What is the relationship between "truth, goodness and beauty" in artistic creation?

Marxist aesthetics scientifically expounds the dialectical relationship between truth, goodness and beauty on the basis of criticizing and absorbing various theories. As far as content is concerned, beauty is neither pure nature nor pure subjective consciousness. Beauty is the essential strength of human beings in perceptual form, and it is the unity of truth and goodness, that is, the unity of purposefulness and regularity in human practice. Human practice is an activity of seeking truth and doing good. Seeking truth is a regular activity; Being a good person is a purposeful activity. Therefore, according to the practical viewpoint of Marxism, beauty is organically combined with truth, goodness and beauty. From the content, beauty is the dialectical unity of truth, goodness and beauty; Formally speaking, beauty is also the dialectical unity of truth, goodness and beauty.

1, beauty and truth

What is true? Truth is not an objective spirit, nor a subjective consciousness (truth), but a real objective substance and its movement, which is an external real world that is not transferred by human consciousness and will. Truth not only refers to the essential law of the external real world, but also refers to the objective material world in which essence and phenomenon, law and structure and form are unified. When the external real world exists as reality and moves endlessly according to its own laws, it is real, not beautiful. The relationship between beauty and truth is as follows:

Beauty is based on truth, and truth is the premise of beauty.

It really refers to the objective material world and its law of movement and change, which is independent of human will and consciousness. It is the foundation and premise of beauty. This is because:

First, beauty must regard nature as the foundation and premise of its existence.

The so-called history is the practical process of human conquest and transformation of nature. Although beauty is a product of history, it must be based on the reality of nature. Without nature, human social practice will lose its object and it will be impossible to develop. Although people are blessed, they also come from nature. Nature is the object of human existence, practice, creation and aesthetics. Without nature, people can neither survive nor create. As the first historical activity of human beings, material production takes nature as the object. Hunting is the direct acquisition of natural objects in nature. The manufacture of labor tools, first of all, is to use natural stones in nature. Even modern large-scale industrial production is inseparable from nature. It is the processing and creation of nature at a higher level by human beings using modern tools and technical means. Steel smelting, coal mining and hydropower station construction all depend on nature. The creation of realistic beauty is like this, and the creation of artistic beauty is no exception. The mythological art of human childhood is the result of conquering, dominating and visualizing natural forces with the help of imagination and fantasy. Therefore, whether it is the creation of realistic beauty or artistic beauty, it is not an activity of pure subjective will, but a material activity that depends on nature and transforms it according to its objective laws. Only by relying on nature and conforming to objective laws can human beings create history and beauty.

Secondly, beauty must depend on the objective matter of nature and become the existence of perceptual form.

Although beauty is not the attribute of objective things in essence, it must depend on the attribute of objective things. Without matter, beauty has no attachment. The existence of objective matter is real. Any aesthetic object is first and foremost a material object. First, there is the material existence of the sun, the moon, the mountains and the sea, and then people have an aesthetic relationship with it, making the sun fiery red, the moon bright, the mountains magnificent and the sea magnificent. Without the material existence of the sun, moon, mountains and oceans, these beauties would be out of the question. Beauty is not an illusory fantasy, but a concrete image that really exists in the objective material world. Once beauty loses the material attribute of specific things, its objectivity and image will disappear on its own. The same is true of art. As the materialization of the artist's aesthetic psychology, art is the product of the artist's active creation, but it cannot be separated from the material form. On the one hand, it originates from the reality of the objective material world and is a reflection of social real life; On the other hand, it must be attached to something as a carrier and form. If art loses the material media that convey artistic information, such as language, color, sound and form, it is even more impossible to talk about artistic beauty. Therefore, beauty is not the natural attribute of objective things, nor is it equal to the laws of nature, but must depend on the natural attributes of objective things and conform to the laws of nature. In this sense, it is really the foundation and premise of beauty.

Not necessarily beautiful, but beauty must be true.

Although beauty is based on truth, truth is not equal to beauty. Beauty in the history of aesthetics lies in truth, and the view that truth is beauty emphasizes the dependence of beauty on truth and the similarity between beauty and truth, but fails to see the difference between beauty and truth. From the connection between beauty and truth, beauty must be based on truth, and beauty must be true; But it can't be said to be really beautiful. The difference between beauty and truth lies in two aspects:

First, from a historical point of view, truth exists with the universe before beauty; After the truth, beauty comes into being through human social practice.

As a real existence, the external world existed long before the appearance of human beings, and moved endlessly according to its own natural laws. At this time, nature only exists as truth, but it is not beautiful. Beauty is the product of the historical practice of human society, and its appearance is much later than that of nature. Only the nature conquered and transformed by human practice and humanized nature can have a beautiful existence.

Secondly, in essence, only the truth that conforms to human purpose and the law of beauty is beautiful.

Human practical activities are conscious and purposeful activities. The product of human labor is the crystallization of purposeful activities. Beauty must be created by labor and must be the product of labor. However, not all products created by labor are beautiful. Only those products that conform to people's purpose and "the law of beauty", show people's essential strength in perceptual form and arouse people's aesthetic pleasure can become beautiful. However, products that run counter to people's consciousness and purpose and deny people's essential strength, such as defective products, defective products and waste products, cannot attract people's aesthetic feeling and become the object of beauty. However, it is still a material existence and a real thing. Therefore, if the real thing wants to be beautiful, it must be purposeful and regular, otherwise, although it is true, it is not beautiful. It can also be said that truth becomes beauty only through the intermediary of goodness. In content, the laws of nature meet the needs of the subject's purpose, and in form, the natural form meets the scale of the subject. Without the combination of truth and goodness, it is not beauty. In this way, it is wrong for Diderot to think that beauty is only the form of truth or goodness, and Hegel to think that beauty is the perceptual manifestation of truth (idea). Because they all regard beauty as a simple form, and do not clarify the relationship between beauty and truth in content.

2. Beauty and goodness

What is good? Goodness is not human's subjective will and desire, nor is it human's moral concept and code of conduct, but the utilitarian purpose and realistic requirement of the subject's practical activities and their realization, that is, the reality affirms the purpose. In other words, goodness is the positive realization of the essential power by the subject in practical activities and the utility of reality to the subject. Goodness contains two meanings: one is the utilitarian requirement of subject practice, which can be understood as the need, purpose and scale of practice; The second is the external reality of subject practice, which can be understood as the realization of the purpose of practical activities and its products. This kind of goodness in subject practice is the contradictory unity between individuals and groups, individuals and society, and is by no means a narrow personal practice requirement and reality, but a universal human practice requirement and reality. When the subject practice exists as goodness, it is only goodness, not beauty. The connection and difference between beauty and goodness are as follows:

(1) Goodness is the premise of beauty, and its function lies in the foundation of beauty.

The starting point and destination of human's practical activities to conquer and transform nature is to realize human's wishes and meet human's needs. What people think beautiful at first is actually useful. Although aesthetics is gradually divorced from practicality, it still has hidden functions at the root. We say that goodness is the premise of beauty, because:

First, beauty is not good, but beauty must be based on goodness.

The truth of nature must be transformed by the subject's practice to meet people's needs, so as to realize people's purpose, become nature that meets the purpose, and become beauty. Nature, which was originally opposed to human beings, has been recognized and transformed through human practical activities, and gradually benefited human beings, that is, from "things are in themselves" to "things are for our own use", which is goodness. The reason why the ancients regarded "sheep as beautiful" lies in the direct utility of sheep-sheep's obesity is always associated with the sweetness of taste. Beautiful city sculptures and garden landscapes always have pleasant spiritual effects. Modern people's growing aesthetic pursuit, healthy body, exuberant energy, exquisite food, beautiful clothes, comfortable living room, elegant environment and rich cultural life are all based on the beauty of utilitarian content. The initial beauty is attached to what is useful and beneficial to people. Those things that are harmful to people and deny life can never be the object of beauty in essence. "Everything that is beautiful to human beings is useful to them-something meaningful in the struggle against nature and other social life for survival." (Complete Works of Lu Xun, Volume 4, p. 263. It is precisely because purpose is the premise of beauty that beauty can exist only by virtue.

Second, beauty is not good, but beauty must be based on good as a condition for its emergence and development.

Although beauty is not the requirement of external reality for the subject's practice, it must rely on the subject's practical activities. Only when human practice conquers and transforms nature, can beauty be produced and developed when nature meets the requirements of subject practice. As an external reality that meets the requirements of the subject's practical purpose, there are two forms: one is the practical activity itself that exists as a dynamic form, that is, the modeling power that conforms to the purpose and regularity; The other is the product of static practice. Therefore, although beauty is not the objective requirement of subjective practice for external reality, it is the realization of this objective requirement; Although beauty is not good, it is an affirmation of truth, goodness and beauty. Goodness is another necessary premise of beauty. It can be said that there is no beauty without goodness. In the past, the theory of equality of beauty, goodness and goodness unilaterally emphasized the relationship between beauty and goodness, while ignoring the difference between beauty and goodness. In addition, it fails to see that goodness must be transformed into beauty, it must be hidden in vivid and concrete images in the form of reality, and it must arouse the aesthetic pleasure of the appreciator. In the past, the theory of "irrelevance" between beauty and goodness saw the difference between them, but cut off the deep internal relationship between them. It didn't even see that beauty had a definite nature, and some function lurked in the foundation of beauty. The reasons for these two theoretical errors are: first, the nature of the phenomenon has not been investigated; second, the utilitarianism of goodness (direct personal and material; Indirect social and spiritual) in a narrow sense.

Beauty is based on goodness, but goodness is not beauty.

Pure goodness, that is, the objective requirement of the subject of practice for external reality, still exists only as goodness rather than beauty. Only when the purpose of the subject's practice conforms to the objective law and is affirmed by reality can the truth of the external reality form be obtained, that is, beauty can be achieved with the help of some image carrier. This is because:

First, goodness is affirmed by truth, and only by obtaining the reality in the form of reality can it be beautiful.

The purpose of subject practice requires that it is beautiful because it conforms to objective laws, achieves the unity of regularity and purpose, and is affirmed by reality, or goodness is affirmed by truth, so that it can master and apply objective laws, be enriched and obtain the reality of realistic forms. And those requirements and activities that do not conform to the objective laws are unrealized goodness and have not been truly affirmed, so they are not beautiful.

Second, the form of goodness conforms to the "internal scale" of the subject's practice and is beautiful.

The goodness affirmed by reality, even if it obtains some realistic form, is not necessarily beautiful. Only when the real form of this realistic form is constructed according to the "law of beauty", that is, the purpose of the subject's practice conforms to the objective law, and the "internal scale" of the subject's practice conforms to the objective natural form, then it is beautiful. Therefore, it can also be said that goodness becomes beauty, which must be combined with truth through real intermediary and conform to truth. In content, the purpose of subject practice requires to conform to objective laws, and in form, the "internal scale" of subject practice conforms to natural forms.

3. The relationship between truth, goodness and beauty

Truth, goodness and beauty are three ways for human beings to master the world, which respectively reflect the dynamic process and achievements of human cognitive activities, practical activities and aesthetic activities, and are also basic concepts belonging to science, ethics and aesthetics respectively. Beauty, truth and goodness are all products of social history in the final analysis. They are not only three different aspects of human practice, but also the all-round development of different value forms of human practice. It is really human's understanding and grasp of the objective material world and its laws. Goodness is the purpose, requirement and realization of people's free and conscious activities. Beauty is the unity of regularity and purpose and its perceptual form, also known as free form, that is, the objectification or perceptual manifestation of human essential strength.

Truth, goodness and beauty are consistent in the following aspects: first, they all exist objectively, have their own essential attributes, characteristics and laws, and are not transferred by people's subjective will. Humans can only find it, adapt to it, master it and use it, but can't ignore it, violate it and force it. Secondly, all three are formed in practice. Without the material production and spiritual production practice of human society, there would be no truth, goodness and beauty; Beauty; At the same time, the three must serve and be applied to practice, otherwise the truth, goodness and beauty will be meaningless. Third, from the essential source, all three are gradually formed in the relationship between man and nature. Without the improvement of human's ability to understand, transform and conquer nature, the continuous progress of human's own quality and social productivity, the continuous expansion of human spiritual activities and the continuous enhancement of subjective initiative consciousness, there will be no truth, goodness and beauty. There are profound and inseparable internal and essential relations between them, as well as colorful and complicated external phenomena, and there are irreplaceable differences in attribute categories.

As mentioned above, the relationship between truth, goodness and beauty is embodied in the following aspects: beauty must be based on truth, goodness and beauty; Without truth, goodness and beauty, there will be nothing. However, beauty is neither pure truth nor pure goodness. It is unscientific to equate beauty with truth or goodness indiscriminately. Beauty is the unity of truth, goodness and beauty, both in content and form. There are two forms of this unity: as far as truth is transformed into beauty, it can only become beauty through the intermediary of goodness, which is manifested as natural beauty with goodness as its content and truth as its form. Truth without goodness is just a natural thing that has nothing to do with people. It is not beautiful if it violates the purpose and needs of the subject of practice. As far as the transformation from goodness to beauty is concerned, goodness can only become beauty through real intermediary. This kind of beauty is manifested in the social beauty with truth as its content and goodness as its form. There is no real goodness, which violates the objective laws of natural and historical development. No subject practice and its products are beautiful. No matter what form it takes, beauty, as the unity of truth and goodness, is higher than pure truth or pure goodness in degree, and its essence is the harmony, blending and unity between man and nature.

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