Contemplating the Beautiful

Whatever is true,
Whatever is honorable,
Whatever is just,
Whatever is pure
Whatever is pleasing,
Whatever is commendable,
If there is any excellence,
And if there is anything worthy of praise,
Think about these things.
St. Paul


It seems to me that at the heart of theology, philosophy, spirituality, and religion is the idea of a life well lived. In their different ways, each discipline tries to find an answer to that perennial human search. What does a well-lived life look like? What would make us decent human beings?

British philosopher G.E. Moore just over 100 years ago in his Principia Ethica reached his conclusion about the life well lived. It consisted in two things: friendship and contemplation of the beautiful. These, for Moore, were what made life worth living. His was not a novel suggestion. I think you can find very similar thoughts in Plato and Aristotle. Nonetheless, I find Moore’s conclusion very appealing.

Moore’s idea is subject to the criticism that both friendship and contemplation of beauty are luxuries for those who already have their basic human needs met. If you are poor and have no food or decent shelter, then what need of friendship and beauty? So goes the argument. However, I could make the argument—but not here—that for all human beings, in whatever physical condition, friendship and beauty are what make life tolerable.

Friendship is close to my heart, but it is the contemplation of beauty I want to think about today. It is in that poetic passage of St. Paul where he urges us to think about beauty—the true, honorable, just, pure, pleasing, commendable, excellent and worthy of praise. These things are nourishment for the human spirit. Deprived of beauty we wither and die.

Paul’s little poem leads to expansive ideas of beauty and what is might mean to think about beauty. Every conceivable thing that is true, honorable, just, pure, pleasing, commendable, excellent and worthy of praise is beautiful. Physical objects, works of art, nature, people, music, activities, non-human animals, crafts, and engineering—the list goes on. Beauty is expansive, if we have eyes to see.

Thinking too is expansive. It is not merely the rationality of the calculation. In the Post-Enlightenment world we have tended to separate thought from feeling in a severe way. If one is feeling, then one is not thinking. Yet, surely to think involves both reasoning and feeling. Reasons and emotions are all part of the complexity of thinking. This is important when we consider contemplation of the beautiful. It is not a calculating analysis of a sunset or thinking about the meaning of a walk in the woods. To think about—to contemplate—the purely sensual delight of walking in the woods is to be there, to experience, to feel, to be swallowed, to be overwhelmed. That is to contemplate beauty. To think about the beauty of music is not to analyze the notes, the melody, the rhythm, the harmony (though for some folk that is contemplation), it is to feel the music, to be taken up by it, to be absorbed in it.

That feeds the soul.

I do not think that Moore has the last word on a life well lived. But, I think he was on to something. So was St. Paul.