Beauty

It Must Be Beautiful “Both men [Einstein and Dirac] were captivated by the belief that the fundamental equations of physics must be beautiful.” xiv According to Einstein’s son Hans, “the highest praise for a good theory or a good piece of work was not that it was correct nor that it was exact but that it was beautiful.” xv

“it is certainly true that mathematical beauty is an important criterion for physicists in evaluating alternative theories.” Holder p.19

Ode on a Grecian Urn John Keats

Thou still unravished bride of quietness, Thou foster-child of silence and slow time, Sylvan historian, who canst thus express A flowery tale more sweetly than our rhyme: What leaf-fringed legend haunts about thy shape Of deities or mortals, or of both, In Tempe or the dales of Arcady? What men or gods are these? What maidens loth? What mad pursuit? What struggle to escape? What pipes and timbrels? What wild ecstasy? Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard Are sweeter; therefore, ye soft pipes, play on; Not to the sensual ear, but, more endeared, Pipe to the spirit ditties of no tone: Fair youth, beneath the trees, thou canst not leave Thy song, nor ever can those trees be bare; Bold Lover, never, never canst thou kiss, Though winning near the goal — yet, do not grieve; She cannot fade, though thou hast not thy bliss, Forever wilt thou love, and she be fair! Ah, happy, happy boughs! that cannot shed Your leaves, nor ever bid the Spring adieu; And, happy melodist, unwearied, Forever piping songs forever new; More happy love! more happy, happy love! Forever warm and still to be enjoyed, Forever panting, and forever young; All breathing human passion far above, That leaves a heart high-sorrowful and cloyed, A burning forehead, and a parching tongue. Who are these coming to the sacrifice? To what green altar, O mysterious priest, Lead'st thou that heifer lowing at the skies, And all her silken flanks with garlands dressed? What little town by river or sea shore, Or mountain-built with peaceful citadel, Is emptied of this folk, this pious morn? And, little town, thy streets for evermore Will silent be; and not a soul to tell Why thou art desolate, can e'er return. O Attic shape! Fair attidude! with brede Of marble men and maidens overwrought, With forest branches and the trodden weed; Thou, silent form, dost tease us out of thought As doth eternity: Cold Pastoral! When old age shall this generation waste, Thou shalt remain, in midst of other woe Than ours, a friend to man, to whom thou say'st, "Beauty is truth, truth beauty, — that is all Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know."

All things bright and beautiful, All creatures great and small, All things wise and wonderful, The Lord God made them all.

Sing aloud, loud, loud. sing aloud, loud, loud. God is good Sing aloud, loud, loud! sing aloud, loud, loud! God is good! God is truth! God is beauty! Praise him!

Matisse Chapel - Vence https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AsDh5WdZLEo

God: the source of all aesthetic beauty. God: found in beauty God: the source of all aesthetic beauty. God: found in beauty. Beauty: good and true and divine.

Pied Beauty Gerard Manley Hopkins Glory be to God for dappled things – For skies of couple-colour as a brinded cow; For rose-moles all in stipple upon trout that swim; Fresh-firecoal chestnut-falls; finches’ wings; Landscape plotted and pieced – fold, fallow, and plough; And áll trádes, their gear and tackle and trim. All things counter, original, spare, strange; Whatever is fickle, freckled (who knows how?) With swift, slow; sweet, sour; adazzle, dim; He fathers-forth whose beauty is past change: Praise him.

Implications? Personal – self-esteem; mental health? Social – who do we value? How do we judge? Spiritual – Where is God to be found?

BUT ……

Isaiah 53 He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him,     nothing in his appearance that we should desire him. He was despised and rejected by mankind,     a man of suffering, and familiar with pain. Like one from whom people hide their faces     he was despised, and we held him in low esteem.

Matthias Grünewald (1480-1528) The Crucifixion

Beauty?

Beauty?

Beauty? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TSJGJC33df8

Beauty?

The Beauty of Self-giving Love Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I have become sounding brass or a clanging cymbal. 2 And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. 3 And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, but have not love, it profits me nothing. 4 Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; 5 does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; 6 does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; 7 bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. 8 Love never fails. But whether there are prophecies, they will fail; whether there are tongues, they will cease; whether there is knowledge, it will vanish away. 9 For we know in part and we prophesy in part. 10 But when that which is perfect has come, then that which is in part will be done away. 11 When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things. 12 For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know just as I also am known. 13 And now abide faith, hope, love, these three; but the greatest of these is love. 1 Corinthians 13

God: the source of all ethical beauty. God: found in beauty God: the source of all ethical beauty. God: found in beauty. Beauty: good and true and divine.

Sing aloud, loud, loud. sing aloud, loud, loud. God is good Sing aloud, loud, loud! sing aloud, loud, loud! God is good! God is truth! God is beauty! Praise him!