Appendix. The Symbolism of Colors Applied to the Art of Oratory.
We close this book with an appendix which will serve for ornament. Before delivering up a suite of rooms, we are wont to embellish them with rich decorations. Architects usually color their plans. We also wish to give color to our criterion, by explaining the symbolism of colors.
The symbolism of colors.
In the literary world, color gives forms of speech consecrated by frequent usage. Thus we very often say: a florid style, a brilliant orator. This figurative language signifies that in order to shine, the orator must be adorned with the lustre of flowers. And as one flower excels others and pleases us by the beauty of its colors, so the orator must excel, and please by the brilliant shades of his diction. It is as impossible to give renown to a monotonous and colorless orator as to a faded, discolored flower. Would you give to the phenomena of your organism this beautiful corolla of the flower of your garden, throw your glance upon nature.
Nature speaks to the eye through an enchanting variety of colors, and these colors in turn teach man how he may himself speak to the eyes. The whole man might recognize himself under the smiling emblem of colors. Imagine him in whatever state you will, a color will give you the secret of his aspirations. And so it has been easy for us to show you the orator imaged in this colored chart, and we shall have no trouble in justifying our choice of colors.
Since man, as to his soul, presents himself in three states: the sensitive, intellectual and moral; and in his organism in the eccentric, concentric and normal states; a priori, you may conclude that nature has three colors to symbolize the three states, and experience will not contradict you.
In fact, red, yellow and blue are the primitive colors. All others are derived from these three rudimentary colors.
Why have we painted the column that corresponds to the life red? Because red is the color of blood, and the life is in the blood. But life is the fountain of strength and power. Hence red is the proper symbol of strength and power in God, in man and in the demon.
Why blue in the column of the concentric state, the mind? Because blue, from its transparency, is most soothing to our eyes.
Why yellow in the column of the soul? Because yellow has the color of flame; it is the true symbol of a soul set on fire by love. Yellow is, then, the emblem of pure love and of impure flames.
Why not use white in our chart? Because white is incandescence in the highest degree. We say of iron that it is at a red or a white heat. But in this world it is rare to see a heart at a white heat. Earthly thermometers do not mark this degree of heat.
It cannot be denied that red, yellow and blue are the three elementary colors, whose union gives birth to all the varieties that delight our eyes. We have proof of this in one of nature's most beautiful phenomena--the rainbow.
The rainbow is composed of seven colors. Here we distinguish the red, yellow and blue in all their purity; then from the fusion of these three primary colors, we have violet, orange, green and indigo.
This is the order in which the seven colors of the rainbow appear to us:
Violet (red}, orange (yellow), green (blue), indigo. Orange is composed of yellow and red. Yellow mixed with blue, produces green. Blue when saturated, becomes indigo. Upon closer investigation, we may easily find the nine shades which correspond perfectly to the nine operations of our faculties, and to the nine functions of angelic minds.
By complicating and blending the mixture of these colors, we shall have all the tints that make nature so delightful a paradise.
The seven notes of music sound in accord with the seven colors of the rainbow. There is a brotherhood between the seven notes and the seven colors.
The voice-apparatus, with that of speech and gesture, is for the orator a pallet like that upon which the painter prepares and blends those colors which, under the brush of a Raphael, would at once glow forth in a masterpiece.
Delsarte's criterion is true; still more, it is beautiful, especially so with its brilliant adornment of the colors of the rainbow.
We verify our judgment by an explanation of the colored chart.
As may be seen, this chart is an exact reproduction of the criterion explained at the beginning of this book, only we have adorned it with colors analogous to the different states of the soul that art is called upon to reproduce.
Beginning with the three transverse columns corresponding to the genus, we have painted the lower column red, the middle column yellow, and the upper one blue. These are the three colors that symbolize the life, soul and mind, as well as the genera.
Passing to the vertical columns which correspond to species, we have painted the first column red, the second yellow, and the third blue, passing from left to right. The blending of these colors produces the variety of shades we might have in this representation.
Blue added to blue gives indigo; blue with yellow gives a deep green; with red, violet. Yellow passed over to the middle column, gives bright green upon blue; pure yellow, when passed upon yellow, and orange upon red.
Thus pure red will be the expression of the sensitive state or the life. Orange will render soul from life, and violet will be the symbol of mind from life.
Applying this process of examination to the two other columns, we shall know by one symbolic color, what the soul wishes at the present hour, and these same colors will, besides, serve to regulate the attitude of our organs.
Honor and thanks to the genius which gives us this criterion, where is reflected the harmony of all worlds!