stemming spirituality. Such
inner light would, however, pale to insignificance in comparison with the
transcendently-biased, LSD-inspired light of the superconscious,
and since the superconscious derives its authority
and justification from an omega-oriented transcendentalism, so the
institutional embodiment of superconscious religion,
namely the Centre, would be independent of the Republican State and, in its
political manifestation, entitled to arrogate from the State such bureaucratic,
political, and economic responsibilities as were formerly the State's duty, so
as to set up the politico-religious framework whereby the political side of
such a framework withers in proportion to the expansion of its religious side,
the inevitable consequence being, at some future millennial point in time, the
totally absolutist Centre and transcendently-oriented spiritual purism of a
full-blown 'Kingdom of Heaven' on earth, preparatory to its ultimate
realization in the heavenly Beyond ... of universal space. Thus no co-existence of new-brain State with superconscious Centre, but the incorporation into and
subordination of bureaucratic obligations to the Centre in the name of
Messianic transcendentalism, with Social Transcendentalist implications
thereafter. In such fashion, the lower,
artificial heat of the State will be redeemed in and transmuted by the higher,
supernatural light of the Centre, as the superconscious
achieves its ascendancy over the new brain ... to usher in the era of true
spiritual salvation.
189. Just as there is heat-light, which is the
appearance of heat, whether as natural fire or electric fire, so there is
light-heat, which is the essence of light, whether natural or artificial. In psychic terms, the heat-light of the old
brain manifests itself in fantasy or natural visions, whereas the heat-light of
the new brain takes the form of artificially-induced visionary experience. Conversely, the light-heat of the
subconscious manifests itself in negative feelings, particularly of sadness,
whereas the light-heat of the superconscious takes
the form of positive feelings, especially of joy, which is equivalent to
spiritual love. No divine consciousness
without feelings and, conversely, no feelings without consciousness!
190. A
distinction should not only be drawn between subconscious, conscious,
and superconscious ... on the tripartite basis of
Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, but also between these and what Jung calls the
personal unconscious and the collective unconscious, which correspond to
heat-light in both the old and the new brains respectively, and may therefore
be theologically equated with the Virgin Mary and the Second Coming - the
former chiefly manifesting on the plane of fantasy and the latter chiefly on
that of artificially-induced visionary experience. Thus the psyche is approximately divisible as
follows:-
SUBCONSCIOUS CONSCIOUS SUPERCONSCIOUS
(Father) (Son) (Holy Ghost)
* * *
* * * *
* *
* *
* *
* *
* *
* *
*
* * *
* *
* *
* *
PERSONAL
UNCONSCIOUS COLLECTIVE UNCONSCIOUS
(Virgin Mary) (Second Coming)
with
evolutionary zigzagging implications as we progress, over the generations, from
mind to mind or, which amounts to the same, light to light, whether on the
primary levels of mind or, as in the cases of both the personal and the
collective unconscious, on what could be termed its secondary levels, which are
less transcendent since more directly connected with the brain. Such secondary levels will tend to
predominate in those historical periods in between the primary levels of mind
and their religious correlations, as during that period between the
subconscious and the conscious, which finds its religious correlation in
paganism and Christianity, when the personal unconscious is uppermost and, more
relevantly to ourselves, that period between the conscious and the superconscious, which has its religious correlation in
Christianity and Transcendentalism, when the collective unconscious is
pre-eminent. These facts tempt one to
equate the personal unconscious and the collective unconscious with 'Dark
Ages', although their respective realizations are really more symptomatic of
religion in a Dark Age than with such an age itself, which,
by contrast, finds its psychic analogue in heat, as directly related to both
the old and the new brains and their political correlations with
barbarism. Certainly we cannot progress
from one primary level of religion to another without these secondary levels
coming in-between, which keep the torch of light shining no matter how dark the
ensuing barbarism ... in the realm of political upheaval.
191. A distinction ought therefore to be drawn
between what may be termed the impure subconscious and the pure subconscious on
the one hand, and between the impure superconscious
and the pure superconscious on the other, with
dreaming and tripping implications respectively - the former corresponding to
the personal unconscious, albeit on its lowest level, and the latter to the
collective, or impersonal, unconscious, though on its highest level. By contrast, the pure subconscious would be that
state of unconsciousness beneath dreams, as applicable to dreamless sleep,
whereas the pure superconscious would be that state
of superconsciousness above trips, as applicable to
the most exalted meditative clarity ... when pure spirit is realized as the
highest level of awareness and ultimate destiny of psychic evolution - a
totally psychic absorption in the maximum spiritual essence. Consequently an
antithetical equivalent of the pure subconscious. Now, in terms of such antitheses, we may
accord similar standings to dreaming and film-viewing, fantasy and video, not
to mention static naturally-induced visionary experience and
artificially-induced visionary experience, so that a pattern of psychic
evolution arises with dreams and films, fantasies and videos, and visions and
trips in identical positions on their respective psychic spectra ... between
the absolutes of the pure subconscious and the pure superconscious. Certainly there is an antithetical
equivalence between dreams and films, with the former natural and the latter
artificial, the former appertaining to the impure subconscious internally, and
the latter to the impure superconscious externally,
each of which are beyond the conscious control of the viewer - active,
collective modes of visionary experience.
Likewise a similar antithesis can be construed as existing between
fantasy and video, given the more personal nature of each mode of visionary
experience, the former a step-up from dreams and the latter a step-up from
films and/or television, the making of videos equivalent, in modern artificial
terms, to fantasizing, fantasizing artificially, so to speak, with the option
of dwelling upon a particular subject or context until it has been sufficiently
explored and has delivered up all or most of its creative possibilities - for
better or worse. Above fantasies,
however, we may posit natural visions, which, by contrast, appear external to
the impure subconscious ... as though imposed upon the psyche from without, and
it seems reasonable to regard LSD trips as constituting an antithetical
equivalent of such visions by dint of the static and almost transcendent nature
of artificially-induced visionary experience, which pertains to the impure superconscious internally ... in contrast not only to natural
visionary experience - rare as that is in this day and age - but to film- and
video-viewing as well. Thus we can
accord it a higher moral status than attaches to either of the other modes of
artificial visionary experience - one more on the level of light than of heat,
and therefore specifically relative to the Second Coming rather than to the
Antichrist. And yet film-viewing,
whether on television or elsewhere, is a mode of
transcendent visionary experience ... outside and above the conscious self, a
sort of artificial psychic activity which renders the conscious psyche passive
and receptive, and is accordingly superior to that psyche or, as I should say,
level of psychic behaviour, just as dreams signify a superior, more evolved
psychic phenomenon than the sleepy sensuality of the pure subconscious. In viewing films our personal egos are
eclipsed and transcended, as we enter a collective realm of visionary
experience relative to the lowest level of the superconscious. It is a mode of salvation. Now if higher, purer and more truly divine
levels of psychic salvation are to be achieved in the course of time, then it
is just as well to have passed through the lower levels first, no matter how
nominally. Doubtless the vision-prone
mystics of the past would fail to have experienced their natural visions, had
they not also been capable of dreaming.
However, for the modern man, watching television is a kind of dreaming
or, rather, an antithetical equivalent of dreaming, a new-brain as opposed to
an old-brain phenomenon, and if he is not fully awake while doing so, at least
he is far from asleep!
192. Concerning the subject of consciousness, we may
hold that it is primarily and inherently memory, that is to say, a capacity to
know and fix everything it is brought into contact with via the senses,
particularly the eyes. We should,
however, distinguish between recollective memory,
which is the form memory usually takes, as when we are conscious of striving to
remember or recall something ... be it a face, date, name, number, place, or
whatever, and collective memory, which is rather more unconscious or immediate,
and to the degree that we take it so much for granted as to forget its
existence - not altogether surprisingly, in that it is the essence of consciousness. Thus when, for example, I sit down at my
table to write, I know, without needing to reflect upon it, what a table
is, where it is, what I use it
for, and that it is my table. All of this is subliminal knowledge, which is
nothing less than the essence of consciousness as memory. Sometime ago I learnt about tables, both
generally and in particular, and they are now a part of my consciousness. I learnt about words, especially English
words, and they too are etched in my memory ... as conceptual consciousness,
which stands to perceptual consciousness as heat to light. Were I to forget my name, I would have cause
to suppose that I had 'gone mad' or 'lost my mind', and, certainly, any
experience which causes one to lose consciousness of who or where one is or
with what one is dealing will indicate that one has either fallen beneath
consciousness to a deeply subconscious level or, alternatively, risen above it
to a highly superconscious level, neither of which
modes of psychic experience are connected with consciousness. For consciousness, whether perceptual or
conceptual, outer or inner, is of the world, a worldly level of psychic
experience whose essence is memory, which is a kind of combination of will and
idea, whereas the deeper subconscious is pure will and the higher superconscious pure idea, the former excluding the
possibility of idea, or representation, and the latter the possibility of will
- Hell and Heaven beneath and above the world, which, as Schopenhauer correctly
maintained, is a combination of will and idea, or perceptual and conceptual
modes of consciousness.
193. Corresponding, as it does, to the world, we may
hold that consciousness is akin to a psychic globe which, through the agency of
conscious will, can be swivelled around until the specific content being sought
is brought into recollective focus and accordingly
becomes uppermost in our consciousness.
On this globe, akin to a map of the world, all dates, names, words,
faces, numbers, etc., have their place, some of which are further away from the
near-point of consciousness than others at any given time, but all or most of
which are accessible to conscious attention through application of the will, so
that they often change places ... depending on what is uppermost in our minds at
the time. To extend the metaphor, we may
hold that perceptual consciousness corresponds to the mapped outlines of the
various countries on this globe, while conceptual consciousness corresponds to
the names of the towns, cities, countries, states, etc., to be found on
it. Thus there exists a kind of
symbiosis between them, which makes for the totality of consciousness, both
collective and recollective. Either side of this consciousness, however,
we find the capacity for two very different globes that, as pure will and pure
idea (representation), will exist to a greater or lesser extent depending on
the degree of psychic evolution of the individual at any given epoch in
time. One may argue that in a primitive
or pagan age the subconscious globe will be predominant over the conscious one,
whereas in an advanced or transcendental age the superconscious
globe will predominate over consciousness, and to such an extent, at its
furthermost point of development, as to totally eclipse normal consciousness,
making for a state of mind akin to Heaven.
Obviously we are talking here about different levels and types of
civilization in relation to these psychic distinctions, be it the hellish
civilization of the subconscious, the worldly civilization of the conscious, or,
indeed, the heavenly civilization of the superconscious,
with will - memory - idea distinctions respectively ... in a gradual
progression from the perceptual to the conceptual, from appearance to essence,
objectivity to subjectivity, the centrifugal to the centripetal, via dualistic
compromises coming in-between. Horses,
carriages/cars, and motorbikes would not be an inappropriate parallel to these
three types of civilization or stages of psychic evolution. There are dozens of others.
194. The tripartite division of the chart below into light (L) - heat (H) -
motion (M) equivalents, with feelings on the top spectrum, emotions on the
middle spectrum, and sensations on the bottom spectrum, may be equated with spirit,
soul, and flesh or, which amounts to the same thing, God, Devil, and world:-
L. FATHER SON HOLY GHOST
Illusion Feelings Truth
Sadness Happiness
SUBCONSCIOUS CONSCIOUS SUPERCONSCIOUS
H. SATAN ANTI-VIRGIN ANTICHRIST
Ugliness Emotions Beauty
Hate Love
OLD BRAIN MID-BRAIN NEW BRAIN
M. OLD WORLD MID-WORLD
NEW WORLD
Evil Sensations Good
Pain Pleasure
OLD BODY MID-BODY NEW BODY
Thus we can
speak of a spirit spectrum in relation to light, a soul spectrum in relation to
heat, and a flesh spectrum in relation to motion. Hitherto I have distinguished between soul
and spirit in terms of a proton/electron evolutionary divide, with everything
on the proton side, whether biased towards particles or wavicles,
equivalent to soul and, conversely, everything on the electron side, whether
biased towards particles or wavicles, equivalent to
spirit, so that there would have been distinctions, for instance, between 'good
soul' and 'good spirit' on the one hand, i.e. the Father and the Holy Ghost, as
between 'bad soul' and 'bad spirit' on the other, i.e. Satan and the
Antichrist. Now, however, I am obliged,
by the apparent logic of my chart, to take a longitudinal rather than a
latitudinal view, so to speak, of soul/spirit distinctions, in consequence of
which we will be distinguishing rather more between 'bad spirit' in terms of
the Father and 'good spirit' in terms of the Holy Ghost, as well as between
'bad soul' in terms of the Devil (Satan) and 'good soul' in terms of the
Antichrist, with sadness/happiness distinctions in the first, or light
spectrum, and hate/love distinctions in the second, or heat, spectrum, as
between subconscious and superconscious on the one
hand, and old brain and new brain on the other hand. As also indicated in the above chart, I have
further distinguished quantitative attributes from qualitative ones, which
gives us an illusion/truth dichotomy in relation to the divine, or light,
spectrum, but an ugliness/beauty dichotomy in relation to the diabolic, or
heat, spectrum. One could describe the
quantitative attribute as apparent, and the qualitative attribute, by
contrast, as essential - which applies no less to the distinction
already touched upon in relation to consciousness, as between the perceptual
and the conceptual. Clearly, if the
light spectrum is metaphysical, then the heat spectrum is aesthetic, as
relative to the emotions. However, when
we come to the third spectrum we are talking of sensations, whether in terms of
the extremely negative or of the extremely positive, pain or pleasure, and
while these constitute the twin qualitative poles of the flesh, their
quantitative counterparts will be evil and good, thus justifying one in
conceiving of the motion spectrum as ethical, evil being not so much an
attribute of the Devil as of the world ... particularly in its primitive, or
natural, phase, and primarily having to do with pain (as Schopenhauer rightly
contended). But an age which is
post-worldly, and hence post-bodily, can only be 'beyond good and evil', and
accordingly disposed to the head, whether in terms of new-brain love or of superconscious joy, beauty or truth, depending on the
nature of the individual and, no less importantly, the type of society in which
he lives. Clearly, communist societies
are more concerned with love of one's fellow (proletarian) man than with the
transcendental pursuit of joy through adherence to spiritual truth. My own ideal type of society would place the
emphasis on the latter ideal, thereby indicating allegiance to the Divine
rather than to the Diabolic. Worldly
post-worldly societies like
195. Sense in which Jung was
a divine psychologist, Adler a diabolic psychologist, and Freud a worldly
psychologist.
Adaptation neurosis, self-assertion neurosis, sexual neurosis: light,
heat, and motion. Or,
alternatively, spirit, soul, and flesh.
In the case of the first type of neurosis, we are dealing with a failure
to 'be oneself', whether through force of
circumstances or wilful deviation, and its corollary of an attempted adaptation
to contexts which are inherently alien to one's essential self. In the case of the second type of neurosis,
however, we are in the realm of thwarted ambition, of a check on the will to
power, a curb on self-assertion which, if too persistent and stringent, can
lead to a mental crisis of the Adlerian variety. Yet just as one must be a person who is
inherently disposed to 'being himself' or 'being one with his self' to run the
risk of succumbing, in the event of that disposition being thwarted, to the
Jungian neurosis, so one has to be a person inherently given to self-assertion
and the will to power over others ... to risk succumbing, through failure in
this endeavour, to the Adlerian neurosis, which I
have characterized as diabolic. However,
in the case of the third type of neurosis, which has to do with sexual
repression, with fantasy-wishes unfulfilled or unrealizable ... usually because
they are of a character that conventional morality places under taboo, we are
brought from the realm of the head to that of the body, and it follows no less
than in the above two cases that the kind of person who risks succumbing to
this worldly or sexual neurosis must possess a strong sexual drive to begin
with, must be primarily a sexual being rather than either a spiritual or a
soulful one, so that failure to achieve his objectives or enact his fantasies
may bring on the type of neurosis in question.
Thus in distinguishing, as Jung does, between these three basic types of
neurosis, one is effectively distinguishing between three basic types of
person, as regarding minds, brains, and bodies.
Of course, no-one is ever entirely one thing or another; even the
greatest mind has a body, just as the least spiritual of persons has a
mind. But to the extent that people are
roughly divisible into these three categories, we are permitted to generalize
on the basis that a 'mind person' will be more likely to succumb to an
adaptation neurosis than to either of the other types, assuming he fails to 'be
himself', whereas a 'brain person' will be more likely to succumb to a
self-assertion neurosis in the event of being systematically thwarted in his
power drives, and a 'body person' may risk a sexual neurosis if denied
fulfilment of his basic sexual urges, whether or not they are rooted in
fantasy. Consequently we cannot ascribe
an identical neurosis predilection to everyone, but must distinguish between
what may be termed elite neuroses, or those of the head, whether mind or brain,
and popular neuroses, as principally affecting Les hommes moyen sensuels,
or the broad physically-inclined masses.
Hence Jung and Adler may be described as 'head' psychologists, Freud, by
contrast, as a 'body' psychologist - a tripartite distinction between God,
Devil, and world. Of the three, the most
truly psychological, or psyche-logical, was Jung.
196. Latin light, Slavic
heat, and Teutonic motion - divine, diabolic, and worldly distinctions as
affecting and reflecting race.
In Western civilization, the alpha-stemming head of Roman
Catholicism/Eastern Orthodoxy ... was superseded by the worldly body of
Protestantism, that predominantly Nordic form of Christianity which has since
been superseded - and should eventually be entirely eclipsed - by the
omega-aspiring head of Transcendental Socialism/Social Transcendentalism. From the subconscious and
the old brain to the body, and from the body to the new brain and the superconscious.
197. Natural light/open fires; gas light/gas fires;
electric light/electric fires; neon lighting/central heating. A light/heat evolutionary
progression from autocratic beginnings to theocratic endings via democratic and
socialist stages coming in-between.
An approximate religious/political parallel would, I believe, run as
follows: Catholicism/Royalism; Protestantism - High Toryism/ Liberalism - Liberal Democracy - Low Toryism - Nazism/Democratic Socialism - Marxian Socialism;
Fascism - Social Transcendentalism/Communism - Transcendental Socialism. Certainly ideological distinctions can be
inferred to exist between one type of electric-light bulb and another, and I
venture to suggest that whereas ordinary transparent electric-light bulbs are
approximately Low Tory, opaque and/or coloured ones will be comparatively
Nazi. Likewise an ideological
distinction can be drawn between twin-bar (relative) electric fires and single
bar (absolute) electric fires, with Democratic Socialist/Marxian Socialist
implications. As regards neon lighting and central heating, we are
distinguishing between Fascist single-tube arrangements and Social
Transcendentalist encased neon arrangements on the one hand, and between
Communist horizontally-biased central-heating arrangements and Transcendental
Socialist vertically-biased central-heating arrangements on the other hand, so
that parallels may be inferred with jazz and rock-jazz in the case of light,
but with rock and jazz-rock in the case of heat or, alternatively, with streamlined
scooters and plain scooters in the one case, but plain motorbikes and
streamlined motorbikes in the other case.
Probably fan heaters come in between the light/heat extremes as a sort
of superworldly parallel to motion, and I venture to
ascribe them an Ecological status commensurate with a middle-ground
supernaturalism.
198. In generalizing the
arts into light, heat, and motion distinctions, it is tempting to ascribe to
art (painting) a light equivalence, to music a heat equivalence, and to
literature a motion equivalence, so that the first may be equated with spirit,
the second with soul, and the third with matter or, in terms of man, the
flesh. Art does seem to be evolving
towards light, striving upwards ... as the progression from painting to light
art attests, whereas music, although capable of evolutionary refinement,
suggests a connection with heat by dint of its soulful attributes. On the other hand, literature would seem to
be connected with social and, in particular these days, sexual motion, and thus
to have distinctly worldly overtones ... as befits a story or extended
narrative of social experience. And yet
we can divide literature into three basic categories, viz. philosophy, poetry,
and fiction, and it is no less tempting to ascribe to philosophy a light
equivalence and to poetry a heat equivalence, so that the one accords with art
and the other with music - spirit and soul respectively, with conceptual and
perceptual, essential and apparent distinctions. Truly, it is philosophy that is abstract and
idealistic, a metaphysical reflection on the life of the spirit and its quest,
through truth, for joy, whereas poetry, having romantic overtones, is rather
more concrete and naturalistic, concerned with the life of the soul and its
quest, through beauty, for love.
Clearly, beauty and truth are not identical, despite Keats' oft-quoted
assertion to the contrary, but as distinct as poetry and philosophy or, to
revert to theological language, the Devil and God. Where they are similar ... is in pertaining
rather more to the head than to the body, which, as already noted, finds its
chief spokesman in narrative literature, whether, as traditionally, in plays
or, more contemporaneously, in novels - that Protestant extrapolation from
(Catholic) plays and latter-day account of the life of the body and its quest,
through the good act, for the ultimate pleasure.
199. If a distinction between beauty and truth,
poetry and philosophy, accords with a diabolic/divine dichotomy, then we can
say that, in general, poets are diabolic and, by contrast, philosophers divine,
though only on the basis that genuinely poetic and philosophic works are being
produced in each case. The concept of
the 'poet maudit', as especially
applicable to Baudelaire, would therefore be true, in different degrees, of all
poets, and Milton's concept of Satan as the perfect manly beauty would hold
merit in our eyes as a testimony to the correlation between beauty and the
diabolic, and its concomitance of sexual love - at least in contemporary
terms. For we cannot
overlook the traditional or primitive correlation between ugliness and the
diabolic, with its qualitative attribute of hate. Irrespective of to which evolutionary level
of the diabolic a poet relates, or whether in fact both levels, as pertaining
to the old and the new brains respectively, don't play a more-or-less equal
part, we can satisfy ourselves as to the true nature of the poet and accept the
fact that 'God's spies' are more likely to be demonic than angelic - indeed, are
compelled, by the concrete nature of their trade, to align themselves with
soul, whether for better (love) or worse (hate). Thus an historical pattern can be discerned
in which the diabolic, as we define it, is never very far away, whether in
terms of Dante's Inferno, Milton's Paradise Lost, Goethe's Faust,
Baudelaire's Les Fleurs du
Mal, Rimbaud's Une Saison en Enfer, Eliot's The Waste Land, Pound's Cantos,
or Ginsberg's Howl. Not to
mention several of the works of Villon, Byron,
Shelley, Coleridge, Lautréamont, Artaud,
Thomas, Corso, Brecht, Lorca, Joyce, Wilde, Graves, and Durrell. By contrast, the philosophers, in their
pursuit of truth, appear disposed to the Divine, and thus to the Hegelian
furtherance of spirit. Even the poetic
philosophy of Nietzsche's Zarathustra is more a
matter of divine truth than of diabolic beauty.
Neither can we equate the typical philosopher's lifestyle with that of
the typical poet, since philosophers are not usually disposed to debauchery,
drug addiction, alcoholism, lechery, sodomy, gluttony, and other
well-documented 'poetic vices', but lead comparatively calm, sober, ascetic
lives, as befitting the pursuit of truth.
They are the wise, whereas poets are generally fools who suffer the
consequences of their folly. In fact, we
should distinguish between poetic chaff and philosophic wheat, and judge them
accordingly, dividing the Damned from the Saved, the slaves of love from the
joyful free. Thus we would see quite
clearly that while poets like Dylan Thomas and Robert Graves were decidedly of
the Damned, philosophers like John Cowper Powys and Bertrand Russell were just
as decidedly of the Saved, their books on happiness no less a testimony to
philosophic truth than the love poems of Thomas and Graves bear testimony to
poetic beauty.
200. Now what applies to poets and philosophers may
well apply to musicians and artists ... if we are to equate music with the
Diabolic and art with the Divine - in other words, with heat and light
distinctions respectively. Certainly the
artist is, as a rule, a less romantic creature than the musician, especially
those for whom 'music is the food of love', and we need not doubt that his vocation
is relatively ascetic, demanding a more austere and sober lifestyle ... as
befits such an abstract medium - a medium no less in harmony with philosophy
than music with poetry, particularly this century ... when song-writing is so
ubiquitous (not to say iniquitous). One
would have to think long and hard to come up with a pair of musicians who could
be said to rival Mondrian and Kandinsky,
let alone Ben Nicholson, in matters ascetic and abstract; for musicians are
rather more disposed to the soul than to the spirit, and consequently concerned
not so much with the pursuit of happiness through truth as with the pursuit of
love through beauty ... such as one finds in Strauss, Elgar,
Mahler, Rachmaninov, and the Romantics
generally. The Neo-Classical revolt
against emotional excesses was intended to switch the emphasis from the
qualitative to the quantitative, from love to beauty, and thus to further form
at the expense of content. Like all such
revolts it was symptomatic of bourgeois decadence and had to contend with
post-Romantic trends in the overall guise of a quasi-truthful and hence
pitch-biased avant-garde. For just as there is such a thing as philosophic poetry, so there
is abstract music, or music with a leaning towards truth, and here, if
anywhere, can be found musicians of a cast approximating to the modern artist. In terms of contrast between art and music,
however, it does seem that a qualitative emphasis in art calls forth or finds
itself juxtaposed with a quantitative emphasis in music, and vice versa,
so that the two disciplines are forever at loggerheads, with greater contrast
between the Divine and the Diabolic in consequence. One has only to consider the qualitative
emphasis on happiness to be found in fête champêtre
paintings of the eighteenth century, and contrast this with the formal beauty
of the music of the period, with its Mozartian
classicism, to see this point all too clearly.
Is there not a similar contrast between Romantic painting, with its
emphasis on factual truth, no matter how unpleasant, and Romantic music, the
strong emotional emphasis of which has particular regard to love? And what of the distinction between the
abstract happiness of, say, Neo-Plasticism and the
abstract beauty of the Neo-Classical tradition?
Certainly, the swing to abstract truth in Post-Painterly Abstraction is
paralleled by a Neo-Romantic outpouring of love and emotion which co-exists
with both avant-garde and Neo-Classical trends.
Could this Neo-Romanticism in music have its political analogue in
Liberal Democracy, I wonder? For if one
is to attach political parallels to musical styles, it could well be that
Romanticism is to music what Liberalism is to politics, whereas Neo-Classical
music finds its political parallel in Democratic Socialism, and the
avant-garde, by contrast, in Low Toryism and/or some
Far-Right equivalence, as befitting an idealistic bias. Such speculation, admittedly, somewhat
removes us from our original concern, but surely it is not without substance? For if music is generally a thing of the
brain spectrum so to speak, then it will have closer
parallels with economics and politics than with religion, which, by contrast,
pertains to the mind spectrum, i.e. to light as opposed to heat. And the same could be argued of poetry, in
contrast to philosophy.
