Goethe's Conception of the World
Views Concerning Nature and the Development of Living Beings
GA 6
VIII. The Phenomena of the World of Colour
[ 1 ] The feeling that “great works of Art are produced by men according to true and natural laws” was an ever-present stimulus to Goethe to search for these laws of artistic creation. He was convinced that the effectiveness of a work of Art must depend on a natural conformity to law that it reveals. He wishes to discover this conformity to law. He wanted to know why the highest works of Art are at the same time the loftiest productions of Nature. It became clear to him that the Greeks proceeded according to the same laws which Nature follows when they developed “the circle of divine form out of the human structure” Italian Journey, 28th Jan., 1787.). His aim is to see how Nature brings about this form in order that he may understand it in works of Art. Goethe describes how in Italy he gradually acquired an insight into the natural law of artistic creation (Kürschner, Nat. Lit. Bd. 36.). “Happily I could always hold fast to certain maxims taken from poetry, which inner feeling and long usage had preserved in me, so that as the result of an uninterrupted perception of Nature and Art, animated conversations with connoisseurs of more or less insight, and the life I continually led in the company of more or less practical or thoughtful artists, it became possible for me, though not without difficulty, gradually to analyse Art for myself without dissecting it and to become conscious of its interpenetrating elements.” But one particular element will not reveal to him the natural laws in accordance with which it is active in a work of Art, namely colour. Several pictures were “designed and composed in his presence and carefully studied according to their parts, arrangement and form.” The artists were able to tell him how they proceeded with their composition. But as soon as it came to the question of colour everything seemed to depend on caprice. No one knew what relation prevailed between colour and chiaroscuro—light and shade—or between the single colours. Nobody could tell Goethe, for instance, why yellow makes a warm, pleasant impression, why blue evokes a feeling of cold, why yellow and reddish-blue side by side produce an effect of harmony. He realised that he must first acquaint himself with the laws of the world of colour in Nature in order from there to penetrate into the secrets of colouring.
[ 2 ] The ideas concerning the physical nature of colour-phenomena which still lingered in Goethe's memory from his student days, and the scientific treatises which he consulted, alike proved fruitless for his purpose. “With the rest of the world I was convinced that all colours were contained in light; I never heard anything but this, and I never found the slightest cause for doubting it, because I had then no further interest in the matter” (Confessions of the Author. Kürschner. Nat. Lit. Bd., 36.2.). When, however, his interest began to be aroused, he found that he “could evolve nothing for his purpose” out of this view. Newton was the founder of this view which Goethe found to be prevailing among Nature investigators and which, indeed, still occupies the same position to-day. According to this view, white light, as it proceeds from the sun, is composed of colours. The colours arise because the constituent parts are separated out from the white light. If we allow sunlight to enter a dark room through a small round opening, and catch it on a white screen placed perpendicular to the direction of the instreaming light, we obtain a white image of the sun. If we place between the opening and the screen a glass prism through which the light streams, then the white circular image of the sun is changed. It appears as though distorted, drawn out lengthways, and coloured. This image is called the solar spectrum. If we place the prism so that the upper portions of light have to traverse a shorter path within the mass of glass than the lower, the coloured image is extended downwards. The upper edge of the image is red, the lower, violet; the red passes downwards into yellow, the violet upwards into blue; the central portion of the image is, generally speaking, white. Only when there is a certain distance between the screen and prism does the white in the centre vanish entirely; the entire image then appears coloured, from above downwards, in the following order: Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Light Blue, Indigo, Violet. Newton and his followers conclude from this experiment that the colours are originally contained in the white light but intermingled with each other. They are separated from each other by the prism. They have the property of being deviated in varying degrees from their direction when passing through a transparent body, that is to say, of being refracted. The red light is refracted least, the violet most. They appear in the spectrum according to their degree of refrangibility. If we observe through a prism a narrow strip of paper on a black background this also appears deviated. It is at the same time broader and coloured at the edges. The upper edge appears violet, the lower red; the violet here also passes over into the blue and the red over into yellow; the middle is generally white. Only when there is a certain distance between the prism and the strip does this appear wholly in colours. Green again appears in the middle. Here also the white of the strip of paper is said to be resolved into its colour constituents. That all these colours appear only when there is a certain distance between the screen or strip of paper and the prism, whereas otherwise the centre is white, the Newtonians explain simply. They say: In the middle the more strongly refracted colours from the upper portion of the image coincide with those that are more weakly refracted from below, and blend to make white. The colours only appear at the edges because here into these portions of light that are more weakly refracted, no strongly refracted colours can fall from above, and into those portions that are more strongly refracted none of the more weakly refracted portions can fall from below.
[ 3 ] This is the view from which Goethe could evolve nothing useful for his purpose. He had therefore to observe the phenomena himself. He went to Büttner in Jena who lent him the apparatus with which he could make the necessary experiments. He was occupied at the time with other work and was, at Büttner's request, about to return the apparatus. Before doing so, however, he took a prism in order to look through it at a white wall. He expected that it would appear in various degrees of colour, but it remained white. Colours only appeared at those places where the white contacted dark. The window-bars appeared in the most vivid colours. From these observations Goethe thought he had discovered that the Newtonian view was false, that colours are not contained in the white light. The boundary, the darkness, must have something to do with the origin of the colours. He continued the experiments. He observed white surfaces on black, black surfaces on white backgrounds. Gradually his own view was formed. A white disc on a black background appeared distorted on looking through the prism. Goethe thought that the upper parts of the disc extend over the adjacent black of the background, whereas this background extends over the lower parts of the disc. If one now looks through the prism one perceives the black background through the upper part of the disc as through a white veil. If one looks at the lower part of the disc it appears through the overlying darkness. Above, the light is spread over the dark; below, dark over light. The upper edge appears blue, the lower, yellow. The blue passes over into violet towards the black—the yellow into red below. If the prism is moved further from the disc the coloured edges spread out, the blue downwards, the yellow upwards. At a sufficient distance the yellow from below extends over the blue from above, and green arises from their overlapping in the middle. In confirmation of this view Goethe observed a black disc on a white ground through the prism. Now dark is spread over light above, light over dark below. Yellow appears above, blue below. As the edges are extended by placing the prism farther away from the disc, the lower blue, which gradually passes over into violet in the centre, spreads over the upper yellow and the yellow, as it extends, gradually takes on a reddish shade. The colour of peach-blossom arises in the middle. Goethe says to himself: what holds good for the white disc must also hold good for the black. “If the light is there resolved into colours here also the darkness must be regarded as being resolved into colours” (Confessions of the Author. Kürschner. Nat. Lit. Bd., 36.). Goethe now imparts his observations and the doubts which had grown out of them with regard to the Newtonian view to a Physicist of his acquaintance. The Physicist considered his doubts to be unfounded. He interpreted the coloured edges and the white in the centre, as well as its transition into green when the prism is removed further away from the object observed, according to Newton's view. Other Nature investigators whom Goethe approached did the same, and so he continued the observations in which he would have liked to have had assistance from trained specialists alone. He had a large prism of plate-glass constructed which he filled with pure water. He noticed that the glass prism whose cross-section is an equilateral triangle is, on account of the marked dispersion of the colours, often a hindrance to the observer; therefore he had his large prism constructed with the cross section of an isosceles triangle, the smallest angle of which was only 15 to 20 degrees. Goethe calls the experiments performed when the eye looks at an object through the prism, subjective. They present themselves to the eye but are not rooted in the outer world. He wants to add to these objective experiments. To this end he made use of the water-prism. The light shines through a prism and the colour-image is caught on a screen behind the prism. Goethe now caused the sunlight to pass through the openings in cut pasteboard. In this way he obtained an illuminated space bounded by darkness. This circumscribed beam of light passes through the prism and is refracted by this from its original direction. If one places a screen before the beam of light issuing from the prism, there arises on it an image which is, generally speaking, coloured at the edges above and below. If the prism is placed with the narrow end below, the upper edge of the image is coloured blue and the lower edge yellow. The blue passes over towards the dark space into violet, and towards the light centre into light blue; the yellow passes over towards the darkness into red. In this phenomenon, too, Goethe derived the appearance of colours from the boundary. Above, the clear light-beams radiate into the dark space; they illumine a darkness which thereby appears blue. Below, the dark space radiates into the light-beams; it darkens the light and makes it appear yellow. When the screen is moved further from the prism the coloured edges get broader, the yellow approaches the blue. Through the streaming of the blue into the yellow, when there is a sufficient distance between the screen and the prism, green appears in the middle of the image. Goethe made the instreaming of the light into the dark and of the dark into the light perceptible by agitating a cloud of fine white dust which he produced from fine, dry hair-powder along the line by which the light-beam passes through the dark space. “The more or less coloured phenomenon will now be caught up by the white atoms and presented in its whole length and breadth to the eye of the spectator” (Farbenlehre, Didactic Part., para. 326.). Goethe found that the view he had acquired of the subjective phenomena was confirmed by the objective phenomena. Colours are produced by the working together of light and darkness. The prism only serves to move light and darkness over each other.
[ 4 ] After these experiments Goethe cannot adopt the Newtonian conception. His attitude to it was the same as his attitude to Haller's Encasement Theory. Just as according to this theory the developed organism with all its parts is contained in the germ, so the Newtonians believe that the colours which appear under certain conditions in the light, are already contained in it; Goethe could use the same words against this belief which he used against the Encasement Theory, that it “is based on a mere invention, devoid of all element of sense experience, on an assumption which can never be demonstrated in the sense world” (Essay on K. Fr. Wolf. Kürschner. Nat. Lit., Bd. 33.). To Goethe colours are new formations which are developed in the light, not entities that have merely developed out of the light. He had to reject the Newtonian view because of his own mode of thinking in conformity with the idea. The Newtonian view has no knowledge of the nature of the idea. It only acknowledges what is actually present, present in the same sense as the sensible-perceptible. Where it cannot establish the reality through the senses it assumes the reality hypothetically. Because colours develop through the light, and thus must already be contained ideally within it, the Newtonians imagine that they are also actually and materially contained in it, and are only called forth by the prism and the dark border. Goethe knows, however, that idea is active in the sense-world; therefore he does not transfer what exists as idea into the realm of the actual. Idea works in inorganic just as in organic Nature, but not as sensible-supersensible form. Its external manifestation is wholly material, merely pertaining to the senses. It does not penetrate into the sensible; it does not permeate it spiritually. The processes of inorganic Nature run their course according to law, and this conformity to law presents itself to the observer as idea. If one perceives white light in one part of space and colours that arise through the light in another, a causal connection exists between the two perceptions and this can be conceived of as idea. When, however, this idea is given embodiment and transferred into space as something concrete which passes over from the object of the one perception into that of the other, this is the result of a crude mode of thinking. It was this crudeness that repelled Goethe from the Newtonian theory. It is the idea which leads over one inorganic process into another, not a concrete thing that passes from the one to the other.
[ 5 ] The Goethean world-conception can only acknowledge two sources for all knowledge of the inorganic processes of Nature: that which is sensibly perceptible in these processes and the ideal connections between the sensible-perceptible which reveal themselves to thought. The ideal connections within the sense-world are not all of the same kind. Some of these connections are immediately obvious when sense perceptions appear side by side, or after, each other, and there are others which can only be penetrated if one traces them back to others of the first kind. In the phenomenon which presents itself to the eye when it beholds darkness through light, perceiving blue, Goethe thinks he recognises a connection of the first kind between light, darkness and colour. It is just the same when light is perceived through darkness, and yellow arises. One can perceive in the border-phenomena of the spectrum a connection which becomes evident through direct observation. The spectrum which shows seven colours in a sequence from red to violet can only be understood by realising that other conditions are there as well as those which give rise to the border-phenomena. The single border-phenomena have united themselves in the spectrum into one complicated phenomenon which can only be understood if one deduces it from the basic phenomena. That which stands before the observer in the basic phenomenon in its purity, appears impure and modified in the phenomena complicated by the additional conditions. The simple facts can no longer be directly recognised. Therefore Goethe seeks everywhere to lead back the complicated phenomena to the simple and pure. To him the explanation of inorganic Nature lies in this. He goes no further back than the pure phenomenon. An ideal connection between sensible perceptions is revealed therein—a connection which is self-explanatory. Goethe calls this pure phenomenon the primary or basic phenomenon (Urphänomen). He regards it as idle speculation to think further about the primary phenomenon. “The magnet is a primary phenomenon which one need only express in order to explain it” (Prose Aphorisms. Kürschner. Nat. Lit. Bd., 36.). A compound phenomenon is explained when we show how it is built up out of primary phenomena.
[ 6 ] Modern natural science sets to work differently from Goethe. It seeks to trace back processes in the sense-world to movements of the smallest parts of bodies and in order to explain these movements it makes use of the same laws which it applies to the movements which transpire visibly in space. It is the task of mechanics to explain these visible movements. When the movement of a body is observed mechanics ask: By what forces has it been set in motion? What path does it travel in a definite time? What form has the line in which it moves? It tries to present mathematically the relations between the force, the path traversed, and the form of its path. The scientist says: Red light can be traced back to the vibratory motion of the tiniest parts of a body, and this motion is propagated through space. This motion becomes comprehensible when the laws discovered in mechanics are applied to it. The science of inorganic Nature considers its goal to be a gradual and complete passing over into applied mechanics.
[ 7 ] Modern physics enquires after the number of vibrations in unit time which correspond to a definite colour. From the number of vibrations corresponding to red, and from the number corresponding to violet, it seeks to determine the physical connection of the two colours. The qualitative disappears before its gaze; it observes the spatial and time elements of processes. Goethe asks: What is the connection between red and violet when we disregard these spatial and time elements and consider only the qualitative? The Goethean mode of observation presupposes that the qualitative is also actually present in the outer world, and that it forms, with the temporal and spatial, one inseparable whole. Modern physics, on the contrary, has to proceed from the basic conception that in the outer world only the quantitative, dark and colourless processes of motion are present, and that the qualitative only arises as the effect of the quantitative, on an organism endowed with sense and mind. If this assumption were correct, the ordered connections between the qualitative could not be sought in the outer world, but would have to be deduced from the nature of sense-organs, nervous mechanism, and organs of presentation. The qualitative elements of processes would not be the object of physical investigation but of physiology and psychology. Modern natural science proceeds along the lines of this assumption. According to this view the organism translates one process of movement into the sensation of red, another process into that of violet according to the constitution of its eyes, optic nerves and brain. The external aspect of the world of colour is thus explained if the connection between the processes of movement by which this world is determined have been perceived.
[ 8 ] A proof of this view is sought in the following observation. The optic nerve experiences each external impression as the sensation (Empfindung) of light. Not only light but also a blow or pressure on the eye, an irritation of the retina by a quick movement of the eye, an electric current conducted through the head—all these things give rise to the sensation of light. Another sense (organ) experiences the same stimuli in a different way. If blows, pressure, irritation, or electric currents stimulate the skin they cause sensations of touch. Electricity excites in the ear a sensation of hearing, on the tongue one of taste. It is concluded from this that the content of sensation arising in the organism as the result of an influence from outside differs from the external processes by which it is caused. The colour red is not sensed by the organism because it is united with a corresponding process of movement outside in space, but because the eye, optic nerve and brain of the organism are so constituted that they translate a colourless process of movement into a colour. The law expressing this was called by the physiologist, Johannes Müller, who first enunciated it, the Law of the Specific-Sense-Energies.
[ 9 ] This observation only proves that the sense-and mind-endowed organism can translate the most diverse impressions into the language of the particular senses on which they fall. This does not, however, prove that the content of each sense-experience exists only within the organism. Irritation of the optic nerve causes an indefinite, wholly general stimulus which contains nothing that causes us to localise its content outside in space. The sensation arising as the result of a real impression of light is, by its content, inseparably united with the spatial-time process corresponding to it. The movement of a body and its colour are in quite the same way contents of perception. When we conceive of the movement per se we are abstracting from all else which we perceive in the body. All the other mechanical and mathematical conceptions are, like the movement, drawn from the world of perception. Mathematics and mechanics arise as the result of one portion being separated off from the content of the perceptual world and studied by itself. In reality there are no objects or processes whose content is exhausted when we have comprehended in them all the elements that can be expressed through mathematics and mechanics. All that is mathematical and mechanical is bound up with colour, warmth, and other qualities. If physics has to assume that vibrations in space, of minute dimensions and a very high velocity correspond to the perception of a colour, these movements can only be thought of as analogous to the movements which go on visibly in space. That is to say, if the corporeal world is conceived of as in motion, even to its most minute elements, it must be conceived of as endowed with colour, warmth and other qualities also down to its most minute elements. Those who regard colours, warmth, tones and so on, as qualities which only exist inwardly as the effects of external processes on the sensitive (vorstellenden) organism, must also transfer everything mathematical and mechanical connected with these qualities to within. But then there is nothing left for the outer world. The red which I see, and the light vibrations which the physicist indicates as corresponding to this red, are in reality a unity, which only the abstracting intellect can separate from each other. I should see the vibrations in space which correspond to the quality “red” as movement if my eye were organised for this. But united with the movement I should have the impression of the red colour.
[ 10 ] Modern Natural Science transfers an unreal abstraction, a vibrating substratum devoid of all perceptual qualities into space, and is astonished that it cannot understand what causes the receptive (vorstellenden) organism with its nerve apparatus and brain to translate these indifferent processes of movement into the variegated sense-world, permeated by degrees of warmth and sounds. Du Bois-Reymond assumes, therefore, that man, because of an insuperable barrier to his knowledge, will never understand how the fact: “I taste something sweet, smell the fragrance of roses, hear the tone of the organ, see red” is connected with definite movements of the tiniest molecules in the brain—movements which in their turn are caused by vibrations of tasteless, odourless, soundless and colourless elements of the external corporeal world. “It is absolutely and eternally incomprehensible that it should not be a matter of indifference to a number of Carbon, Hydrogen, Nitrogen, Oxygen atoms how they are placed and move, how they were placed and moved and how they will be placed and will move” (Grenzen des Naturerkennens. Leipsig, 1882. S. 35.). But there are no boundaries to knowledge here. Wherever a collection of atoms exists in space in a definite movement, there also necessarily exists a definite quality (e.g. Red). And vice-versa, wherever red appears, there the movement must exist. Only the abstracting intellect can separate the one from the other. Those who think of the movement as actually separated from the remaining content of the process to which the movement belongs, cannot rediscover the transition from the one to the other.
[ 11 ] Only what is movement in a process can again be derived from movement; that which belongs to the qualitative aspect of the world of light and colours can also only be traced back to a qualitative element within the same sphere. Mechanics leads back complicated movements to simple movements which are directly comprehensible. The theory of colours must lead back complicated colour-phenomena to simple colour phenomena which can be penetrated in the same way. A simple process of movement is just as much a primary phenomenon as the appearance of yellow from the inter-working of light and dark. Goethe knows what the primary mechanical phenomena can accomplish towards the explanation of inorganic Nature. He leads back that which is not mechanical within the corporeal world to primary phenomena which are not of a mechanical nature. Goethe has been reproached with condemning the mechanical consideration of Nature and limiting himself simply to the observation and classification of the sensible-perceptible (Cp. Harnack's Goethe in der Epoche seiner Vollendung. S. 12.). Du Bois-Reymond (Goethe und kein Ende. S. 29) finds that “Goethe's theorising limits itself to deriving other phenomena out of a primary phenomenon, as he calls it. It is rather like one shadowy picture following another without any illuminating causal connection. What was wholly lacking in Goethe was the concept of mechanical causality.” What does mechanics do, however, but derive complicated processes from simple, primary phenomena? Goethe has accomplished in the region of colour just what mechanics perform in the realm of movement. It is because Goethe does not consider all processes in inorganic Nature to be purely mechanical that he has been accused of lacking the concept of mechanical causality. His accusers merely show that they themselves err concerning the significance of mechanical causality within the corporeal world. Goethe remains within the qualitative realm of the world of light and colours. He leaves to others the quantitative and mechanical elements which can be expressed mathematically. He “endeavoured throughout to keep the theory of colours apart from mathematics, although clearly, certain points arise where the assistance of the art of measurement would be desirable. But this very want may in the end be advantageous, since it may now become the business of the ingenious mathematician himself to ascertain where the doctrine of colours is in need of his aid and how he can contribute to the complete elucidation of this branch of physics” (Farbenlehre. S. 727.). The qualitative elements of the sense of sight—light, darkness and colours—must first be understood from out of their own connections. They must be traced back to primary phenomena; then at a higher level of thought it is possible to investigate the relation existing between these connections and the quantitative, the mechanical-mathematical element in the world of light and colours.
[ 12 ] Goethe seeks to lead back the connections within the qualitative element of the world of colours to the simplest elements, just as strictly as the mathematician or mechanician does in his sphere. “We have to learn from the mathematician the careful cautiousness with which he proceeds step by step, deducing each step from the preceding one and even where we employ no calculation, we must always proceed as if we had to render account to the strictest geometrician. For it is really the mathematical method which, on account of its cautiousness and purity, immediately reveals any gap in an assertion, and its proofs are in truth only detailed affirmations that what is brought into connection has already existed in its simple parts and its entire sequence, that its whole range has been examined and found to be correct and irrefutable under all conditions” (Kürschner. Nat. Lit. Bd., 34. Versuch als Vermittler vom Subjekt und Objekt.).
[ 13 ] Goethe derives the explanatory principles for the phenomena directly from the sphere of observation. He shows how the phenomena are connected within the world of experience. He rejects conceptions which lead out of and beyond the realm of observation. All modes of explanation that overstep the field of experience by drawing in factors which, by their very nature cannot be observed, are contrary to the Goethean world-conception. Such a mode of explanation is that which seeks the nature of light in a medium which cannot itself be perceived as such but can only be observed in its mode of working as light. To this category also belong the methods which hold sway in modern natural science, where light vibrations are executed, not by the perceptible qualities revealed to the sense of sight but by the smallest parts of an imperceptible substance. To imagine that a definite colour is united with a definite process of movement in space does not contradict the Goethean world-conception. But the assertion that this process of movement belongs to a region of reality transcending experience, i.e. the world of substance which can be observed in its effects, but not in its own being, contradicts it absolutely. For an adherent of the Goethean world-conception the light vibrations are processes in space and have no other kind of reality than that which inheres in any other content of perception. They elude immediate observation not because they lie beyond the region of experience, but because the organisation of the human sense-organs is not subtle enough to have direct perception of movements so minute. If an eye were so organised that it could observe in all details the oscillations of a body occurring four hundred billion times a second, such a process would resemble a process in the crude sense-world. That is to say, the vibrating body would manifest the same properties as other objects of perception.
[ 14 ] Any explanation which derives objects and processes of experience from others lying beyond the field of experience can only attain to adequate conceptions of the realm of reality, lying beyond observation, by borrowing certain attributes from the world of experience and carrying them over to what cannot be experienced. Thus the physicist carries over hardness and impenetrability to the tiniest corporeal elements to which he also ascribes the power of attracting and repelling similar elements; on the other hand he does not ascribe to these elements, colour, warmth and other qualities. He believes that he explains a process of Nature which can be experienced by tracing it back to one that is not capable of being experienced. According to Du Bois-Reymond's view the knowledge of Nature consists in tracing back processes in the corporeal world to movements of atoms brought about by their forces of attraction and repulsion (Grenzen des Naturerkennens. 1882. S. 10.). Matter, the substance filling space, is regarded as being endowed with movement. This substance has existed from eternity, and will exist for all eternity. Matter itself does not belong to the realm of observation but lies beyond it. Du Bois-Reymond, therefore, assumes that man is incapable of knowing the nature of matter as such, and that because of this he derives the processes of the corporeal world from something whose nature will always remain unknown to him. “We shall never know more than we do to-day as to what ‘haunts’ space where matter is” (Grenzen des Naturerkennens. S. 22.). This concept of matter dissolves into nothingness before a more exact consideration. The real content given to this concept is borrowed from the world of experience. Man perceives movements within the world of experience. He feels a pull if he holds a weight in the hand, and a pressure if he places a weight on the surface of the hand held horizontally. In order to explain this perception he forms the idea of force. He imagines that the Earth attracts the weight. The force itself cannot be perceived. Its nature is ideal, but it belongs, nevertheless, to the realm of observation. The mind observes it because it beholds the ideal relations among the perceptions. Man is led to the concept of a repelling force if he presses a piece of india-rubber and then leaves it to itself. It re-assumes its former shape and size. He imagines that the compressed parts of the rubber repel each other and again assume their former volume. The mode of thinking of which we have spoken carries over conceptions which have been drawn from observation to a region of reality transcending experience. Thus it does nothing in reality but derive one experience out of another, only it places the latter arbitrarily in a region lying beyond experience. It can be shown in regard to any mode of thought which speaks of a transcendental region that it takes certain fragments from the region of experience and relegates them to a sphere of reality transcending observation. If these fragments of experience are removed from the conception of the transcendental there only remains a concept devoid of content, a negation. The explanation of any experience can only consist in tracing it back to another possible experience. Ultimately we come to elements within experience that can no longer be derived from others. These cannot be further explained because they are in no need of explanation. They contain it within themselves. Their immediate being consists in what they present to observation. To Goethe light is an element of this kind. According to his view, whoever freely perceives light in manifestation has understood it. Colours arise in light and their origin is understood if we show how they arise therein. Light itself is there in immediate perception. We know what is ideally contained in it if we observe the connection that exists between it and colours. From the standpoint of Goethe's world-conception it is impossible to ask concerning the nature of light, concerning the transcendental element corresponding to the phenomenon “Light.” “It is really useless to undertake to express the essential nature of a thing; we perceive effects, and a complete history of these effects would in all cases comprise the nature of the thing.” That is to say, a complete account of the effects of an experience embraces all the phenomena which are ideally contained therein. “It would be useless to try to describe a man's character, but put together his actions, his deeds, and a picture of his character will stand before us. Colours are acts of light, its active and passive modifications. In this sense we may expect from them some illumination concerning light itself” (Farbenlehre. Didactic Part. Preface.).
[ 15 ] Light presents itself to observation as “the simplest and most homogeneous, undivided entity that we know” (Correspondence with Jacobi, p. 167.). Opposed to it there is darkness. For Goethe darkness is not the complete, passive absence of light. It is something active. It opposes itself to light and interplays with it. Modern natural science regards darkness as a complete nullity. The light which streams into a dark space has, according to this modern view, no opposition from the darkness to overcome. Goethe imagines that light and darkness are related to each other like the north and south poles of a magnet. Darkness can weaken the light in its power of action. Vice-versa, light can limit the energy of darkness. Colour arises in both cases. A physical view which conceives darkness as perfect passivity cannot speak of such an inter-working. It has therefore to derive colours out of light alone. Darkness appears as a phenomenon for observation just as does light. Darkness is a content of perception in the same sense as light. The one is merely the antithesis of the other. The eye which looks out into the night mediates the real perception of darkness. If darkness were the absolute void, there would be no perception on looking out into the dark.
[ 16 ] Yellow is light toned down by darkness; blue is darkness weakened by light.
[ 17 ] The eye is adapted for transmitting to the sensitive organism the phenomena of light and colour and the relations between them. It does not function passively in this connection, but enters into living interplay with the phenomena. Goethe endeavoured to cognise the manner of this inter-working. He considers the eye to be wholly living and seeks to understand the expressions of its life. How does the eye relate itself to the individual phenomenon? How does it relate itself to the connections between phenomena? These are questions which he puts to himself. Light and darkness, yellow and blue, are opposites. How does the eye experience these opposites? It must lie in the nature of the eye that it experiences the mutual relations which exist between the single perceptions. For “the eye has to thank the light for its existence. The light calls forth out of indifferent auxiliary animal organs, an organ that is akin to itself; the eye forms itself by the light for the light, so that the inner light can meet the external light” (Farbenlehre. Didactic Part. Introduction.).
[ 18 ] Just as light and darkness are mutually opposed to each other in external Nature, similarly the two states in which the eye is placed by these two phenomena are also opposed to each other. If we keep our eyes open in a dark space a certain lack is experienced. If, however, the eye is turned to a strongly illuminated white surface it becomes incapable, for a certain time, of distinguishing moderately illuminated objects. Looking into the dark increases its receptivity; looking into the light weakens it.
[ 19 ] Every impression on the eye remains within it for a time. When we look at a black window cross against a light background, we shall, when we shut our eyes, still have the phenomenon for some time before us. If while the impression still lasts, we look at a light grey surface, the cross appears light, the panes, on the contrary, dark. A reversal of the original phenomenon thus occurs. It follows from this that the eye has been disposed by the one impression to produce the opposite out of itself. As light and darkness stand in relation to each other in the outer world, so also do the corresponding states of the eye. Goethe thinks that the region in the eye on which the dark cross fell is rested and becomes receptive to a new impression. Therefore it is that the grey surface works more intensely on it than on the rest of the eye which previously received the stronger light from the window panes. Light produces in the eye the inclination to dark, dark the inclination to light. If we hold a dark object before a light-grey surface and look fixedly at the same place when it is removed, the space it occupied appears much lighter than the remaining surface. A grey object on a dark ground appears lighter than the same object on a light ground. The eye is disposed by the dark ground to see the object lighter, and by the light to see it darker. These phenomena are indications to Goethe of the great activity of the eye, “and to the passive resistance which all that is living is forced to exhibit when any definite state is presented to it. Thus inbreathing already presupposes outbreathing, and vice-versa. The eternal formula of life is also manifest here. When darkness is presented to the eye, the eye demands light; it demands darkness when light is presented to it and manifests thereby its vitality, its fitness to grasp the object by producing from itself something that is opposed to the object” (Farbenlehre. S. 38.).
[ 20 ] Colour perceptions also evoke a reaction in the eye in a similar way to light and darkness. Let us hold a small piece of yellow paper before a moderately illuminated white surface, and look fixedly at the small yellow patch. If after a little while the paper is removed, we shall see the space which the paper had occupied as violet. The impression of yellow causes the eye to produce violet from out of itself. Similarly, blue will produce orange as reaction, and red will produce green. Thus in the eye every colour impression has a living relation to another. The states into which the eye is put by perceptions stand in a connection similar to that of the contents of these perceptions in the external world.
[ 21 ] When light and darkness work on the eye this living organ meets them with its demands; if they work on things outside in space these interact with them. Empty space has the property of transparency. It does not work on light and darkness at all. They penetrate it unhindered. It is different when space is occupied with objects. This occupation of space may be of such a kind that the eye does not perceive it because light and darkness shine through it in their original form. Then we speak of transparent objects. If light and darkness do not pass through an object unweakened, the object is designated semi-transparent. The occupation of space by a semi-transparent medium furnishes the possibility for observing light and darkness in their mutual relation. Something bright seen through a semi-transparent medium appears yellow, and something dark, blue. The medium is a material substance which is illuminated by the light. It appears dark, compared with a clearer, more intense light behind it, and bright compared with a darkness passing through it. When a semi-transparent medium is thus presented to light or darkness, then brightness and darkness are present and really work into one another.
[ 22 ] If the transparency of the medium through which the light shines gradually decreases, the yellow assumes a yellowish-red hue and finally a ruby-red colour. If the transparency of a medium through which darkness penetrates increases, the blue passes over to indigo and finally to violet. Yellow and blue are primary colours. They arise through the working-together of light or darkness with the medium. Both can assume a reddish hue, the former through decrease, the latter through increase, in the transparency of the medium. Thus red is not a primary colour. It appears as a hue of yellow or blue. Yellow, with its red shades, which deepen to pure red, stands near to light; blue with its shades is allied to darkness. If blue and yellow mingle, green arises. If blue intensified to violet mixes with yellow deepened to red, purple arises.
[ 23 ] Goethe followed up these basic phenomena in Nature. The bright sun orb seen through a haze of semi-transparent vapour appears yellow. The darkness of space seen through atmospheric vapours illuminated by the day-light presents itself as the blue of heaven. “Similarly, the mountains appear blue to us; for when we behold them at so great a distance that we no longer distinguish the local colours, and no light from their surface works on our eye, they resemble so many dark objects, which owing to the interposed vapours appear blue” (Farbenlehre. Para. 156.).
[ 24 ] Out of his deep penetration into the works of Art produced by painters, there arose in Goethe the need to understand the laws which dominate the phenomena of the sense of sight. Every painting presented him with riddles. How is the chiaroscuro related to the colours? What relations do the single colours bear to each other? Why does yellow produce a joyful, and blue a serious mood? The Newtonian doctrine of colours could yield no point of view able to elucidate these mysteries. The Newtonian theory derives all colours out of light, places them side by side in sequence, and says nothing about their relation to darkness or of their living relations to each other. Goethe was able to solve the riddles presented to him by Art by the insight he had acquired along his own paths. Yellow must possess a bright, gay, mildly stimulating character because it is the colour nearest to light. It arises through the gentlest moderation of light. Blue indicates the darkness working in it. Therefore it produces a sense of coldness, just as it “is reminiscent of shadows.” Reddish-yellow arises through the intensification of yellow towards the side of darkness. Through this intensification its energy increases; the gaiety and brightness pass over into rapture. With the further intensification of reddish-yellow into yellowish-red, the gay, cheerful feeling is transformed into the impression of power. Violet is blue striving towards light. The repose and coldness of blue hereby change into unrest. This restless feeling increases in blue-red. Pure red stands in the centre between yellowish-red and bluish-red. The violence of the yellow quietens down; the passive repose of the blue is animated. Red gives the impression of ideal satisfaction, the equalising of extremes. A feeling of satisfaction also arises through green which is a mixture of yellow and blue. The satisfaction is purer here than that produced by red because the gaiety of the yellow is not intensified and the repose of the blue not disturbed through the red shade.
[ 25 ] The eye, when confronting one colour, immediately demands another. When the eye looks at yellow the longing arises for violet; when it perceives blue it desires orange; when it looks at red it yearns for green. It is comprehensible that the feeling of satisfaction should arise, if by the side of one colour presented to the eye there is placed another which the eye desires in accordance with its nature. The law of colour harmony is an outcome of the nature of the eye. Colours which the eye demands in juxtaposition to each other work harmoniously. If two colours appear side by side, the one of which does not demand the other, then the eye is stimulated into opposition. The juxtaposition of yellow and purple has something one-sided about it, but the effect is that of brightness and magnificence. The eye demands violet by the side of yellow in order to express itself according to its nature. If purple appears in the place of violet the object asserts its claims against those of the eye. It does not accommodate itself to the demands of the organ. Juxtapositions of this kind serve to draw attention to the significance of things. They will not satisfy unconditionally but they characterise. Characteristic combinations of this kind demand colours which do not stand in complete contrast to each other, and yet do not merge directly into each other. Juxtapositions of the latter kind impart a kind of characterless element to the objects on which they occur.
[ 26 ] The origin and nature of the phenomena of light and colour were revealed to Goethe in Nature. He found the same thing again in the creations of painters, where it is raised to a higher level, translated into the spiritual. Goethe acquired a deep insight into the relation of Nature and Art as the result of his observations concerning the perceptions of sight. This may well have been in his mind when, after the conclusion of the Doctrine of Colour, he wrote concerning these observations to Frau von Stein: “I do not regret having sacrificed so much time to them. I have thereby attained an education which I could hardly have got elsewhere.”
[ 27 ] Goethe's doctrine of colour differs from that of Newton and of those physicists who build up their views on the basis of Newton's ideas, because it proceeds from a different conception of the world. Those who do not bear in mind the connection that has here been demonstrated between Goethe's general ideas of Nature and his doctrine of colour will be unable to hold any other opinion than that Goethe came to his view of colour because he had no understanding for the physicists' true methods of observation. Those who perceive this connection will also realise that within the Goethean world-conception no other doctrine of colour is possible. Goethe would have been unable to think differently about the nature of the phenomena of colour, even if all the discoveries made in this sphere since his time had been laid before him, and even if he had been able to make use of the experimental methods in their present perfection. Although he could not embody Frauenhof's lines wholly into his conception of Nature after he had become aware of their discovery, neither this nor any other discovery in the realm of optics is an objection to his conceptions. In all these things it is merely a question of so elaborating Goethe's view that these phenomena can find their place in it. It must be admitted that physicists who adhere to the Newtonian point of view can make nothing of Goethe's views of colour. That is not because they possess knowledge of phenomena which contradict Goethe's conception, but because they have grown accustomed to a view of Nature which prevents them from understanding the real aim and object of Goethe's view.
Die Erscheinungen der Farbenwelt
[ 1 ] Goethe wird durch die Empfindung, daß «die hohen Kunstwerke von Menschen nach wahren und natürlichen Gesetzen hervorgebracht» sind, fortwährend angeregt, diese wahren und natürlichen Gesetze des künstlerischen Schaffens aufzusuchen. Er ist überzeugt, die Wirkung eines Kunstwerkes müsse darauf beruhen, daß aus demselben eine natürliche Gesetzmäßigkeit herausleuchtet. Er will diese Gesetzmäßigkeit erkennen. Er will wissen, aus welchem Grunde die höchsten Kunstwerke zugleich die höchsten Naturwerke sind. Es wird ihm klar, daß die Griechen nach eben den Gesetzen verfuhren, nach denen die Natur verfährt, als sie «aus der menschlichen Gestalt den Kreis göttlicher Bildung» entwickelten (Italienische Reise, 28. Januar 1787). Er will sehen, wie die Natur diese Bildung zustande bringt, um sie in den Kunstwerken verstehen zu können. Goethe schildert, wie es ihm in Italien allmählich gelungen ist, zu einer Einsicht in die natürliche Gesetzmäßigkeit des künstlerischen Schaffens zu kommen (vgl. «Konfession des Verfassers», Kürschner, Band 36). «Zum Glück konnte ich mich an einigen von der Poesie herübergebrachten, mir durch inneres Gefühl und langen Gebrauch bewährten Maximen festhalten, so daß es mir zwar schwer, aber nicht unmöglich ward, durch ununterbrochenes Anschauen der Natur und Kunst, durch lebendiges wirksames Gespräch mit mehr oder weniger einsichtigen Kennern, durch stetes Leben mit mehr oder weniger praktischen oder denkenden Künstlern, nach und nach mir die Kunst überhaupt einzuteilen, ohne sie zu zerstückeln, und ihre verschiedenen, lebendig ineinander greifenden Elemente gewahr zu werden.» Nur ein einziges Element will ihm nicht die natürlichen Gesetze offenbaren, nach denen es im Kunstwerke wirkt: das Kolorit. Mehrere Gemälde werden «in seiner Gegenwart erfunden und komponiert, die Teile, der Stellung und der Form nach, sorgfältig durchstudiert». Die Künstler können ihm Rechenschaft geben, wie sie bei der Komposition verfahren. Sobald aber die Rede aufs Kolorit kommt, da scheint alles von der Willkür abzuhängen. Niemand weiß, welcher Bezug zwischen Farbe und Helldunkel, und zwischen den einzelnen Farben herrscht. Worauf es beruht, daß Gelb einen warmen und behaglichen Eindruck macht, Blau die Empfindung der Kälte hervorruft, daß Gelb und Rotblau nebeneinander eine harmonische Wirkung hervorbringen, darüber kann Goethe keinen Aufschluß gewinnen. Er sieht ein, daß er sich mit der Gesetzmäßigkeit der Farbenwelt in der Natur erst bekannt machen muß, um von da aus in die Geheimnisse des Kolorits einzudringen.
[ 2 ] Weder die Begriffe über die physische Natur der Farbenerscheinungen, die Goethe von seiner Studienzeit her noch im Gedächtnis hatte, noch die physikalischen Kompendien, die er um Rat fragte, erwiesen sich für seinen Zweck als fruchtbar. «Wie alle Welt war ich überzeugt, daß die sämtlichen Farben im Licht enthalten seien; nie war es mir anders gesagt worden und niemals hatte ich die geringste Ursache gefunden, daran zu zweifeln, weil ich bei der Sache nicht weiter interessiert war» («Konfession des Verfassers », Kürschner, Band 36/2). Als er aber anfing, interessiert zu sein, da fand er, daß er aus dieser Ansicht nichts für seinen Zweck entwickeln konnte. Der Begründer dieser Ansicht, die Goethe bei den Naturforschern herrschend fand und die heute noch dieselbe Stellung einnimmt, ist Newton. Sie behauptet, das weiße Licht, wie es von der Sonne ausgeht, ist aus farbigen Lichtern zusammengesetzt. Die Farben entstehen dadurch, daß die einzelnen Bestandteile aus dem weißen Lichte ausgesondert werden. Läßt man durch eine kleine runde Öffnung Sonnenlicht in ein dunkles Zimmer treten, und fängt es auf einem weißen Schirme, der senkrecht gegen die Richtung des einfallenden Lichtes gestellt wird, aut., so erhält man ein weißes Sonnenbild. Stellt man zwischen die Öffnung und den Schirm ein Glasprisma, durch welches das Licht durchstrahlt, so verändert sich das weiße runde Sonnenbild. Es erscheint verschoben, in die Länge gezogen und farbig. Man nennt dieses Bild Sonnenspektrum. Bringt man das Prisma so an, daß die oberen Partien des Lichtes einen kürzeren Weg innerhalb der Glasmasse zurückzulegen haben als die unteren, so ist das farbige Bild nach unten verschoben. Der obere Rand des Bildes ist rot, der untere violett; das Rote geht nach unten in Gelb, das Violette nach oben in Blau über; die mittlere Partie des Bildes ist im allgemeinen weiß. Nur bei einer gewissen Entfernung des Schirmes vom Prisma verschwindet das Weiße in der Mitte vollständig; das ganze Bild erscheint farbig, und zwar von oben nach unten in der Folge: rot, orange, gelb, grün, hellblau, indigo, violett. Aus diesem Versuche schließen Newton und seine Anhänger, daß die Farben ursprünglich in dem weißen Lichte enthalten seien, aber miteinander vermischt. Durch das Prisma werden sie voneinander gesondert. Sie haben die Eigenschaft, beim Durchgange durch einen durchsichtigen Körper verschieden stark von ihrer Richtung abgelenkt, das heißt gebrochen zu werden. Das rote Licht wird am wenigsten, das violette am meisten gebrochen. Nach der Stufenfolge ihrer Brechbarkeit erscheinen sie im Spektrum. Betrachtet man einen schmalen Papierstreifen auf schwarzem Grunde durch das Prisma, so erscheint derselbe ebenfalls abgelenkt. Er ist zugleich breiter und an seinen Rändern farbig. Der obere Rand erscheint violett, der untere rot; das Violette geht auch hier ins Blaue, das Rote ins Gelbe über; die Mitte ist im allgemeinen weiß. Nur bei einer gewissen Entfernung des Prismas von dem Streifen erscheint dieser ganz farbig. In der Mitte erscheint wieder das Grün. Auch hier soll das Weiße des Papierstreifens in seine farbigen Bestandteile zerlegt sein. Daß nur bei einer gewissen Entfernung des Schirmes oder Streifens vom Prisma alle Farben erscheinen, während sonst die Mitte weiß ist, erklären die Newtonianer einfach. Sie sagen: in der Mitte fallen die stärker abgelenkten Lichter vom oberen Teil des Bildes mit den schwächer abgelenkten vom unteren zusammen und vermischen sich zu Weiß. Nur an den Rändern erscheinen die Farben, weil hier in die am schwächsten abgelenkten Lichtteile keine stärker abgelenkten von oben und in die am stärksten abgelenkten keine schwächer abgelenkten von unten hineinfallen können.
[ 3 ] Dies ist die Ansicht, aus der Goethe für seinen Zweck nichts entwickeln kann. Er will deshalb die Erscheinungen selbst beobachten. Er wendet sich an Hofrat Büttner in Jena, der ihm die Apparate leihweise überläßt, mit denen er die nötigen Versuche anstellen kann. Er ist zunächst mit anderen Arbeiten beschäftigt und will, auf Büttners Drängen, die Apparate wieder zurückgeben. Vorher nimmt er doch noch ein Prisma zur Hand, um durch dasselbe auf eine völlig geweißte Wand zu sehen. Er erwartet, daß sie in verschiedenen Stufen gefärbt erscheine. Aber sie bleibt weiß. Nur an den Stellen, wo das Weiße an Dunkles stößt, treten Farben auf. Die Fensterstäbe erscheinen in den allerlebhaftesten Farben. Aus diesen Beobachtungen glaubt Goethe zu erkennen, daß die Newtonsche Anschauung falsch sei, daß die Farben nicht im weißen Lichte enthalten seien. Die Grenze, das Dunkle, müsse mit der Entstehung der Farben etwas zu tun haben. Er setzt die Versuche fort. Weiße Flächen auf schwarzem und schwarze Flächen auf weißem Grunde werden betrachtet. Allmählich bildet er sich eine eigene Ansicht. Eine weiße Scheibe auf schwarzem Grunde erscheint beim Durchblicken durch das Prisma verschoben. Die oberen Partien der Scheibe, meint Goethe, schieben sich über das angrenzende Schwarz des Untergrundes; während sich dieser Untergrund über die unteren Partien der Scheibe hinzieht. Sieht man nun durch das Prisma, so erblickt man durch den oberen Scheibenteil den schwarzen Grund wie durch einen weißen Schleier. Besieht man sich den unteren Teil der Scheibe, so scheint dieser durch das übergelagerte Dunkel hindurch. Oben wird ein Helles über ein Dunkles geführt; unten ein Dunkles über ein Helles. Der obere Rand erscheint blau, der untere gelb. Das Blau geht gegen das Schwarze zu in Violett; das Gelbe nach unten in ein Rot über. Wird das Prisma von der beobachteten Scheibe entfernt, so verbreitern sich die farbigen Ränder; das Blau nach unten, das Gelb nach oben. Bei hinreichender Entfernung greift das Gelb von unten über das Blau von oben; durch das Übereinandergreifen entsteht in der Mitte Grün. Zur Bestätigung dieser Ansicht betrachtet Goethe eine schwarze Scheibe auf weißem Grunde durch das Prisma. Nun wird oben ein Dunkles über ein Helles, unten ein Helles über ein Dunkles geführt. Oben erscheint Gelb, unten Blau. Bei Verbreiterung der Ränder durch Entfernung des Prismas von der Scheibe wird das untere Blau, das allmählich gegen die Mitte zu in Violett übergeht, über das obere Gelb, das in seiner Verbreiterung nach und nach einen roten Ton erhält, geführt. Es entsteht in der Mitte Pfirsichblüt. Goethe sagte sich: was für die weiße Scheibe richtig ist, muß auch für die schwarze gelten. «Wenn sich dort das Licht in so vielerlei Farben auflöst... so müßte ja hier auch die Finsternis als in Farben aufgelöst angesehen werden.» («Konfession des Verfassers »,Kürschner, Band 36/2.) Goethe teilt nun seine Beobachtungen und die Bedenken, die ihm daraus gegen die Newtonsche Anschauung erwachsen sind, einem ihm bekannten Physiker mit. Dieser erklärt die Bedenken für unbegründet. Er leitete die farbigen Ränder und das Weiße in der Mitte, sowie dessen Übergang in Grün, bei gehöriger Entfernung des Prismas von dem beobachteten Objekt, im Sinne der Newtonschen Ansicht ab. Ähnlich verhalten sich andere Naturforscher, denen Goethe die Sache vorlegt. Er setzt die Beobachtungen, für die er gerne Beihilfe von kundigen Fachleuten gehabt hätte, allein fort. Er läßt ein großes Prisma aus Spiegelscheiben zusammensetzen, das er mit reinem Wasser anfüllt. Weil er bemerkt, daß die gläsernen Prismen, deren Querschnitt ein gleichseitiges Dreieck ist, wegen der starken Verbreiterung der Farbenerscheinung dem Beobachter oft hinderlich sind, läßt er seinem großen Prisma den Querschnitt eines gleichschenkeligen Dreieckes geben, dessen kleinster Winkel nur fünfzehn bis zwanzig Grade groß ist. Die Versuche, welche in der Weise angestellt werden, daß das Auge durch das Prisma auf einen Gegenstand blickt, nennt Goethe subjektiv. Sie stellen sich dem Auge dar, sind aber nicht in der Außenwelt fixiert. Er will zu diesen noch objektive hinzufügen. Dazu bedient er sich des Wasserprismas. Das Licht scheint durch ein Prisma durch, und hinter dem Prisma wird das Farbenbild auf einem Schirme aufgefangen. Goethe läßt nun das Sonnenlicht durch die Öffnungen ausgeschnittener Pappen hindurchgehen. Er erhält dadurch einen erleuchteten Raum, der ringsherum von Dunkelheit begrenzt ist. Diese begrenzte Lichtmasse geht durch das Prisma und wird durch dasselbe von ihrer Richtung abgelenkt. Hält man der aus dem Prisma kommenden Lichtmasse einen Schirm entgegen, so entsteht auf demselben ein Bild, das im allgemeinen an den Rändern oben und unten gefärbt ist. Ist das Prisma so gestellt, daß sein Querschnitt von oben nach unten schmäler wird, so ist der obere Rand des Bildes blau, der untere gelb gefärbt. Das Blau geht gegen den dunklen Raum in Violett, gegen die helle Mitte zu in Hellblau über; das Gelbe gegen die Dunkelheit zu in Rot. Auch bei dieser Erscheinung leitet Goethe die Farbenerscheinung von der Grenze her. Oben strahlt die helle Lichtmasse in den dunklen Raum hinein; sie erhellt ein Dunkles, das dadurch blau erscheint. Unten strahlt der dunkle Raum in die Lichtmasse hinein; er verdunkelt ein Helles und läßt es gelb erscheinen. Durch Entfernung des Schirmes von dem Prisma werden die Farbenränder breiter, das Gelbe nähert sich dem Blauen. Durch Einstrahlung des Blauen in das Gelbe erscheint bei hinlänglicher Entfernung des Schirmes vom Prisma in der Mitte des Bildes Grün. Goethe macht sich das Hineinstrahlen des Hellen in das Dunkle und des Dunklen in das Helle dadurch anschaulich, daß er in der Linie, in welcher die Lichtmasse durch den dunklen Raum geht, eine weiße feine Staubwolke erregt, die er durch feinen trockenen Haarpuder hervorbringt. «Die mehr oder weniger gefärbte Erscheinung wird nun durch die weißen Atome aufgefangen und dem Auge in ihrer ganzen Breite und Länge dargestellt.» (Farbenlehre, didaktischer Teil § 326.) Goethe findet seine Ansicht, die er an den subjektiven Erscheinungen gewonnen, durch die objektiven bestätigt. Die Farben werden durch das Zusammenwirken von Hell und Dunkel hervorgebracht. Das Prisma dient nur dazu, Hell und Dunkel übereinander zu schieben.
[ 4 ] Goethe kann, nachdem er diese Versuche gemacht hat, die Newtonische Ansicht nicht zu der seinigen machen. Es geht ihm mit ihr ähnlich, wie mit der Hallerschen Einschachtelungslehre. Wie diese den ausgebildeten Organismus bereits mit allen seinen Teilen im Keime enthalten denkt, so glauben die Newtonianer, daß die Farben, die unter gewissen Bedingungen am Lichte erscheinen, in diesem schon eingeschlossen seien. Er könnte gegen diesen Glauben dieselben Worte gebrauchen, die er der Einschachtelungslehre entgegengehalten hat, sie «beruhe auf einer bloßen außersinnlichen Einbildung, auf einer Annahme, die man zu denken glaubt, aber in der Sinnenwelt niemals darstellen kann.» Vgl. den Aufsatz über K. Fr. Wolff, Kürschner, Band 33.) Ihm sind die Farben Neubildungen, die an dem Lichte entwickelt werden, nicht Wesenheiten, die aus dem Lichte bloß ausgewickelt werden. Wegen seiner «der Idee gemäßen Denkweise» muß er die Newtonsche Ansicht ablehnen. Diese kennt das Wesen des Ideellen nicht. Nur was tatsächlich vorhanden ist, erkennt sie an. Was in derselben Weise vorhanden ist wie das Sinnlich-Wahrnehmbare. Und wo sie die Tatsächlichkeit nicht durch die Sinne nachweisen kann, da nimmt sie dieselbe hypothetisch an. Weil am Lichte die Farben sich entwickeln, also der Idee nach schon in demselben enthalten sein müssen, glaubt sie, sie seien auch tatsächlich, materiell in demselben enthalten und werden durch das Prisma und die dunkle Umgrenzung nur hervorgeholt. Goethe weiß, daß die Idee in der Sinnenwelt wirksam ist; deshalb versetzt er etwas, was als Idee vorhanden ist, nicht in den Bereich des Tatsächlichen. In der unorganischen Natur wirkt das Ideelle ebenso wie in der organischen, nur nicht als sinnlich-übersinnliche Form. Seine äußere Erscheinung ist ganz materiell, bloß sinnlich. Es dringt nicht ein in das Sinnliche; es durchgeistigt dieses nicht. Die Vorgänge der unorganischen Natur verlaufen gesetzmäßig, und diese Gesetzmäßigkeit stellt sich dem Beobachter als Idee dar. Wenn man an einer Stelle des Raumes weißes Licht und an einer andern Farben wahrnimmt, die an demselben entstehen, so besteht zwischen den beiden Wahrnehmungen ein gesetzmäßiger Zusammenhang, der als Idee vorgestellt werden kann. Wenn aber jemand diese Idee verkörperlicht und als Tatsächliches in den Raum hinaus versetzt, das von dem Gegenstande der einen Wahrnehmung in den der andern hinüberzieht, so entspringt das aus einer grobsinnlichen Vorstellungsweise. Dieses Grobsinnliche ist es, was Goethe von der Newtonschen Anschauung zurückstößt. Die Idee ist es, die einen unorganischen Vorgang in den andern hinüberleitet, nicht ein Tatsächliches, das von dem einen zu dem andern wandert.
[ 5 ] Die Goethesche Weltanschauung kann nur zwei Quellen für alle Erkenntnis der unorganischen Naturvorgänge anerkennen: dasjenige, was an diesen Vorgängen sinnlich wahrnehmbar ist, und die ideellen Zusammenhänge des Sinnlich-Wahrnehmbaren, die sich dem Denken offenbaren. Die ideellen Zusammenhänge innerhalb der Sinneswelt sind nicht gleicher Art. Es gibt solche, die unmittelbar einleuchtend sind, wenn sinnliche Wahrnehmungen nebeneinander oder nacheinander auftreten, und andere, die man erst durchschauen kann, wenn man sie auf solche der ersten Art zurückführt. In der Erscheinung, die sich dem Auge darbietet, wenn es ein Dunkles durch ein Helles ansieht und Blau wahrnimmt, glaubt Goethe einen Zusammenhang der ersten Art zwischen Licht, Finsternis und Farbe zu erkennen. Ebenso ist es, wenn Helles durch ein Dunkles angeschaut, gelb ergibt. Die Randerscheinungen des Spektrums lassen einen Zusammenhang erkennen, der durch unmittelbares Beobachten klar wird. Das Spektrum, das in einer Stufenfolge sieben Farben vom Rot bis zum Violett zeigt, kann nur verstanden werden, wenn man sieht, wie zu den Bedingungen, durch welche die Randerscheinungen entstehen, andere hinzugefügt werden. Die einfachen Randerscheinungen haben sich in dem Spektrum zu einem komplizierten Phänomen verbunden, das nur verstanden werden kann, wenn man es aus den Grunderscheinungen ableitet. Was in dem Grundphänomen in seiner Reinheit vor dem Beobachter steht, das erscheint in dem komplizierten, durch die hinzugefügten Bedingungen, unrein, modifiziert. Die einfachen Tatbestände sind nicht mehr unmittelbar zu erkennen. Goethe sucht daher die komplizierten Phänomene überall auf die einfachen, reinen zurückzuführen. In dieser Zurückführung sieht er die Erklärung der unorganischen Natur. Vom reinen Phänomen geht er nicht mehr weiter. In demselben offenbart sich ein ideeller Zusammenhang sinnlicher Wahrnehmungen, der sich durch sich selbst erklärt. Das reine Phänomen nennt Goethe Urphänomen. Er sieht es als mäßige Spekulation an, über das Urphänomen weiter nachzudenken. «Der Magnet ist ein Urphänomen, das man nur aussprechen darf, um es erklärt zu haben.» (Sprüche in Prosa, Kürschner, Band 36.) Ein zusammengesetztes Phänomen wird erklärt, wenn man zeigt, wie es sich aus Urphänomenen aufbaut.
[ 6 ] Die moderne Naturwissenschaft verfährt anders als Goethe. Sie will die Vorgänge in der Sinnenwelt auf Bewegungen kleinster Körperteile zurückführen und bedient sich zur Erklärung dieser Bewegungen derselben Gesetze, durch die sie die Bewegungen begreift, die sichtbar im Raume vor sich gehen. Diese sichtbaren Bewegungen zu erklären, ist Aufgabe der Mechanik. Wird die Bewegung eines Körpers beobachtet, so fragt die Mechanik: Durch welche Kraft ist er in Bewegung versetzt worden; welchen Weg legt er in einer bestimmten Zeit zurück; welche Form hat die Linie, in der er sich bewegt usw. Die Beziehungen der Kraft, des zurückgelegten Weges, der Form der Bahn sucht sie mathematisch darzustellen. Nun sagt der Naturforscher: Das rote Licht kann auf eine schwingende Bewegung kleinster Körperteile zurückgeführt werden, die sich im Raume fortpflanzt. Begriffen wird diese Bewegung dadurch, daß man die in der Mechanik gewonnenen Gesetze auf sie anwendet. Die Wissenschaft der unorganischen Natur betrachtet es als ihr Ziel, allmählich vollständig in angewandte Mechanik überzugehen.
[ 7 ] Die moderne Physik fragt nach der Anzahl der Schwingungen in der Zeiteinheit, welche einer bestimmten Farbenqualität entsprechen. Aus der Anzahl der Schwingungen, die dem Rot entsprechen und aus derjenigen, welche dem Violett entsprechen, sucht sie den physikalischen Zusammenhang der beiden Farben zu bestimmen. Vor ihren Blicken verschwindet das Qualitative; sie betrachtet das Räumliche und Zeitliche der Vorgänge. Goethe fragt: Welcher Zusammenhang besteht zwischen Rot und Violett, wenn man vom Räumlichen und Zeitlichen absieht und bloß das Qualitative der Farben betrachtet. Die Goethesche Betrachtungsweise hat zur Voraussetzung, daß das Qualitative wirklich auch in der Außenwelt vorhanden ist und mit dem Zeitlichen und Räumlichen ein untrennbares Ganzes ist. Die moderne Physik muß dagegen von der Grundanschauung ausgehen, daß in der Außenwelt nur Quantitatives, licht- und farblose Bewegungsvorgänge vorhanden seien, und daß alles Qualitative erst als Wirkung des Quantitativen auf den sinn- und geistbegabten Organismus entstehe. Wäre diese Annahme richtig, dann könnten die gesetzmäßigen Zusammenhänge des Qualitativen auch nicht in der Außenwelt gesucht, sie mußten aus dem Wesen der Sinneswerkzeuge, des Nervenapparates und des Vorstellungsorganes abgeleitet werden. Die qualitativen Elemente der Vorgänge wären dann nicht Gegenstand der physikalischen Untersuchung, sondern der physiologischen und psychologischen. Dieser Voraussetzung gemäß verfährt die moderne Naturwissenschaft. Der Organismus übersetzt, nach ihrer Ansicht, entsprechend der Einrichtung seiner Augen, seines Sehnervs und seines Gehirns einen Bewegungsvorgang in die Empfindung des Rot, einen andern in die des Violett. Daher ist alles Äußere der Farbenwelt erklärt, wenn man den Zusammenhang der Bewegungsvorgänge durchschaut hat, von denen diese Welt bestimmt wird.
[ 8 ] Ein Beweis für diese Ansicht wird in folgender Beobachtung gesucht. Der Sehnerv empfindet jeden äußeren Eindruck als Lichtempfindung. Nicht nur Licht, sondern auch ein Stoß oder Druck auf das Auge, eine Zerrung der Netzhaut bei schneller Bewegung des Auges, ein elektrischer Strom, der durch den Kopf geleitet wird: das alles bewirkt Lichtempfindung. Dieselben Dinge empfindet ein anderer Sinn in anderer Weise. Stoß, Druck, Zerrung, elektrischer Strom bewirken, wenn sie die Haut erregen, Tastempfindungen. Elektrizität erregt im Ohr eine Gehör-, auf der Zunge eine Geschmacksempfindung. Daraus schließt man, daß der Empfindungsinhalt, der im Organismus durch eine Einwirkung von außen auftritt, verschieden ist von dem äußeren Vorgange, durch den er veranlaßt wird. Die rote Farbe wird von dem Organismus nicht empfunden, weil sie an einen entsprechenden Bewegungsvorgang draußen im Raume gebunden ist, sondern weil Auge, Sehnerv und Gehirn des Organismus so eingerichtet sind, daß sie einen farblosen Bewegungsvorgang in eine Farbe übersetzen. Das hiermit ausgesprochene Gesetz wurde von dem Physiologen Johannes Müller, der es zuerst aufgestellt hat, das Gesetz der spezifischen Sinnesenergien genannt.
[ 9 ] Die angeführte Beobachtung beweist nur, daß der sinn- und geistbegabte Organismus die verschiedenartigsten Eindrücke in die Sprache der Sinne übersetzen kann, auf die sie ausgeübt werden. Nicht aber, daß der Inhalt jeder Sinnesempfindung auch nur im Innern des Organismus vorhanden ist. Bei einer Zerrung des Sehnervs entsteht eine unbestimmte, ganz allgemeine Erregung, die nichts enthält, was veranlaßt, ihren Inhalt in den Raum hinaus zu versetzen. Eine Empfindung, die durch einen wirklichen Lichteindruck entsteht, ist inhaltlich unzertrennlich verbunden mit dem Räumlich-Zeitlichen, das ihr entspricht. Die Bewegung eines Körpers und seine Farbe sind auf ganz gleiche Weise Wahmehmungsinhalt. Wenn man die Bewegung für sich vorstellt, so abstrahiert man von dem, was man noch sonst an dem Körper wahrnimmt. Wie die Bewegung, so sind alle übrigen mechanischen und mathematischen Vorstellungen der Wahrnehmungswelt entnommen. Mathematik und Mechanik entstehen dadurch, daß von dem Inhalte der Wahrnehmungswelt ein Teil ausgesondert und für sich betrachtet wird. In der Wirklichkeit gibt es keine Gegenstände oder Vorgänge, deren Inhalt erschöpft ist, wenn man das an ihnen begriffen hat, was durch Mathematik und Mechanik auszudrücken ist. Alles Mathematische und Mechanische ist an Farbe, Wärme und andere Qualitäten gebunden. Wenn der Physik nötig ist, anzunehmen, daß der Wahrnehmung einer Farbe Schwingungen im Raume entsprechen, denen eine sehr kleine Ausdehnung und eine sehr große Geschwindigkeit eigen ist, so können diese Bewegungen nur analog den Bewegungen gedacht werden, die sichtbar im Raume vorgehen. Das heißt, wenn die Körperwelt bis in ihre kleinsten Elemente bewegt gedacht wird, so muß sie auch bis in ihre kleinsten Elemente hinein mit Farbe, Wärme und andern Eigenschaften ausgestattet vorgestellt werden. Wer Farben, Wärme, Töne usw. als Qualitäten auffaßt, die als Wirkungen äußerer Vorgänge durch den vorstellenden Organismus nur im Innern desselben existieren, der muß auch alles Mathematische und Mechanische, das mit diesen Qualitäten zusammenhängt, in dieses Innere verlegen. Dann aber bleibt ihm für seine Außenwelt nichts mehr übrig. Das Rot, das ich sehe, und die Lichtschwingungen die der Physiker als diesem Rot entsprechend nachweist, sind in Wirklichkeit eine Einheit, die nur der abstrahierende Verstand voneinander trennen kann. Die Schwingungen im Raume, die der Qualität «Rot» entsprechen, würde ich als Bewegung sehen, wenn mein Auge dazu organisiert wäre. Aber ich würde verbunden mit der Bewegung den Eindruck der roten Farbe haben.
[ 10 ] Die moderne Naturwissenschaft versetzt ein unwirkliches Abstraktum, ein aller Empfindungsqualitäten entkleidetes, schwingendes Substrat in den Raum und wundert sich, daß nicht begriffen werden kann, was den vorstellenden mit Nervenapparaten und Gehirn ausgestatteten Organismus veranlassen kann, diese gleichgültigen Bewegungsvorgänge in die bunte, von Wärmegraden und Tönen durchsetzte Sinnenwelt zu übersetzen. Du Bois-Reymond nimmt deshalb an, daß der Mensch wegen einer unüberschreitbaren Grenze seines Erkennens nie verstehen werde, wie die Tatsache: «ich schmecke Süßes, rieche Rosenduft, höre Orgelton, sehe Rot», zusammenhängt mit bestimmten Bewegungen kleinster Körperteile im Gehirn, welche Bewegungen wieder veranlaßt werden durch die Schwingungen der geschmack-, geruch-, ton- und farbenlosen Elemente der äußeren Körperwelt. «Es ist eben durchaus und für immer unbegreiflich, daß es einer Anzahl von Kohlenstoff-, Wasserstoff-, Stickstoff-, Sauerstoff- usw. Atomen nicht sollte gleichgültig sein, wie sie liegen und sich bewegen, wie sie lagen und sich bewegten, wie sie liegen und sich bewegen werden.» («Grenzen des Naturerkennens», Leipzig 1882, S.33f.) Es liegt aber hier durchaus keine Erkenntnisgrenze vor. Wo im Raume eine Anzahl von Atomen in einer bestimmten Bewegung ist, da ist notwendig auch eine bestimmte Qualität (z.B. Rot) vorhanden. Und umgekehrt, wo Rot auftritt, da muß die Bewegung vorhanden sein. Nur das abstrahierende Denken kann das eine von dem andern trennen. Wer die Bewegung von dem übrigen Inhalte des Vorganges, zu dem die Bewegung gehört, in der Wirklichkeit abgetrennt denkt, der kann den Übergang von dem einen zu dem andern nicht wieder finden.
[ 11 ] Nur was an einem Vorgang Bewegung ist, kann wieder von Bewegung abgeleitet werden; was dem Qualitativen der Farben- und Lichtwelt angehört, kann auch nur auf ein ebensolches Qualitatives innerhalb desselben Gebietes zurückgeführt werden. Die Mechanik führt zusammengesetzte Bewegungen auf einfache zurück, die unmittelbar begreiflich sind. Die Farbentheorie muß komplizierte Farbenerscheinungen auf einfache zurückführen, die in gleicher Weise durchschaut werden können. Ein einfacher Bewegungsvorgang ist ebenso ein Urphänomen, wie das Entstehen des Gelben aus dem Zusammenwirken von Hell und Dunkel. Goethe weiß, was die mechanischen Urphänomene für die Erklärung der unorganischen Natur leisten können. Was innerhalb der Körperwelt nicht mechanisch ist, das führt er auf Urphänomene zurück, die nicht mechanischer Art sind. Man hat Goethe den Vorwurf gemacht, er habe die mechanische Betrachtung der Natur verworfen und sich nur auf die Beobachtung und Aneinanderreihung des Sinnlich-Anschaulichen beschränkt. Vgl. z.B. Harnack in seinem Buche «Goethe in der Epoche seiner Vollendung», S. 12) Du Bois-Reymond findet («Goethe und kein Ende», Leipzig 1883, S.29): «Goethes Theoretisieren beschränkt sich darauf, aus einem Urphänomen, wie er es nennt, andere Phänomene hervorgehen zu lassen, etwa wie ein Nebelbild dem andern folgt, ohne einleuchtenden ursächlichen Zusammenhang. Der Begriff der mechanischen Kausalität war es, der Goethe gänzlich abging.» Was tut aber die Mechanik anderes, als verwickelte Vorgänge aus einfachen Urphänomenen hervorgehen lassen? Goethe hat auf dem Gebiete der Farbenwelt genau dasselbe gemacht, was der Mechaniker im Gebiete der Bewegungsvorgänge leistet. Weil Goethe nicht der Ansicht ist, alle Vorgänge in der unorganischen Natur seien rein mechanische, deshalb hat man ihm den Begriff der mechanischen Kausalität aberkannt. Wer das tut, der zeigt nur, daß er selbst im Irrtum darüber ist, was mechanische Kausalität innerhalb der Körperwelt bedeutet. Goethe bleibt innerhalb des Qualitativen der Licht- und Farbenwelt stehen; das Quantitative, Mechanische, das mathematisch auszudrücken ist, überläßt er andern. Er «hat die Farbenlehre durchaus von der Mathematik entfernt zu halten gesucht, ob sich gleich gewisse Punkte deutlich genug ergeben, wo die Beihilfe der Meßkunst wünschenswert sein würde ... Aber so mag auch dieser Mangel zum Vorteil gereichen, indem es nunmehr des geistreichen Mathematikers Geschäft werden kann, selbst aufzusuchen, wo denn die Farbenlehre seiner Hilfe bedarf, und wie er zur Vollendung dieses Teils der Naturlehre das Seinige betragen kann.» (§ 727 des didaktischen Teiles der Farbenlehre.) Die qualitativen Elemente des Gesichtssinnes: Licht, Finsternis, Farben müssen erst aus ihren eigenen Zusammenhängen begriffen, auf Urphänomene zurückgeführt werden; dann kann auf einer höheren Stufe des Denkens untersucht werden, welcher Bezug besteht zwischen diesen Zusammenhängen und dem Quantitativen, dem Mechanisch-Mathematischen in der Licht- und Farbenwelt.
[ 12 ] Die Zusammenhänge innerhalb des Qualitativen der Farbenwelt will Goethe in ebenso strengem Sinne auf die einfachsten Elemente zurückführen, wie das der Mathematiker oder Mechaniker auf seinem Gebiete tut. Die «Bedächtlichkeit, nur das Nächste ans Nächste zu reihen, oder vielmehr das Nächste aus dem Nächsten zu folgern, haben wir von den Mathematikern zu lernen und selbst da, wo wir uns keiner Rechnung bedienen, müssen wir immer so zu Werke gehen, als wenn wir dem strengsten Geometer Rechenschaft zu geben schuldig wären. - Denn eigentlich ist es die mathematische Methode, welche wegen ihrer Bedächtlichkeit und Reinheit gleich jeden Sprung in der Assertion offenbart, und ihre Beweise sind eigentlich nur umständliche Ausführungen, daß dasjenige, was in Verbindung vorgebracht wird, schon in seinen einfachen Teilen und in seiner ganzen Folge da gewesen, in seinem ganzen Umfange übersehen und unter allen Bedingungen richtig und unumstößlich erfunden worden.» (« Der Versuch als Vermittler von Subjekt und Objekt» Kürschner, Band 34).
[ 13 ] Goethe entnimmt die Erklärungsprinzipien für die Erscheinungen unmittelbar aus dem Bereich der Beobachtung. Er zeigt, wie innerhalb der erfahrbaren Welt die Erscheinungen zusammenhängen. Vorstellungen, welche über das Gebiet der Beobachtung hinausweisen, lehnt er für die Naturauffassung ab. Alle Erklärungsarten, die das Feld der Erfahrung dadurch überschreiten, daß sie für die Naturerklärung Faktoren herbeiziehen, die ihrer Wesenheit nach nicht beobachtbar sind, widersprechen der Goetheschen Weltanschauung. Eine solche Erklärungsart ist diejenige, welche das Wesen des Lichtes in einem Lichtstoff sucht, der als solcher nicht selbst wahrgenommen, sondern nur in seiner Wirkungsweise als Licht beobachtet werden kann. Auch gehört zu diesen Erklärungsarten die in der modernen Naturwissenschaft herrschende, nach welcher die Bewegungsvorgänge der Lichtwelt nicht von den wahrnehmbaren Qualitäten, die dem Gesichtssinn gegeben sind, sondern von den kleinsten Teilen des nicht wahrnehmbaren Stoffes ausgeführt werden. Es widerspricht der Goetheschen Weltanschauung nicht, sich vorzustellen, daß eine bestimmte Farbe mit einem bestimmten Bewegungsvorgang im Raume verknüpft sei. Aber es widerspricht ihr durchaus, wenn behauptet wird, dieser Bewegungsvorgang gehöre einem außerhalb der Erfahrung gelegenen Wirklichkeitsgebiete an, der Welt des Stoffes, die zwar in ihren Wirkungen, nicht aber ihrer eigenen Wesenheit nach beobachtet werden kann. Für einen Anhänger der Goetheschen Weltanschauung sind die Lichtschwingungen im Raume Vorgänge, denen keine andere Art von Wirklichkeit zukommt als dem übrigen Wahmehmungsinhalt. Sie entziehen sich der unmittelbaren Beobachtung nicht deshalb, weil sie jenseits des Gebietes der Erfahrung liegen, sondern weil die menschlichen Sinnesorgane nicht so fein organisiert sind, daß sie Bewegungen von solcher Kleinheit noch unmittelbar wahrnehmen. Wäre ein Auge so organisiert, daß es das Hin- und Herschwingen eines Dinges, das in einer Sekunde sich vierhundert billionenmal wiederholt, noch in allen Einzelheiten beobachten könnte, so würde sich ein solcher Vorgang genau so darstellen wie einer der grobsinnlichen Welt. Das heißt, das schwingende Ding würde dieselben Eigenschaften zeigen, wie andere Wahrnehmungsdinge.
[ 14 ] Jede Erklärungsart, welche die Dinge und Vorgänge der Erfahrung aus anderen, nicht innerhalb des Erfahrungsfeldes gelegenen ableitet, kann zu inhaltvollen Vorstellungen von diesem jenseits der Beobachtung befindlichen Wirklichkeitsgebiete nur dadurch gelangen, daß sie gewisse Eigenschaften aus der Erfahrungswelt entlehnt und auf das Unerfahrbare überträgt. So überträgt der Physiker Härte, Undurchdringlichkeit auf die kleinsten Körperelemente, denen er außerdem noch die Fähigkeit zuschreibt, ihresgleichen anzuziehen und abzustoßen; dagegen erkennt er diesen Elementen Farbe, Wärme und andere Eigenschaften nicht zu. Er glaubt einen erfahrbaren Vorgang der Natur dadurch zu erklären, daß er ihn auf einen nicht erfahrbaren zurückführt. Nach Du Bois-Reymonds Ansicht ist Naturerkennen Zurückführen der Vorgänge in der Körperwelt auf Bewegungen von Atomen, die durch deren anziehende und abstoßende Kräfte bewirkt werden («Grenzen des Naturerkennens», Leipzig 1882, S. 10). Als das Bewegliche wird dabei die Materie, der den Raum erfüllende Stoff, angenommen. Dieser Stoff soll von Ewigkeit her dagewesen sein und wird in alle Ewigkeit hinein da sein. Dem Gebiete der Beobachtung soll aber die Materie nicht angehören, sondern jenseits desselben vorhanden sein. Du Bois-Reymond nimmt deshalb an, daß der Mensch unfähig sei, das Wesen der Materie selbst zu erkennen, daß er also die Vorgänge der Körperwelt auf etwas zurückführe, dessen Natur ihm immer unbekannt bleiben wird. «Nie werden wir besser als heute wissen, was hier im Raume, wo Materie ist, spukt.» («Grenzen des Naturerkennens», S.22.) Vor einer genauen Überlegung löst sich dieser Begriff der Materie in Nichts auf Der wirkliche Inhalt, den man diesem Begriffe gibt, ist aus der Erfahrungswelt entlehnt. Man nimmt Bewegungen innerhalb der Erfahrungswelt wahr. Man fühlt einen Zug, wenn man ein Gewicht in der Hand hält, und einen Druck, wenn man auf die horizontal hingehaltenene Handfläche ein Gewicht legt. Um diese Wahrnehmung zu erklären, bildet man den Begriff der Kraft. Man stellt sich vor, daß die Erde das Gewicht anzieht. Die Kraft selbst kann nicht wahrgenommen werden. Sie ist ideell. Sie gehört aber doch dem Beobachtungsgebiete an. Der Geist beobachtet sie, weil er die ideellen Bezüge der Wahrnehmungen untereinander anschaut. Zu dem Begriffe einer Abstoßungskraft wird man geführt, wenn man ein Stück Kautschuk zusammendrückt, und es sich dann selbst überläßt. Es stellt sich in seiner früheren Gestalt und Größe wieder her. Man stellt sich vor, die zusammengedrängten Teile des Kautschuks stoßen sich ab und nehmen den früheren Rauminhalt wieder ein. Solche aus der Beobachtung geschöpfte Vorstellungen überträgt die angedeutete Denkart auf das unerfahrbare Wirklichkeitsgebiet. Sie tut in Wirklichkeit also nichts, als ein Erfahrbares aus einem andern Erfahrbaren herleiten. Nur versetzt sie willkürlich das letztere in das Gebiet des Unerfahrbaren. Jeder Vorstellungsart, die innerhalb der Naturanschauung von einem Unerfahrbaren spricht, ist nachzuweisen, daß sie einige Lappen aus dem Gebiete der Erfahrung aufnimmt und in ein jenseits der Beobachtung gelegenes Wirklichkeitsgebiet verweist. Nimmt man die Erfahrungslappen aus der Vorstellung des Unerfabrbaren heraus, so bleibt ein inhaltloser Begriff, ein Unbegriff, zurück. Die Erklärung eines Erfahrbaren kann nur darin bestehen, daß man es auf ein anderes Erfahrbares zurückführt. Zuletzt gelangt man zu Elementen innerhalb der Erfahrung, die nicht mehr auf andere zurückgeführt werden können. Diese sind nicht weiter zu erklären, weil sie keiner Erklärung bedürftig sind. Sie enthalten ihre Erklärung in sich selbst. Ihr unmittelbares Wesen besteht in dem, was sie der Beobachtung darbieten. Ein solches Element ist für Goethe das Licht. Nach seiner Ansicht hat das Licht erkannt, wer es unbefangen in der Erscheinung wahrnimmt. Die Farben entstehen am Lichte und ihre Entstehung wird begriffen, wenn man zeigt, wie sie an demselben entstehen. Das Licht selbst ist in unmittelbarer Wahrnehmung gegeben. Was in ihm ideell veranlagt ist, erkennt man, wenn man beobachtet, welcher Zusammenhang zwischen ihm und den Farben ist. Nach dem Wesen des Lichtes zu fragen, nach einem Unerfahrbaren, das der Erscheinung «Licht» entspricht, ist vom Standpunkte der Goetheschen Weltanschauung aus unmöglich. «Denn eigentlich unternehmen wir umsonst, das Wesen eines Dinges auszudrücken. Wirkungen werden wir gewahr, und eine vollständige Geschichte dieser Wirkungen umfaßte wohl allenfalls das Wesen jenes Dinges.» Das heißt eine vollständige Darstellung der Wirkungen eines Erfahrbaren umfaßt alle Erscheinungen, die in ihm ideell veranlagt sind. «Vergebens bemühen wir uns, den Charakter eines Menschen zu schildern; man stelle dagegen seine Handlungen, seine Taten zusammen, und ein Bild des Charakters wird uns entgegentreten. - Die Farben sind Taten des Lichtes, Taten und Leiden. In diesem Sinne können wir von denselben Aufschlüsse über das Licht erwarten.» (Didaktischer Teil der Farbenlehre. Vorwort.)
[ 15 ] Das Licht stellt sich der Beobachtung dar als « das einfachste, unzerlegteste, homogenste Wesen, Jas wir kennen.» (Briefwechsel mit Jacobi, S. 167.) Ihm entgegengesetzt ist die Finsternis. Für Goethe ist die Finsternis nicht die vollkommen kraftlose Abwesenheit des Lichtes. Sie ist ein Wirksames. Sie stellt sich dem Licht entgegen und tritt mit ihm in Wechselwirkung. Die moderne Naturwissenschaft sieht die Finsternis an als ein vollkommenes Nichts. Das Licht, das in einen finstern Raum einströmt, hat, nach dieser Ansicht, keinen Widerstand der Finsternis zu überwinden. Goethe stellt sich vor, daß Licht und Finsternis sich zueinander. ähnlich verhalten wie der Nord- und Südpol eines Magneten Die Finsternis kann das Licht in seiner Wirkungskraft schwächen. Umgekehrt kann das Licht die Energie der Finsternis beschränken. In beiden Fällen entsteht die Farbe. Eine physikalische Anschauung, die sich die Finsternis als das vollkommen Unwirksame denkt, kann von einer solchen Wechselwirkung nicht sprechen. Sie muß daher die Farben allein aus dem Lichte herleiten. Die Finsternis tritt für die Beobachtung ebenso als Erscheinung auf wie das Licht. Das Dunkel ist in demselben Sinne Wahrnehmungsinhalt wie die Helle. Das eine ist nur der Gegensatz des andern. Das Auge, das in die Nacht hinausblickt, vermittelt die reale Wahrnehmung der Finsternis. Wäre die Finsternis das absolute Nichts, so entstände gar keine Wahrnehmung, wenn der Mensch in das Dunkel hinaussieht.
[ 16 ] Das Gelb ist ein durch die Finsternis gedämpftes Licht; das Blau eine durch das Licht abgeschwächte Finsternis.
[ 17 ] Das Auge ist dazu eingerichtet, dem vorstellenden Organismus die Erscheinungen der Licht- und Farbenwelt und die Bezüge dieser Erscheinungen zu vermitteln. Es verhält sich dabei nicht bloß aufnehmend, sondern tritt in lebendige Wechselwirkung mit den Erscheinungen. Goethe ist bestrebt, die Art dieser Wechselwirkung zu erkennen. Er betrachtet das Auge als ein durchaus Lebendiges und will seine Lebensäußerungen durchschauen. Wie verhält sich das Auge zu der einzelnen Erscheinung? Wie verhält es sich zu den Bezügen der Erscheinungen? Das sind Fragen, die er sich vorlegt. Licht und Finsternis, Gelb und Blau sind Gegensätze. Wie empfindet das Auge diese Gegensätze? Es muß in der Natur des Auges begründet sein, daß es die Wechselbeziehungen, die zwischen den einzelnen Wahrnehmungen bestehen, auch empfinde. Denn «das Auge hat sein Dasein dem Lichte zu danken. Aus gleichgültigen tierischen Hilfsorganen ruft sich das Licht ein Organ hervor, das seinesgleichen werde; und so bildet sich das Auge am Lichte fürs Licht, damit das innere Licht dem äußern entgegentrete.» (Didaktischer Teil der Farbenlehre. Einleitung.)
[ 18 ] So wie Licht und Finsternis sich in der äußeren Natur gegensätzlich verhalten, so stehen die beiden Zustände einander entgegen, in die das Auge durch die beiden Erscheinungen versetzt wird. Wenn man das Auge innerhalb eines finstern Raumes offen hält, so wird ein gewisser Mangel empfindbar. Wird es dagegen einer stark beleuchteten weißen Fläche zugewendet, so wird es für eine gewisse Zeit unfähig, mäßig beleuchtete Gegenstände zu unterscheiden. Das Sehen ins Dunkle steigert die Empfänglichkeit; dasjenige in das Helle schwächt sie ab.
[ 19 ] Jeder Eindruck aufs Auge bleibt eine Zeitlang in demselben. Wer ein schwarzes Fensterkreuz auf einem hellen Hintergrunde ansieht, wird, wenn er die Augen schließt, die Erscheinung noch eine Weile vor sich haben. Blickt man, während der Eindruck noch dauert, auf eine hellgraue Fläche, so erscheint das Kreuz hell, der Scheibenraum dagegen dunkel. Es findet eine Umkehrung der Erscheinung statt. Daraus folgt, daß das Auge durch den einen Eindruck disponiert wird, den entgegengesetzten aus sich selbst zu erzeugen. Wie in der Außenwelt Licht und Finsternis in Beziehung zu einander stehen, so auch die entsprechenden Zustände im Auge. Goethe stellt sich vor, daß der Ort im Auge, auf den das dunkle Kreuz fiel, ausgeruht und empfänglich für einen neuen Eindruck ist. Deshalb wirkt auf ihn die graue Fläche lebhafter als auf die übrigen Orte im Auge, die vorher das stärkere Licht von den Fensterscheiben empfangen haben. Hell erzeugt im Auge die Hinneigung zum Dunkel; Dunkel die zum Hellen. Wenn man ein dunkles Bild vor eine hellgraue Fläche hält und unverwandt, indem es vorgenommen wird, auf denselben Fleck sieht, so erscheint der Raum, den das dunkle Bild eingenommen hat, um vieles heller als die übrige Fläche. Ein graues Bild auf dunklem Grund erscheint heller als dasselbe Bild auf hellem. Das Auge wird durch den dunklen Grund disponiert, das Bild heller; durch den hellen es dunkler zu sehen. Goethe wird durch diese Erscheinungen auf die große Regsamkeit des Auges verwiesen «und den stillen Widerspruch, den jedes Lebendige zu äußern gedrungen ist, wenn ihm irgend ein bestimmter Zustand dargeboten wird. So setzt das Einatmen schon das Ausatmen voraus und umgekehrt... Es ist die ewige Formel des Lebens, die sich auch hier äußert. Wie dem Auge das Dunkle geboten wird, so fordert es das Helle; es fordert Dunkel, wenn man ihm Hell entgegenbringt und zeigt eben dadurch seine Lebendigkeit, sein Recht, das Objekt zu fassen, indem es etwas, das dem Objekt entgegengesetzt ist, aus sich selbst hervorbringt.» (§ 38 des didaktischen Teiles der Farbenlehre.)
[ 20 ] In ähnlicher Weise wie Licht und Finsternis rufen auch Farbenwahmehmungen eine Gegenwirkung im Auge hervor. Man halte ein kleines Stück gelbgefärbten Papiers vor eine mäßig erleuchtete weiße Tafel, und schaue unverwandt auf die kleine gelbe Fläche. Nach einiger Zeit hebe man das Papier hinweg. Man wird die Stelle, die das Papier ausgefüllt hat, violett sehen. Das Auge wird durch den Eindruck des Gelb disponiert, das Violett aus sich selbst zu erzeugen. Ebenso wird das Blaue das Orange, das Rote das Grün als Gegenwirkung hervorbringen. Jede Farbenempfindung hat also im Auge einen lebendigen Bezug zu einer andern. Die Zustände, in die das Auge durch Wahrnehmungen versetzt wird, stehen in einem ähnlichen Zusammenhange wie die Inhalte dieser Wahrnehmungen in der Außenwelt.
[ 21 ] Wenn Licht und Finsternis, Hell und Dunkel aufs Auge wirken, so tritt ihnen dieses lebendige Organ mit seinen Forderungen entgegen; wirken sie auf die Dinge draußen im Raume, so treten diese mit ihnen in Wechselwirkung. Der leere Raum hat die Eigenschaft der Durchsichtigkeit. Er wirkt auf Licht und Finsternis gar nicht. Diese scheinen durch ihn in ihrer eigenen Lebhaftigkeit durch. Anders ist es, wenn der Raum mit Dingen gefüllt ist. Diese Füllung kann eine solche sein, daß das Auge sie nicht gewahr wird, weil Licht und Finsternis in ihrer ursprünglichen Gestalt durch sie hindurch scheinen. Dann spricht man von durchsichtigen Dingen. Scheinen Licht und Finsternis nicht ungeschwächt durch ein Ding hindurch, so wird es als trüb bezeichnet. Die trübe Raumausfüllung bietet die Möglichkeit, Licht und Finsternis, Hell und Dunkel in ihrem gegenseitigen Verhältnis zu beobachten. Ein Helles durch ein Trübes gesehen, erscheint gelb, ein Dunkles blau. Das Trübe ist ein Materielles, das vom Lichte durchhellt wird. Gegenüber einem hinter ihm befindlichen helleren, lebhafteren Licht ist das Trübe dunkel; gegen eine durchscheinende Finsternis verhält es sich als Helles. Es wirken also, wenn ein Trübes sich dem Licht oder der Finsternis entgegenstellt, wirklich ein vorhandenes Helles und ein ebensolches Dunkles ineinander.
[ 22 ] Nimmt die Trübe, durch welche das Licht scheint, allmählich zu, so geht das Gelb in Gelbrot und dann in Rubinrot über. Vermindert sich die Trübe, durch die das Dunkel dringt, so geht das Blau in Indigo und zuletzt in Violett über. Gelb und Blau sind Grundfarben. Sie entstehen durch Zusammenwirken des Hellen oder Dunklen mit der Trübe. Beide können einen rötlichen Ton annehmen, jenes durch Vermehrung, dieses durch Verminderung der Trübe. Das Rot ist somit keine Grundfarbe. Es erscheint als Farbenton an dem Gelben oder Blauen. Gelb mit seinen rötlichen Nuancen, die sich bis zum reinen Rot steigern, steht dem Lichte nahe, Blau mit seinen Abtönungen ist der Finsternis verwandt. Wenn sich Blau und Gelb vermischen entsteht Grün; mischt sich das bis zum Violetten gesteigerte Blau mit dem zum Roten verfinsterten Gelb, so entsteht die Purpurfarbe.
[ 23 ] Diese Grunderscheinungen verfolgt Goethe innerhalb der Natur. Die helle Sonnenscheibe durch einen Flor von trüben Dünsten gesehen, erscheint gelb. Der dunkle Weltraum durch die vom Tageslicht erleuchteten Dünste der Atmosphäre angeschaut, stellt sich als das Blau des Himmels dar. «Ebenso erscheinen uns auch die Berge blau: denn, indem wir sie in einer solchen Ferne erblicken, daß wir die Lokalfarben nicht mehr sehen, und kein Licht von ihrer Oberfläche mehr auf unser Auge wirkt, so gelten sie als ein reiner finsterer Gegenstand, der nun durch die dazwischen tretenden Dünste blau erscheint.» (§ 156 des didaktischen Teiles der Farbenlehre.)
[ 24 ] Aus der Vertiefung in die Kunstwerke der Maler ist Goethe das Bedürfnis erwachsen, in die Gesetze einzudringen, denen die Erscheinungen des Gesichtssinnes unterworfen sind. Jedes Gemälde gab ihm Rätsel auf. Wie verhält sich das Hell-Dunkel zu den Farben? In welchen Beziehungen stehen die einzelnen Farben zueinander? Warum bewirkt Gelb eine heitere, Blau eine ernste Stimmung? Aus der Newtonschen Farbenlehre war kein Gesichtspunkt zu gewinnen, von dem aus diese Geheimnisse zu lüften gewesen wären. Sie leitet alle Farben aus dem Licht ab, stellt sie stufenweise nebeneinander und sagt nichts über ihre Beziehungen zum Dunkeln und auch nichts über ihre lebendigen Bezüge zueinander. Aus den auf eigenem Wege gewonnenen Einsichten konnte Goethe die Rätsel lösen, die ihm die Kunst aufgegeben hatte. Das Gelb muß eine heitere, muntere, sanft reizende Eigenschaft besitzen, denn es ist die nächste Farbe am Licht. Es entsteht durch die gelindeste Mäßigkeit desselben. Das Blau weist auf das Dunkle hin, das in ihm wirkt. Deshalb gibt es ein Gefühl von Kälte, so wie «es auch an Schatten erinnert». Das rötliche Gelb entsteht durch Steigerung des Gelben nach der Seite des Dunkeln. Durch diese Steigerung wächst seine Energie. Das Heitere, Muntere geht in das Wonnige über. Sobald die Steigerung noch weitergeht, vom Rotgelben ins Gelbrote, verwandelt sich das heitere, wonnige Gefühl in den Eindruck des Gewaltsamen. Das Violett ist das zum Hellen strebende Blau. Die Ruhe und Kälte des Blauen wird dadurch zur Unruhe. Eine weitere Zunahme erfährt diese Unruhe im Blauroten. Das reine Rot steht in der Mitte zwischen Gelbrot und Blaurot. Das Stürmische des Gelben erscheint gemindert, die lässige Ruhe des Blauen belebt sich. Das Rote macht den Eindruck der idealen Befriedigung, der Ausgleichung der Gegensätze. Ein Gefühl der Befriedigung entsteht auch durch das Grün, das eine Mischung von Gelb und Blau ist. Weil aber hier das Heitere des Gelben nicht gesteigert, die Ruhe des Blauen nicht gestört durch den rötlichen Ton ist, so wird die Befriedigung eine reinere sein als die, welche das Rot hervorbringt.
[ 25 ] Das Auge fordert, wenn ihm eine Farbe entgegengebracht wird, sogleich eine andere. Erblickt es Gelb, so entsteht in ihm die Sehnsucht nach dem Violetten; nimmt es Blau wahr, so verlangt es Orange; sieht es Rot, so begehrt es Grün. Es ist begreiflich, daß das Gefühl der Befriedigung entsteht, wenn neben einer Farbe, die dem Auge dargeboten wird, eine andere gesetzt wird, die es seiner Natur nach erstrebt. Aus dem Wesen des Auges ergibt sich das Gesetz der Farbenharmonie. Farben, die das Auge nebeneinander fordert, wirken harmonisch. Treten zwei Farben nebeneinander auf, von denen die eine nicht die andere fordert, so wird das Auge zur Gegenwirkung aufgeregt. Die Zusammenstellung von Gelb und Purpur hat etwas Einseitiges, aber Heiteres und Prächtiges. Das Auge will Violett neben Gelb, um sich naturgemäß ausleben zu können. Tritt Purpur an die Stelle des Violetten, so macht der Gegenstand seine Ansprüche gegenüber denen des Auges geltend. Er fügt sich den Forderungen des Organs nicht. Zusammenstellungen dieser Art dienen dazu, auf das Bedeutende der Dinge hinzuweisen. Sie wollen nicht unbedingt befriedigen, sondern charakterisieren. Zu solchen charakteristischen Verbindungen eignen sich Farben, die nicht in vollem Gegensatz zueinander stehen, die aber doch auch nicht unmittelbar ineinander übergehen. Zusammenstellungen der letzteren Art geben den Dingen, an denen sie vorkommen, etwas Charakterloses.
[ 26 ] Das Werden und Wesen der Licht- und Farbenerscheinungen hat sich Goethe in der Natur offenbart. Er hat es auch wiedererkannt in den Schöpfungen der Maler, in denen es auf eine höhere Stufe gehoben, ins Geistige übersetzt ist. Einen tiefen Einblick in das Verhältnis von Natur und Kunst hat Goethe durch seine Beobachtungen der Gesichtswahrnehmungen gewonnen. Daran mag er wohl gedacht haben, als er nach Vollendung der «Farbenlehre » über diese Beobachtungen an Frau von Stein schrieb: «Es reut mich nicht, ihnen soviel Zeit aufgeopfert zu haben. Ich bin dadurch zu einer Kultur gelangt, die ich mir von einer andern Seite her schwerlich verschafft hätte.»
[ 27 ] Die Goethesche Farbenlehre ist verschieden von derjenigen Newtons und derjenigen Physiker, die auf Newtons Vorstellungen ihre Anschauungen aufbauen, weil der erstere von einer andern Weltanschauung ausgeht als die letzteren. Wer nicht den hier dargestellten Zusammenhang zwischen Goethes allgemeinen Naturvorstellungen und seiner Farbenlehre ins Auge faßt, der wird nicht anders können, als glauben, Goethe sei zu seinen Farbenanschauungen gekommen, weil ihm der Sinn für die echten Beobachtungsmethoden des Physikers gemangelt habe. Wer diesen Zusammenhang durchschaut, der wird auch einsehen, daß innerhalb der Goetheschen Weltanschauung keine andere Farbenlehre möglich ist als die seinige. Er würde über das Wesen der Farbenerscheinungen nicht anders haben denken können, als er es tat, auch wenn alle seit seiner Zeit gemachten Entdeckungen auf diesem Gebiete vor ihm wären ausgebreitet gewesen, und wenn er die gegenwärtig so vervollkommneten Versuchsmethoden hätte selbst exakt handhaben können. Wenn er auch, nachdem er mit der Entdeckung der Frauenhoferschen Linien bekannt wird, diese auch im Sinne seiner Naturanschauung nicht völlig in diese einreihen kann, so sind doch weder sie noch sonst eine Entdekkung auf optischem Gebiete ein Einwand gegen seine Auffassung. Es handelt sich bei alledem nur darum, diese Goethesche Auffassung so auszubauen, daß diese Erscheinungen in ihrem Sinne in sie sich einfügen. Zuzugeben ist, daß wer auf dem Gesichtspunkte der Newtonschen Auffassung steht, sich bei Goethes Farbenansichten nichts vorstellen könne. Das rührt aber nicht davon her, weil ein solcher Physiker Erscheinungen kennt, die der Goetheschen Auffassung widersprechen, sondern weil er sich in eine Naturanschauung eingewöhnt hat, die ihn verhindert, zu erkennen, was die Goethesche Naturansicht eigentlich will.
The phenomena of the world of color
[ 1 ] Goethe is continually stimulated by the feeling that "the high works of art are produced by men according to true and natural laws" to seek out these true and natural laws of artistic creation. He is convinced that the effect of a work of art must be based on the fact that a natural lawfulness shines out of it. He wants to recognize this lawfulness. He wants to know why the highest works of art are also the highest works of nature. It becomes clear to him that the Greeks acted according to the very laws that nature follows when they developed "the circle of divine formation from the human form" (Italian Journey, January 28, 1787). He wanted to see how nature brought about this formation in order to be able to understand it in the works of art. Goethe describes how he gradually succeeded in Italy in gaining an insight into the natural laws of artistic creation (cf. "Konfession des Verfassers", Kürschner, vol. 36). "Fortunately, I was able to hold on to some maxims brought over from poetry and proven to me through inner feeling and long use, so that it became difficult but not impossible for me, through uninterrupted contemplation of nature and art, through lively effective conversation with more or less insightful connoisseurs, through constant life with more or less practical or thinking artists, to gradually divide art in general without fragmenting it, and to become aware of its various, lively interlocking elements." There is only one element that does not want to reveal to him the natural laws according to which it works in a work of art: color. Several paintings are "invented and composed in his presence, the parts carefully studied in terms of position and form". The artists can give him an account of how they proceed with the composition. But as soon as the discussion turns to coloring, everything seems to depend on arbitrariness. No one knows the relationship between color and chiaroscuro, or between the individual colors. Goethe is unable to find out why yellow makes a warm and cozy impression, why blue evokes the sensation of coldness, why yellow and reddish blue produce a harmonious effect when placed side by side. He realizes that he must first acquaint himself with the laws of the world of color in nature in order to penetrate the secrets of coloration from there.
[ 2 ] Neither the concepts about the physical nature of color phenomena that Goethe still remembered from his student days, nor the physical compendia that he asked for advice, proved to be fruitful for his purpose. "Like the rest of the world, I was convinced that all colors were contained in light; I had never been told otherwise and had never found the slightest reason to doubt it, because I was not interested in the matter" ("Konfession des Verfassers", Kürschner, vol. 36/2). But when he began to be interested, he found that he could develop nothing for his purpose from this view. The founder of this view, which Goethe found prevalent among natural scientists and which still occupies the same position today, is Newton. It claims that white light, as it emanates from the sun, is composed of colored lights. The colors are created by separating the individual components from the white light. If you allow sunlight to enter a dark room through a small round opening and catch it on a white screen placed vertically against the direction of the incident light, you obtain a white image of the sun. If you place a glass prism between the opening and the screen, through which the light shines, the white round image of the sun changes. It appears shifted, elongated and colored. This image is called the solar spectrum. If the prism is positioned so that the upper parts of the light have a shorter path within the glass mass than the lower parts, the colored image is shifted downwards. The upper edge of the image is red, the lower violet; the red fades downwards into yellow, the violet upwards into blue; the middle part of the image is generally white. Only at a certain distance of the screen from the prism does the white in the middle disappear completely; the whole image appears colored, namely from top to bottom in the following sequence: red, orange, yellow, green, light blue, indigo, violet. From this experiment, Newton and his followers concluded that the colors were originally contained in the white light, but were mixed together. They are separated from each other by the prism. They have the property of being deflected from their direction, i.e. refracted, to different degrees when passing through a transparent body. Red light is refracted the least, violet the most. They appear in the spectrum in order of their refractive power. If you look at a narrow strip of paper on a black background through the prism, it also appears deflected. It is both wider and colored at its edges. The upper edge appears violet, the lower red; here too the violet fades into blue, the red into yellow; the center is generally white. Only at a certain distance of the prism from the stripe does it appear completely colored. The green appears again in the center. Here, too, the white of the strip of paper should be broken down into its colored components. The Newtonians explain simply that only at a certain distance of the screen or strip from the prism do all colors appear, while otherwise the middle is white. They say: in the center, the more strongly deflected lights from the upper part of the image coincide with the less strongly deflected lights from the lower part and mix to form white. Only at the edges do the colors appear, because no more strongly deflected light from above can fall into the most weakly deflected parts and no more weakly deflected light from below can fall into the most strongly deflected parts.
[ 3 ] This is the view from which Goethe can develop nothing for his purpose. He therefore wants to observe the phenomena himself. He turned to Privy Councillor Büttner in Jena, who lent him the apparatus with which he could carry out the necessary experiments. He is initially occupied with other work and, at Büttner's insistence, wants to return the apparatus. Before doing so, he takes a prism to look through it at a completely whitewashed wall. He expects it to appear colored in different shades. But it remains white. Colors only appear where the white meets the dark. The window bars appear in the most vivid colors. From these observations Goethe believes that Newton's view is wrong, that colors are not contained in white light. The boundary, the dark, must have something to do with the emergence of colors. He continued the experiments. White areas on a black background and black areas on a white background are observed. Gradually he forms his own view. A white disk on a black background appears shifted when viewed through the prism. According to Goethe, the upper parts of the disk are pushed over the adjacent black background, while this background extends over the lower parts of the disk. If you now look through the prism, you can see the black ground through the upper part of the disk as if through a white veil. If you look at the lower part of the disc, it shines through the superimposed darkness. At the top, a light is superimposed over a dark; at the bottom, a dark is superimposed over a light. The upper edge appears blue, the lower yellow. The blue changes to violet towards the black; the yellow changes to red towards the bottom. If the prism is removed from the observed disc, the colored edges widen; the blue downwards, the yellow upwards. At a sufficient distance, the yellow from below overlaps the blue from above; the overlapping creates green in the middle. To confirm this view, Goethe looks at a black disk on a white background through the prism. Now a dark color is passed over a light color at the top and a light color over a dark color at the bottom. Yellow appears at the top, blue at the bottom. When the edges are widened by removing the prism from the disc, the blue at the bottom, which gradually changes to violet towards the center, is passed over the yellow at the top, which gradually takes on a red tone as it widens. The result is peach blossom in the middle. Goethe said to himself: what is true for the white disk must also be true for the black one. "If the light there dissolves into so many different colors ... the darkness here must also be regarded as dissolved into colors." ("Konfession des Verfassers", Kürschner, Vol. 36/2.) Goethe now shared his observations and the misgivings he had about Newton's view with a physicist he knew. The latter declared the doubts to be unfounded. He deduced the colored edges and the white in the middle, as well as its transition to green, at a proper distance of the prism from the observed object, in the sense of Newton's view. Other naturalists to whom Goethe put the matter were similar. He continued the observations, for which he would have liked to have had the help of knowledgeable experts, on his own. He had a large prism assembled from mirror disks, which he filled with pure water. Because he noticed that the glass prisms, whose cross-section is an equilateral triangle, are often obstructive to the observer due to the strong broadening of the color appearance, he had his large prism given the cross-section of an isosceles triangle, whose smallest angle is only fifteen to twenty degrees. Goethe calls the experiments that are carried out in such a way that the eye looks through the prism at an object subjective. They present themselves to the eye, but are not fixed in the external world. He wants to add objective ones to these. To do this, he uses the water prism. The light shines through a prism, and behind the prism the color image is captured on a screen. Goethe now lets the sunlight pass through the openings of cut-out cardboard. The result is an illuminated space surrounded by darkness. This limited mass of light passes through the prism and is deflected from its direction by it. If a screen is held up to the mass of light coming out of the prism, an image is formed on it which is generally colored at the top and bottom edges. If the prism is positioned so that its cross-section narrows from top to bottom, the upper edge of the image is colored blue and the lower edge yellow. The blue changes to violet towards the dark space and to light blue towards the light center; the yellow changes to red towards the darkness. Goethe also derives the color appearance of this phenomenon from the border. At the top, the bright mass of light radiates into the dark space; it illuminates a dark area, which thus appears blue. Below, the dark space radiates into the light mass; it darkens a light and makes it appear yellow. By removing the screen from the prism, the edges of the colors become wider, the yellow approaches the blue. By shining the blue into the yellow, green appears in the center of the picture when the screen is sufficiently removed from the prism. Goethe visualizes the radiation of the light into the dark and the dark into the light by creating a fine white cloud of dust in the line in which the mass of light passes through the dark space, which he produces with fine dry hair powder. "The more or less colored appearance is now caught by the white atoms and presented to the eye in its entire width and length." (Farbenlehre, didaktischer Teil § 326.) Goethe finds his view, which he gained from the subjective phenomena, confirmed by the objective ones. Colors are produced by the interaction of light and dark. The prism only serves to push light and dark over one another.
[ 4 ] After making these experiments, Goethe cannot adopt the Newtonian view as his own. His approach to it is similar to that of Haller's theory of nesting. Just as the latter thinks the formed organism with all its parts already contained in the germ, so the Newtonians believe that the colors which appear in the light under certain conditions are already enclosed in it. He could use the same words against this belief that he used against the nesting doctrine, that it "is based on a mere extra-sensory imagination, on an assumption that one believes to think, but can never represent in the world of the senses." Cf. the essay on K. Fr. Wolff, Kürschner, vol. 33.) For him, colors are new formations that are developed in the light, not entities that are merely unwound from the light. Because of his "way of thinking in accordance with the idea" he must reject the Newtonian view. This does not recognize the essence of the ideal. It only recognizes what actually exists. What exists in the same way as the sensually perceptible. And where it cannot prove actuality through the senses, it assumes it hypothetically. Because the colors develop in the light, and must therefore according to the idea already be contained in it, it believes that they are also actually, materially contained in it and are only brought out by the prism and the dark outline. Goethe knows that the idea is active in the world of the senses; therefore he does not transfer something that is present as an idea into the realm of the actual. The ideal works in inorganic nature just as it does in organic nature, only not as a sensuous-supersensible form. Its outer appearance is entirely material, merely sensual. It does not penetrate the sensual; it does not spiritualize it. The processes of inorganic nature proceed according to law, and this lawfulness presents itself to the observer as an idea. If one perceives white light at one point in space and colors arising at another, there is a lawful connection between the two perceptions that can be presented as an idea. But if someone embodies this idea and transposes it into space as an actuality, which moves from the object of one perception into that of the other, this arises from a gross sensory mode of perception. It is this gross sensuality that repels Goethe from the Newtonian view. It is the idea that leads one inorganic process into another, not an actuality that moves from one to the other.
[ 5 ] The Goethean worldview can only recognize two sources for all knowledge of inorganic natural processes: that which is sensually perceptible in these processes, and the ideal connections of the sensually perceptible that reveal themselves to thought. The ideal connections within the sensory world are not of the same kind. There are those that are immediately obvious when sensory perceptions occur side by side or one after the other, and others that can only be seen through when they are traced back to those of the first kind. In the appearance that presents itself to the eye when it looks at a dark through a light and perceives blue, Goethe believes he recognizes a connection of the first kind between light, darkness and color. It is the same when light is seen through dark and produces yellow. The peripheral phenomena of the spectrum reveal a connection that becomes clear through direct observation. The spectrum, which shows seven colors from red to violet in a gradual sequence, can only be understood if you can see how other colors are added to the conditions that create the marginal phenomena. The simple marginal phenomena have combined in the spectrum to form a complicated phenomenon that can only be understood if it is derived from the basic phenomena. What stands before the observer in its purity in the basic phenomenon appears impure, modified by the added conditions in the complicated phenomenon. The simple facts are no longer immediately recognizable. Goethe therefore seeks to trace the complicated phenomena everywhere back to the simple, pure ones. In this reduction he sees the explanation of inorganic nature. He goes no further from the pure phenomenon. It reveals an ideal connection between sensory perceptions that is self-explanatory. Goethe calls the pure phenomenon the primal phenomenon. He considers it moderate speculation to think further about the primordial phenomenon. "The magnet is a primordial phenomenon that one may only pronounce in order to have explained it." (Proverbs in Prose, Kürschner, vol. 36.) A composite phenomenon is explained when one shows how it is built up from primordial phenomena.
[ 6 ] Modern natural science takes a different approach to Goethe. It wants to trace the processes in the sensory world back to the movements of the smallest parts of the body and uses the same laws to explain these movements by which it understands the movements that take place visibly in space. Explaining these visible movements is the task of mechanics. If the movement of a body is observed, mechanics asks: By what force has it been set in motion; what path does it cover in a given time; what is the shape of the line in which it moves, etc. The relationships between the force, the distance traveled and the shape of the path are represented mathematically. Now the naturalist says: The red light can be traced back to an oscillating movement of the smallest parts of the body, which propagates in space. This movement is understood by applying the laws of mechanics to it. The science of inorganic nature regards it as its goal to gradually transition completely into applied mechanics.
[ 7 ] Modern physics asks for the number of oscillations in a unit of time that correspond to a certain color quality. From the number of vibrations that correspond to red and those that correspond to violet, it seeks to determine the physical relationship between the two colors. The qualitative aspect disappears before her eyes; she observes the spatial and temporal aspects of the processes. Goethe asks: What is the connection between red and violet if one disregards the spatial and temporal and only considers the qualitative aspects of the colors? Goethe's way of looking at things presupposes that the qualitative is really also present in the external world and is an inseparable whole with the temporal and spatial. Modern physics, on the other hand, must proceed from the basic assumption that only the quantitative, lightless and colorless processes of movement are present in the external world, and that everything qualitative only arises as an effect of the quantitative on the organism endowed with sense and spirit. If this assumption were correct, then the lawful connections of the qualitative could not be sought in the external world, but had to be derived from the nature of the sensory organs, the nervous system and the organ of imagination. The qualitative elements of the processes would then not be the subject of physical investigation, but of physiological and psychological investigation. Modern natural science proceeds according to this premise. In its view, the organism translates one movement process into the sensation of red, another into that of violet, according to the arrangement of its eyes, its optic nerve and its brain. Therefore, everything external to the world of color is explained once one has understood the connection between the processes of movement that determine this world.
[ 8 ] Proof of this view is sought in the following observation. The optic nerve perceives every external impression as a sensation of light. Not only light, but also a bump or pressure on the eye, a strain on the retina when the eye moves rapidly, an electric current passing through the head: all these things cause light perception. The same things are felt by another sense in a different way. Shock, pressure, strain, electric current, when they excite the skin, cause tactile sensations. Electricity excites a sensation of hearing in the ear and a sensation of taste on the tongue. From this it can be concluded that the sensory content that occurs in the organism as a result of an external influence is different from the external process that causes it. The red color is not perceived by the organism because it is bound to a corresponding process of movement outside in space, but because the eye, optic nerve and brain of the organism are set up in such a way that they translate a colorless process of movement into a color. The law expressed here was called the law of specific sensory energies by the physiologist Johannes Müller, who first established it.
[ 9 ] The above observation only proves that the sensory and mentally gifted organism can translate the most diverse impressions into the language of the senses on which they are exerted. However, it does not prove that the content of every sensory sensation is only present within the organism. When the optic nerve is strained, an indefinite, quite general excitement arises which contains nothing that causes its content to be transferred into space. A sensation that arises from a real impression of light is inseparably connected in content with the spatio-temporal that corresponds to it. The movement of a body and its color are perceptual content in quite the same way. When we imagine the movement for ourselves, we abstract from what else we perceive about the body. Like movement, all other mechanical and mathematical concepts are taken from the world of perception. Mathematics and mechanics arise from the fact that a part of the content of the world of perception is separated out and considered in its own right. In reality there are no objects or processes whose content is exhausted when one has understood what can be expressed by mathematics and mechanics. Everything mathematical and mechanical is bound to color, heat and other qualities. If it is necessary for physics to assume that the perception of a color corresponds to vibrations in space, which have a very small extension and a very great speed, then these movements can only be thought of as analogous to the movements that occur visibly in space. In other words, if the physical world is conceived as moving down to its smallest elements, then it must also be conceived as endowed with color, warmth and other properties down to its smallest elements. Whoever conceives of colors, warmth, sounds, etc., as qualities that exist only within the imagining organism as effects of external processes, must also transfer everything mathematical and mechanical that is connected with these qualities to this interior. But then he has nothing left for his outer world. The red that I see and the light vibrations that the physicist proves to correspond to this red are in reality a unity that only the abstracting mind can separate from each other. I would see the vibrations in space, which correspond to the quality "red", as movement if my eye were organized for it. But I would have the impression of the red color in connection with the movement.
[ 10 ] Modern natural science transposes an unreal abstract, a vibrating substrate stripped of all sensory qualities into space and wonders why it is impossible to understand what can cause the imaginative organism, equipped with nervous apparatus and brain, to translate these indifferent processes of movement into the colorful world of the senses, interspersed with degrees of warmth and tones. Du Bois-Reymond therefore assumes that man will never understand how the fact: "I taste sweetness, smell the scent of roses, hear the sound of an organ, see red" is connected with certain movements of the smallest parts of the body in the brain, which movements are in turn caused by the vibrations of the tasteless, odorless, soundless and colorless elements of the outer body world. "It is absolutely and forever incomprehensible that a number of carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen, etc. atoms should not be indifferent to each other. atoms should not be indifferent to how they lie and move, how they lay and moved, how they will lie and move." ("Grenzen des Naturerkennens", Leipzig 1882, p.33f.) However, there is absolutely no limit to knowledge here. Where there is a number of atoms in a certain movement in space, there is necessarily also a certain quality (e.g. red). And vice versa, where red occurs, motion must be present. Only abstract thinking can separate the one from the other. Anyone who thinks of movement as separate from the rest of the content of the process to which the movement belongs in reality cannot find the transition from one to the other.
[ 11 ] Only what is movement in a process can be derived from movement; what belongs to the qualitative world of color and light can also only be traced back to a similar qualitative within the same field. Mechanics traces compound movements back to simple ones that are immediately comprehensible. Color theory must trace complicated color phenomena back to simple ones that can be understood in the same way. A simple process of movement is just as much a primordial phenomenon as the emergence of yellow from the interaction of light and dark. Goethe knows what the mechanical primal phenomena can do for the explanation of inorganic nature. What is not mechanical within the physical world, he traces back to primordial phenomena that are not mechanical. Goethe has been reproached for rejecting the mechanical view of nature and limiting himself to the observation and juxtaposition of the sensible and vivid. Cf. e.g. Harnack in his book "Goethe in der Epoche seiner Vollendung", p. 12) Du Bois-Reymond finds ("Goethe und kein Ende", Leipzig 1883, p.29): "Goethe's theorizing is limited to allowing other phenomena to emerge from a primal phenomenon, as he calls it, such as one nebulous image follows another, without any plausible causal connection. It was the concept of mechanical causality that Goethe completely missed." But what does mechanics do other than allow complex processes to emerge from simple primordial phenomena? Goethe did exactly the same in the field of the world of color as the mechanic does in the field of motion processes. Because Goethe is not of the opinion that all processes in inorganic nature are purely mechanical, the concept of mechanical causality has been denied him. Whoever does this only shows that he himself is mistaken about what mechanical causality means within the physical world. Goethe remains within the qualitative aspects of the world of light and color; he leaves the quantitative, mechanical aspects, which are to be expressed mathematically, to others. He "has sought to keep the theory of color quite distant from mathematics, even though certain points arise clearly enough where the aid of the art of measurement would be desirable ... But even this deficiency may be an advantage, since it can now become the business of the ingenious mathematician to find out for himself where color theory needs his help and how he can contribute to the completion of this part of natural science." (§ 727 of the didactic part of the Theory of Colors.) The qualitative elements of the sense of sight: light, darkness, colors must first be understood from their own contexts, traced back to primordial phenomena; then, at a higher level of thinking, the relationship between these contexts and the quantitative, the mechanical-mathematical in the world of light and color can be investigated.
[ 12 ] The connections within the qualitative aspects of the world of color Goethe wants to trace back to the simplest elements in the same strict sense as the mathematician or mechanic does in his field. We have to learn from the mathematicians the "thoughtfulness of merely stringing together the next to the next, or rather of deducing the next from the next, and even where we make no use of a calculation, we must always proceed as if we owed an account to the most rigorous geometrician. - For it is actually the mathematical method which, on account of its deliberateness and purity, immediately reveals every leap in the assertion, and its proofs are really only circumstantial explanations that what is put forward in connection has already been there in its simple parts and in its whole sequence, has been overlooked in its whole scope and has been invented correctly and irrefutably under all conditions." (" Der Versuch als Vermittler von Subjekt und Objekt" Kürschner, vol. 34).
[ 13 ] Goethe takes the explanatory principles for phenomena directly from the realm of observation. He shows how phenomena are connected within the tangible world. He rejects ideas that point beyond the field of observation for the conception of nature. All types of explanation that transcend the field of experience by invoking factors for the explanation of nature that are not observable by their nature contradict Goethe's world view. One such type of explanation is that which seeks the essence of light in a luminous substance which as such cannot be perceived, but can only be observed in its mode of action as light. Also among these types of explanation is the one prevailing in modern natural science, according to which the processes of movement in the world of light are not carried out by the perceptible qualities given to the sense of sight, but by the smallest parts of the imperceptible substance. It does not contradict Goethe's view of the world to imagine that a certain color is connected with a certain process of movement in space. But it certainly contradicts it if it is claimed that this process of movement belongs to a realm of reality outside of experience, the world of matter, which can be observed in its effects but not in its own essence. For a follower of Goethe's world view, the oscillations of light in space are processes that have no other kind of reality than the rest of the content of perception. They elude direct observation not because they lie beyond the realm of experience, but because the human sense organs are not so finely organized that they can directly perceive movements of such smallness. If an eye were so organized that it could still observe in detail the swinging to and fro of an object that repeats itself four hundred trillion times in one second, such a process would present itself in exactly the same way as one of the gross sensory world. In other words, the vibrating thing would exhibit the same properties as other perceptual things.
[ 14 ] Any kind of explanation that derives the things and processes of experience from others that are not located within the field of experience can only arrive at substantive ideas of this realm of reality that lies beyond observation by borrowing certain properties from the world of experience and transferring them to the inexperient. Thus the physicist transfers hardness and impenetrability to the smallest physical elements, to which he also ascribes the ability to attract and repel their equals; on the other hand, he does not attribute color, warmth and other properties to these elements. He believes he can explain a tangible process of nature by tracing it back to a non-experiential one. In Du Bois-Reymond's view, recognizing nature means tracing the processes in the physical world back to the movements of atoms, which are caused by their attractive and repulsive forces ("Grenzen des Naturerkennens", Leipzig 1882, p. 10). Matter, the substance that fills space, is assumed to be the moving element. This substance is said to have existed from eternity and will continue to exist for all eternity. Matter, however, is not supposed to belong to the realm of observation, but to exist beyond it. Du Bois-Reymond therefore assumes that man is incapable of recognizing the nature of matter itself, that he therefore attributes the processes of the physical world to something whose nature will always remain unknown to him. "We will never know better than we do today what is haunting space, where matter is." ("Grenzen des Naturerkennens", p.22.) Before a precise consideration, this concept of matter dissolves into nothing The real content that one gives to this concept is borrowed from the world of experience. One perceives movements within the world of experience. You feel a pull when you hold a weight in your hand and a push when you place a weight on your horizontally held palm. To explain this perception, we form the concept of force. Imagine that the earth attracts the weight. The force itself cannot be perceived. It is ideal. But it does belong to the field of observation. The mind observes it because it observes the ideal relationships between perceptions. One is led to the concept of a repulsive force if one squeezes a piece of rubber and then leaves it to itself. It restores itself to its former shape and size. One imagines that the compressed parts of the rubber repel each other and regain their former volume. Such ideas, drawn from observation, are transferred to the unperceivable realm of reality. In reality, therefore, it does nothing more than derive one experienceable thing from another experienceable thing. It only arbitrarily transfers the latter into the realm of the unperceivable. Every mode of conception that speaks of an unperceivable within the view of nature must be shown to take some lobes from the realm of experience and refer them to a realm of reality beyond observation. If one removes the lobes of experience from the concept of the inconceivable, what remains is a concept without content, a non-concept. The explanation of an experience can only consist in tracing it back to another experience. Finally, one arrives at elements within experience that can no longer be traced back to others. These cannot be explained further because they do not require any explanation. They contain their explanation within themselves. Their immediate essence consists in what they offer to observation. For Goethe, one such element is light. In his view, light is recognized by those who perceive it impartially in its appearance. Colors arise from light and their emergence is understood when one shows how they arise from it. Light itself is given in direct perception. What is ideally determined in it can be recognized by observing the connection between it and the colors. To ask about the essence of light, about an inexperience that corresponds to the phenomenon of "light", is impossible from the point of view of Goethe's world view. "For we actually undertake to express the essence of a thing in vain. We become aware of effects, and a complete history of these effects would at best encompass the essence of that thing." That is to say, a complete representation of the effects of an experiencable comprises all phenomena that are ideally predisposed in it. "In vain do we endeavor to portray the character of a man; but put together his actions, his deeds, and a picture of character will confront us. - The colors are deeds of light, deeds and suffering. In this sense, we can expect them to provide us with information about light." (Didactic part of the Theory of Colors. Preface.)
[ 15 ] Light presents itself to observation as "the simplest, most undissected, most homogeneous being that we know." (Correspondence with Jacobi, p. 167.) Opposed to it is darkness. For Goethe, darkness is not the completely powerless absence of light. It is something effective. It opposes the light and interacts with it. Modern natural science sees darkness as a complete nothingness. According to this view, the light that streams into a dark room has no resistance from the darkness to overcome. Goethe imagines that light and darkness relate to each other like the north and south poles of a magnet. Darkness can weaken the power of light. Conversely, light can limit the energy of darkness. In both cases, color is created. A physical view that thinks of darkness as something completely ineffective cannot speak of such an interaction. It must therefore derive color from light alone. Darkness appears to the observer just as much as light. Darkness is the content of perception in the same sense as light. The one is only the opposite of the other. The eye that looks out into the night conveys the real perception of darkness. If darkness were absolute nothingness, there would be no perception at all when a person looks out into the darkness.
[ 16 ] The yellow is light attenuated by darkness; the blue is darkness attenuated by light.
[ 17 ] The eye is designed to convey the phenomena of the world of light and color and the relationships between these phenomena to the imagining organism. In doing so, it does not merely absorb, but enters into lively interaction with the phenomena. Goethe strives to recognize the nature of this interaction. He regards the eye as a living thing and wants to see through its vital manifestations. How does the eye relate to the individual phenomenon? How does it relate to the relationships between the phenomena? These are the questions he asks himself. Light and darkness, yellow and blue are opposites. How does the eye perceive these opposites? It must be in the nature of the eye that it also perceives the interrelationships that exist between the individual perceptions. For "the eye owes its existence to the light. From indifferent animal auxiliary organs, light calls forth an organ that becomes its equal; and thus the eye forms itself for light by light, so that the inner light confronts the outer light." (Didactic part of the Theory of Colors. Introduction.)
[ 18 ] Just as light and darkness are opposed to each other in external nature, so the two states into which the eye is placed by the two phenomena are opposed to each other. If the eye is kept open in a dark room, a certain lack of light becomes perceptible. If, on the other hand, it is turned towards a strongly illuminated white surface, it becomes incapable of distinguishing moderately illuminated objects for a certain period of time. Seeing into the dark increases sensitivity; seeing into the light weakens it.
[ 19 ] Every impression on the eye remains in it for a time. If you look at a black window cross on a light background, when you close your eyes you will still have the impression in front of you for a while. If you look at a light gray surface while the impression is still lasting, the cross appears light and the window space dark. The appearance is reversed. It follows that the eye is disposed by one impression to produce the opposite impression from itself. Just as light and darkness are related to each other in the outside world, so are the corresponding states in the eye. Goethe imagines that the place in the eye on which the dark cross fell is rested and receptive to a new impression. That is why the gray area has a more vivid effect on him than on the other places in the eye that previously received the stronger light from the window panes. Light causes the eye to lean towards dark; dark towards light. If you hold a dark image in front of a light gray surface and look at the same spot without looking at it, the space occupied by the dark image appears much brighter than the rest of the surface. A gray image on a dark background appears brighter than the same image on a light background. The eye is predisposed by the dark ground to see the picture brighter; by the light ground to see it darker. Goethe is reminded by these phenomena of the great responsiveness of the eye "and the silent contradiction that every living thing is compelled to express when it is presented with any particular state. Thus inhalation presupposes exhalation and vice versa... It is the eternal formula of life that is also expressed here. Just as the eye is offered the dark, so it demands the light; it demands the dark when it is offered the light and thereby shows its vitality, its right to grasp the object, by bringing forth from itself something that is opposed to the object." (§ 38 of the didactic part of the Theory of Colors.)
[ 20 ] In a similar way to light and darkness, color perceptions also evoke a counter-effect in the eye. Hold a small piece of yellow-colored paper in front of a moderately illuminated white board and look at the small yellow area without changing your gaze. After a while, lift the paper away. You will see that the area which the paper has filled is purple. The eye is predisposed by the impression of the yellow to produce the violet from itself. In the same way, the blue will produce the orange, the red the green as a counter-effect. Each color sensation therefore has a living relationship to another in the eye. The states into which the eye is placed by perceptions are related in a similar way to the contents of these perceptions in the outside world.
[ 21 ] When light and darkness, light and dark act on the eye, this living organ confronts them with its demands; if they act on the things outside in space, these interact with them. Empty space has the property of transparency. It has no effect at all on light and darkness. These shine through it in their own vividness. It is different when the space is filled with things. This filling can be such that the eye is not aware of it because light and darkness shine through it in their original form. Then one speaks of transparent things. If light and darkness do not shine through a thing undiminished, it is called cloudy. The cloudy filling of space offers the possibility of observing light and darkness, light and dark in their mutual relationship. A light seen through a cloudy space appears yellow, a dark blue. The cloudy is a material thing that is illuminated by the light. Compared to a brighter, more vivid light behind it, the cloudy is dark; compared to a translucent darkness, it behaves as light. Thus, when a cloudy object opposes light or darkness, an existing light and an equally dark object really interact.
[ 22 ] If the cloudiness through which the light shines gradually increases, the yellow changes to yellow-red and then to ruby-red. If the opacity through which the dark penetrates decreases, the blue changes to indigo and finally to violet. Yellow and blue are primary colors. They are created by the interaction of the light or dark with the cloudy color. Both can take on a reddish tone, the former by increasing, the latter by reducing the cloudiness. Red is therefore not a basic color. It appears as a hue next to the yellow or blue. Yellow with its reddish nuances, which increase to pure red, is close to light, blue with its shades is related to darkness. When blue and yellow mix, the result is green; when blue, which is intensified to violet, mixes with yellow, which is darkened to red, the result is purple.
[ 23 ] Goethe traces these basic phenomena within nature. The bright disk of the sun seen through a pile of cloudy vapours appears yellow. Dark outer space, seen through the vapors of the atmosphere illuminated by daylight, appears as the blue of the sky. "In the same way the mountains also appear blue to us: for when we see them at such a distance that we no longer see the local colors, and no light from their surface affects our eye, they are regarded as a pure dark object, which now appears blue through the intervening vapors." (§ 156 of the didactic part of the Theory of Colors.)
[ 24 ] From his immersion in the works of art of the painters, Goethe felt the need to penetrate the laws to which the phenomena of the sense of sight are subject. Every painting posed a riddle for him. How does the chiaroscuro relate to the colors? What is the relationship between the individual colors? Why does yellow create a cheerful mood and blue a serious one? Newton's theory of color did not provide a point of view from which these mysteries could be unraveled. It derives all colors from light, juxtaposes them in stages and says nothing about their relationship to the dark, nor about their living relationships to one another. Goethe was able to solve the riddles that art had given him from the insights he had gained on his own. Yellow must possess a cheerful, lively, gently charming quality, for it is the closest color to light. It arises from the mildest moderation of it. Blue points to the dark that is at work in it. That is why it gives a feeling of coldness, just as "it also reminds us of shadows". The reddish yellow is created by increasing the yellow on the side of the dark. This intensification increases its energy. The cheerful, cheerfulness merges into the blissful. As soon as the increase goes even further, from reddish yellow to yellowish red, the cheerful, blissful feeling is transformed into an impression of violence. The violet is the blue striving towards the light. The calm and coldness of the blue thus becomes restlessness. This restlessness is further intensified in the blue-red. The pure red stands in the middle between yellow-red and blue-red. The storminess of the yellow appears diminished, the casual calm of the blue is revitalized. The red gives the impression of ideal satisfaction, the balancing of opposites. A feeling of satisfaction is also created by the green, which is a mixture of yellow and blue. But because the cheerfulness of the yellow is not heightened here and the calm of the blue is not disturbed by the reddish tone, the satisfaction will be purer than that produced by the red.
[ 25 ] When the eye is confronted with one color, it immediately demands another. If it sees yellow, it longs for violet; if it perceives blue, it desires orange; if it sees red, it desires green. It is understandable that the feeling of satisfaction arises when, next to one color presented to the eye, another is placed which it naturally desires. The law of color harmony arises from the nature of the eye. Colors that the eye demands next to each other appear harmonious. If two colors appear side by side, one of which does not demand the other, the eye is stimulated to counteract them. The combination of yellow and purple has something one-sided, but cheerful and splendid about it. The eye wants violet next to yellow in order to be able to express itself naturally. If purple takes the place of violet, the object asserts its claims against those of the eye. It does not submit to the demands of the organ. Compositions of this kind serve to point out the significance of things. They are not necessarily intended to satisfy, but to characterize. Colors that are not in complete contrast to one another, but which do not merge directly into one another, are suitable for such characteristic combinations. Compositions of the latter kind give the things in which they occur something characterless.
[ 26 ] The becoming and essence of light and color phenomena was revealed to Goethe in nature. He also recognized it in the creations of painters, in which it is raised to a higher level, translated into the spiritual. Goethe gained a deep insight into the relationship between nature and art through his observations of facial perceptions. He may well have been thinking of this when he wrote to Frau von Stein about these observations after completing the "Theory of Colors": "I am not sorry to have devoted so much time to them. I have thereby attained a culture that I would have found difficult to obtain from any other source."
[ 27 ] Goethe's theory of color is different from that of Newton and those physicists who base their views on Newton's ideas, because the former proceeds from a different world view than the latter. Anyone who does not see the connection between Goethe's general conceptions of nature and his theory of color, as described here, cannot help but believe that Goethe arrived at his conceptions of color because he lacked a sense for the physicist's genuine methods of observation. Anyone who sees through this connection will also realize that no other theory of color is possible within Goethe's view of the world than his own. He could not have thought differently about the nature of color phenomena than he did, even if all the discoveries made in this field since his time had been laid out before him, and even if he himself had been able to use the experimental methods that are now so perfected. Even if, after he became acquainted with the discovery of Fraunhofer's lines, he could not fully integrate them into his view of nature, neither they nor any other discovery in the optical field would be an objection to his view. In all this it is only a question of developing this Goethean conception in such a way that these phenomena fit into it in their sense. It must be admitted that those who stand on the point of view of Newton's conception cannot imagine anything in Goethe's views of color. However, this is not because such a physicist is familiar with phenomena that contradict Goethe's view, but because he has become accustomed to a view of nature that prevents him from recognizing what Goethe's view of nature actually wants.