Works of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

  632

  Thus a yellow ingredient appears to belong more essentially to leaves than a blue one; for this last vanishes in the autumn, and the yellow of the leaf appears changed to a brown colour. Still more remarkable, however, are the particular cases where leaves in autumn again become pure yellow, and others increase to the brightest red.

  633

  Other plants, again, may, by artificial treatment be entirely converted to a colouring matter, which is as fine, active, and infinitely divisible as any other. Indigo and madder, with which so much is effected, are examples : lichens are also used for dyes.

  634

  To this fact another stands immediately opposed; we can, namely, extract the colouring part of plants, and, as it were, exhibit it apart, while the organisation does not on this account appear to suffer at all. The colours of flowers may be extracted by spirits of wine, and tinge it; the petals meanwhile becoming white.

  635

  There are various modes of acting on flowers and their juices by re-agents. This has been done by Boyle in many experiments. Roses are bleached by sulphur, and may be restored to their first state by other acids; roses are turned green by the smoke of tobacco.

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  LII. Worms, Insects, Fishes.

  636

  WITH regard to creatures belonging to the lower degrees of organisation, we may first observe that worms, which live in the earth and remain in darkness and cold moisture, are imperfectly negatively coloured; worms bred in warm moisture and darkness are colourless; light seems expressly necessary to the definite exhibition of colour.

  637

  Creatures which live in water, which, although a very dense medium, suffers sufficient light to pass through it, appear more or less coloured. Zoophytes, which appear to animate the purest calcareous earth, are mostly white; yet we find corals deepened into the most beautiful yellow-red: in other cells of worms this colour increases nearly to bright red.

  638

  The shells of the crustaceous tribe are beautifully designed and coloured, yet it is to be remarked that neither land-snails nor the shells of crustacea of fresh water, are adorned with such bright colours as those of the sea.

  639

  In examining shells, particularly such as are spiral, we find that a series of animal organs, similar to each other, must have moved increasingly forward, and in turning on an axis, produced the shell in a series of chambers, divisions, tubes, and prominences, according to a plan for ever growing larger. We remark, however, that a tinging juice must have accompanied the development of these organs, a juice which marked the surface of the shell, probably through the immediate co-operation of the sea-water, with coloured lines, points, spots, and shadings: this must have taken place at regular intervals, and thus left the indications of increasing growth lastingly on the exterior; meanwhile the interior is generally found white or only faintly coloured.

  640

  That such a juice is to be found in shell-fish is, besides, sufficiently proved by experience; for the creatures furnish it in its liquid and colouring state : the juice of the ink-fish is an example. But a much stronger is exhibited in the red juice found in many shell-fish, which was so famous in ancient times, and has been employed with advantage by the moderns. There is, it appears, in the entrails of many of the crustaceous tribe a certain vessel which is filled with a red juice; this contains a very strong and durable colouring substance, so much so that the entire creature may be crushed and boiled, and yet out of this broth a sufficiently strong tinging liquid may be extracted. But the little vessel filled with colour may be separated from the animal, by which means of course a concentrated juice is gained.

  641

  This juice has the property that when exposed to light and air it appears first yellowish, then greenish; it then passes to blue, then to a violet, gradually growing redder; and lastly, by the action of the sun, and especially if transferred to cambric, it assumes a pure bright red colour,

  642

  Thus we should here have an augmentation, even to culmination, on the minus side, which we cannot easily meet with in inorganic cases; indeed, we might almost call this example a passage through the whole scale, and we are persuaded that by due experiments the entire revolution of the circle might really be effected, for there is no doubt that by acids duly employed, the pure red may be pushed beyond the culminating point towards scarlet.

  643

  This juice appears on the one hand to be connected with the phenomena of reproduction, eggs being found, the embryos of future shell-fish, which contain a similar colouring principle. On the other hand, in animals ranking higher in the scale of being, the secretion appears to bear some relation to the development of the blood. The blood exhibits similar properties in regard to colour; in its thinnest state it appears yellow; thickened, as it is found in the veins, it appears red; while the arterial blood exhibits a brighter red, probably owing to the oxydation which takes place by means of breathing. The venous blood approaches more to violet, and by this mutability denotes the tendency to that augmentation and progression which are now familiar to us.

  644

  Before we quit the element whence we derived the foregoing examples, we may add a few observations on fishes, whose scaly surface is coloured either altogether in stripes, or in spots, and still oftener exhibits a certain iridescent appearance, indicating the affinity of the scales with the coats of shell-fish, mother-of-pearl, and even the pearl itself. At the same time it should not be forgotten that warmer climates, the influence of which extends to the watery regions, produce, embellish, and enhance these colours in fishes in a still greater degree.

  645

  In Otaheite, Forster observed fishes with beautifully iridescent surfaces, and this effect was especially apparent at the moment when the fish died. We may here call to mind the hues of the chameleon, and other similar appearances; for when similar facts are presented together, we are better enabled to trace them.

  646

  Lastly, although not strictly in the same class, the iridescent appearance of certain molusc may be mentioned, as well as the phosphorescence which, in some marine creatures, it is said becomes iridescent just before it vanishes.

  647

  We now turn our attention to those creatures which belong to light, air and dry warmth, and it is here that we first find ourselves in the living region of colours. Here, in exquisitely organised parts, the elementary colours present themselves in their greatest purity and beauty.

  They indicate, however, that the creatures they adorn, are still low in the scale of organisation, precisely because these colours can thus appear, as it were, unwrought. Here,, too, heat seems to contribute much to their development.

  648

  We find insects which may be considered altogether as concentrated colouring matter; among these, the cochineals especially are celebrated; with regard to these we observe that their mode of settling on vegetables, and even nestling in them, at the same time produces those excrescences which are so useful as mordants in fixing colours.

  649

  But the power of colour, accompanied by regular organisation, exhibits itself in the most striking manner in those insects which require a perfect metamorphosis for their development — in scarabeaei, and especially in butterflies.

  650

  These last, which might be called true productions of light and air, often exhibit the most beautiful colours, even in their chrysalis state, indicating the future colours of the butterfly; a consideration which, if pursued further hereafter, must undoubtedly afford a satisfactory insight into many a secret of organised being.

  651

  If, again, we examine the wings of the butterfly more accurately, and in its net-like web discover the rudiments of an arm, and observe further the mode in which this, as it were, flattened arm is covered with tender plumage and constituted an organ of flying; we believe we recognise a law according to which the great variety of tints is reg
ulated. This will be a subject for further investigation hereafter.

  652

  That, again, heat generally has an influence on the size of the creature, on the accomplishment of the form, and on the greater beauty of the colours, hardly needs to be remarked.

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  LIII. Birds.

  653

  THE more we approach the higher organisations, the more it becomes necessary to limit ourselves to a few passing observations; for all the natural conditions of such organised beings are the result of so many premises, that, without having at least hinted at these, our remarks would only. appear daring, and at the same time insufficient.

  654

  We find in plants, that the consummate flower and fruit are, as it were, rooted in the stem, and that they are nourished by more perfect juices than the original roots first afforded; we remark, too, that parasitical plants which derive their support from organised structures, exhibit themselves especially endowed as to their energies and qualities. We might in some sense compare the feathers of birds with plants of this description; the feathers spring up as a last structural result from the surface of a body which has yet much in reserve for the completion of the external economy, and thus are very richly endowed organs.

  655

  The quills not only grow proportionally to a considerable size, but are throughout branched, by which means they properly become feathers, and many of these feathered branches are again subdivided; thus, again, recalling the structure of plants.

  656

  The feathers are very different in shape and size, but each still remains the same organ, forming and transforming itself according to the constitution of the part of the body from which it springs.

  657

  With the form, the colour also becomes changed, and a certain law regulates the general order of hues as well as that particular distribution by which a single feather becomes party coloured. It is from this that all combination of variegated plumage arises, and whence, at last, the eyes in the peacock’s tail are produced. It is a result similar to that which we have already unfolded in treating of the metamorphosis of plants, and which we shall take an early opportunity to prove.

  658

  Although time and circumstances compel us here to pass by this organic law, yet we are bound to refer to the chemical operations which commonly exhibit themselves in the tinting of feathers in a mode now sufficiently known to us,

  659

  Plumage is of all colours, yet, on the whole, yellow deepening to red is commoner than blue.

  660

  The operation of light on the feathers and their colours, is to be remarked in all cases. Thus, for example, the feathers on the breast of certain parrots, are strictly yellow; the scale-like anterior portion, which is acted on by the light, is deepened from yellow to red. The breast of such a bird appears bright-red, but if we blow into the feathers the yellow appears.

  661

  The exposed portion of the feathers is in all cases very different from that which, in a quiet state, is covered; it is only the exposed portion, for instance, in ravens, which exhibits the iridescent appearance; the covered portion does not : from which indication, the feathers of the tail when ruffled together, may be at once placed in the natural order again.

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  LIV. Mammalia and Human Beings.

  662

  HERE the elementary colours begin to leave us altogether. We are arrived at the highest degree of the scale, and shall not dwell on its characteristics long,

  663

  An animal of this class is distinguished among the examples of organised being, Every thing that exhibits itself about him is living. Of the internal structure we do not speak, but confine ourselves briefly to the surface. The hairs are already distinguished from feathers, inasmuch as they belong more to the skin, inasmuch as they are simple, thread-like, not branched. They are however, like feathers, shorter, longer, softer, and firmer, colourless or coloured, and all this in conformity to laws which might be defined.

  664

  White and black, yellow, yellow-red and brown, alternate in various modifications, but they never appear in such a state as to remind us of the elementary hues. On the contrary,

  they are all broken colours subdued by organic concoction, and thus denote, more or less, the perfection of life in the being they belong to.

  665

  One of the most important considerations connected with morphology, so far as it relates to surfaces, is this, that even in quadrupeds the spots of the skin have a relation with the parts underneath them. Capriciously as nature here appears, on a hasty examination, to operate, she nevertheless consistently observes a secret law. The development and application of this, it is true, are reserved only for accurate and careful investigation and sincere co-operation.

  666

  If in some animals portions appear variegated with positive colours, this of itself shows how far such creatures are removed from a perfect organisation; for, it may be said, the nobler a creature is, the more all the mere material of which he is composed, is disguised by being wrought together; the more essentially his surface corresponds with the internal organisation, the less can it exhibit the elementary colours. Where all tends to make up a perfect whole, any detached specific developments cannot tale place.

  667

  Of man we have little to say, for he is entirely distinct from the general physiological results of which we now treat. So much in this case is in affinity with the internal structure, that the surface can only be sparingly endowed.

  668

  When we consider that brutes are rather encumbered than advantageously provided with intercutaneous muscles; when we see that much that is superfluous tends to the surface,

  for instance, large ears and tails, as well as hair, manes, tufts; we see that nature, in such cases, had much to give away and to lavish.

  669

  On the contrary, the general surface of the human form is smooth and clean, and thus in the most perfect examples the beautiful forms are apparent; for it may be remarked in passing, that a superfluity of hair on the chest, arms, and lower limbs, rather indicates weakness than strength. Poets only have sometimes been induced, probably by the example of the ferine nature, so strong in other respects, to extol similar attributes in their rough heroes.

  670

  But we have here chiefly to speak of colour, and observe that the colour of the human skin, in all its varieties, is never an elementary colour, but presents, by means of organic concoction, a highly complicated result. — Note X.

  671

  That the colour of the skin and hair has relation with the differences of character, is beyond question; and we are led to conjecture that the circumstance of one or other organic system predominating, produces the varieties we see. A similar hypothesis may be applied to nations, in which case it might perhaps be observed, that certain colours correspond with certain confirmations, which has always been observed of the negro physiognomy,

  672

  Lastly, we might here consider the problematical question, whether all human forms and hues are not equally beautiful, and whether custom and self-conceit are not the causes why one is preferred to another? We venture, however, after what has been adduced, to assert that the white man, that is, he whose surface varies from white to reddish, yellowish, brownish, in short, whose surface appears most neutral in hue and least inclines to any particular or positive colour, is the most beautiful. On the same principle a similar point of perfection in human conformation may be defined hereafter, when the question relates to form. We do not

  imagine that this long-disputed question is to be thus, once for all, settled, for there are persons enough who have reason to leave this significancy of the exterior in doubt; but we thus express a conclusion, derived from observation and reflection, such as might suggest itself to a mind aiming at a satisfactory decision. We subjoin a few observations connected with th
e elementary chemical doctrine of colours. — Note Y.

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  LV. Physical and Chemical Effects of the Transmission of Light Through Coloured Mediums.

  673

  The physical and chemical effects of colourless light are known, so that it is unnecessary here to describe them at length. Colourless light exhibits itself under various conditions as exciting warmth, as imparting a luminous quality to certain bodies, as promoting oxydation and de-oxydation. In the modes and degrees of these effects many varieties take place, but no difference is found indicating a principle of contrast such as we find in the transmission of coloured light. We proceed briefly to advert to this.

  674

  Let the temperature of a dark room be observed by means of a very sensible air thermometer; if the bulb is then brought to the direct sum light as it shines into, the room, nothing is more natural than that the fluid should indicate a much higher degree of warmth. If upon this we interpose coloured glasses, it follows again quite naturally that the degree of warmth must be lowered; first, because the operation of the direct light is already somewhat impeded by the glass, and again, more especially, because a coloured glass, as a dark medium, admits less light through it.

  675

  But here a difference in the excitation of warmth exhibits itself to the attentive observer, according to the colour of the glass. The yellow and the yellow-red glasses produce a higher temperature than the blue and blue-red, the difference being considerable.

  676

  This experiment may be made with the prismatic spectrum. The temperature of the room being first remarked on the thermometer, the blue coloured light is made to fall on the bulb, when a somewhat higher degree of warmth is exhibited, which still increases as the other colours are gradually brought to act on the mercury. If the experiment is made with the water-prism, so that the white light can be retained in the centre, this, refracted indeed, but not yet coloured light, is the warmest; the other colours, stand in relation to each other as before.