Creative Intuition in Art and Poetry by Jacques Maritain (review)

BOOK REVIEWS 588 writings, he deals at length with Peirce's theory of knowledge (the assault on Cartesianism, critical commonsensism, and the doctrine of ThoughtSigns ) in three chapters. The originality and value of Peirce's criticisms of Descartes are ascribed to his superior logical equipment, which enabled him to detect the uncriticized presuppositions of that thinker. Peirce's critical commonsensism is shown to imply a rejection of all absolutely first principles, in whose place he puts conjecture as suggested by an experience that is ever subject to change and development. The treatment of the theory of signs is reasonably full, and leads to a discussion of Pragmatism, understood by Peirce rather as a principle of logic than, as in James, as a principle of a metaphysic. Prof. Gallie devotes a chapter to an ambiguity in Peirce's Pragmatism, which claims to provide a general criterion of empirical meaningfulness, whereas it in fact is adapted only to determine the meaning of standard scientific expressions. Peirce's metaphysics is the object of the last two chapters, which consider his categories, and his cosmology; the ontology is considered to be of more importance than the cosmology, whose chief value is placed in its showing up of the defects of classical mechanicism. Prof. Gallic has succeeded in presenting us with a good, reliable and clear introduction to the philosophy of Peirce in its main outline. We may not agree with his own personal philosophic stand-point, and may feel that we would criticize where he often approves; but he does not und,;ly intrude his own views upon the reader (which cannot be said for some of the other similar books of this series) and is for the most part content with the humbler task of the objective historian. It is surely such who, in the long run, do the greatest service to those thinkers whom they admire so much. Collegia Angelicum Rome, Italy AMBROSE J. McNxcHOLL, 0. P. Creative Intuition in Art and Poetry. By Jacques Maritain. New York: Pantheon, 1953. Pp. 4~3 with index. $6.50. The purpose of this book is twofold: first, to make clear the distinct yet indissoluble relationship between art and poetry, and secondly, to reveal the essential part played by the intellect in both art and poetry, and especially to show that poetry has its source in the preconceptual life of the intellect. Art, in this context, is taken to mean " the creative or producing, work-making activity of the human mind," and poetry is not " the particular art which consists in writing verses but a process both more general and more primary: that intercommunication between the inner being of things and the inner being of the human Self which is a 584 BOOK REVIEWS kind of divination. Poetry, in this sense, is the secret life of all the arts." (p. 3) Many other aims are fulfilled, not least of which is the exhaustive revelation of the author's mind on all related subjects. The book has, we think, a threefold division. We may divide it: 1) Introduction to Creative Intuition, ~) Creative Intuition in the Artist, and 3) ,Creative Intuition in the Work. The Introduction comprises two chapters; the first carries out an inductive investigation of the world's art, the second considers art as a practical virtue, and lays some groundwork for the thesis of the work. Creative Intuition in the Artist is then studied through the four causes in the next four chapters. In Chapter Three the author considers the efficient cause; in Chapter Four the material and formal cause; in Chapters Five and Six the final cause. The third main division, Creative Intuition in the Work, considers the meaning of the work in three steps; in Chapter Seven, the essential meaning; in Chapter Eight the transmission of the meaning; and in the final Chapter, the full meaning. The author shows that all art has its roots in poetic intuition. Oriental art, though intent on things, nevertheless reveals obscurely the Self, or the subjectivity of the artist. Occidental art, though increasingly intent on the Self, nevertheless reveals obscurely the inner side of Things. Two arts, intent on opposite poles of interests, come out with...