Chapter IV: Preface: To the Third Edition

The present edition has been entirely revised; some obscurities cleared up, and a chapter on Military Clothing added. The application of Chevreul’s reasoning will doubtless tend to a rational view of this much debated question. It affords much satisfaction to all concerned in the diffusion of the principles enunciated in this work, to observe that they are being generally applied in this country, thus realizing the hopes originally expressed by the translator.

TRANSLATOR’S PREFACE.

Colour, a universal source of enjoyment, so essential an element of decorative art, has not been hitherto the subject of such investigations as to place its powers, harmonies, and discordances among matters of scientific certainty. A few traditionary dogmas have been the only guide of ordinary workmen, while success in design, as well as in the higher regions of art, has been dependent upon that rare union of faculties vaguely denoted by the indefinite, unsatisfactory term, “taste.”

The arrangement of colours in manufactures of English design—since the decline of mediæval art—has commonly been condemned as notoriously arbitrary, destitute of any reference to principle, and deficient in that satisfying richness and beauty which result from harmonious combinations. Although often overcharged with colour, and of costly elaboration, our manufactures have too often proved that the designer—in ignorance of a true, infallible standard—has mistaken gaudiness for splendour, and capricious strangeness for improvement; and, for want of a better claim to popular favour, has constantly sought it by “leaning on novelty, his fickle, frail support.”

The established preference of French designs was shown, by the Great Exhibition of 1851, to be, in the main, well-founded; and one of the leading causes of the perfect success of some objects was found in the fact, that they had been designed and executed in accordance with a well-defined set of principles, extensively taught in France to designers, workmen, and others. These principles it is the purpose of this book to set forth, to illustrate, and to apply to every art of which the choice and arrangement of colours is an element.

The author, M. Chevreul, before the publication of this work, had gained high reputation by his researches in organic chemistry. In his “Considerations sur l’Analyse Organique,” he enunciated principles which, carried into practice in his “Recherches sur les Corps Gras d’origine animal,” opened the path which has been rendered illustrious by Liebig and others. But, being appointed Director of the Dye Works of the Gobelins, he was compelled to abandon these researches—the field in which, “having sown, he had, as it were, only to reap,”—that he might fully investigate the principles involved in the assortment of colours.

M. Chevreul’s earnest attention to this inquiry was continued during ten years, with ample opportunities for investigation. For twenty-five years he has been in the habit of lecturing to workmen, artists, &c. The undisputed superiority of those French manufactures in which these instructions have been fully carried out, has evinced his success and rewarded his exertions.

Aware of the important influence of such knowledge, the Chamber of Commerce of Lyons solicited and obtained from the French Government permission for M. Chevreul to lecture there to the artisans especially, to whom printed copies of the lectures were afterwards gratuitously distributed.

As the present Work contains the substance of these instructions, we may hope that our own industrious countrymen may not long be without a similar advantage.

The value of this book has been universally recognised, and it has already been translated into several languages, although but recently into our own. A recent critic has said, with equal truth and eloquence,—“Rarely has a subject of inquiry, so fraught with beautiful and ready applications, been presented to us. To be familiar with this book is to possess a new sense. Every object in art and nature speaks a new and exciting language. Colour becomes music to the eye. We become impatient of any violent infringement of the principles of harmony, and seek every opportunity of putting our newly-acquired knowledge into practice. The minuteness of investigation, and the copiousness of illustration which characterize this volume are truly remarkable; the most untutored mind cannot fail to understand it, if steady attention be given. As a preparation for a course of scientific study, it is invaluable, for it is an excellent example of the Baconian method of investigation.”

EXTRACTS FROM THE AUTHOR’S PREFACE.

In seeking to discover the causes of the complaint made of the quality of certain colours prepared in the dyeing laboratory of the Gobelins, I was at once convinced, that, although the complaints concerning the instability of the light blues, greys, and browns, might be well founded, there were others, especially those of a want of vigour in the blacks employed for the shadows of blue and violet draperies, which were not so; for, having procured black-dyed wools from the most celebrated dye works in France and other countries, and having found that they were not superior to those of the Gobelins, I saw that the want of vigour alleged against the blacks was owing to the colours contiguous to them, and that the matter was involved in the phenomena of _the contrast of colours_.

It was thus demonstrated to me that I had two absolutely distinct subjects to investigate, in order to fulfil my duties as Director of the Dye Works; the first being the contrast of colours, considered in the most general manner, both in relation to science and to its applications: the second—the chemistry of dyeing. These are the two centres around which have converged all my researches during the last ten years.

In fact, numerous observations made during several months, on the view of coloured objects, which were verified by my pupils and others, much accustomed in their profession to judge of colours and to appreciate the least differences between them, have been collected and described as well-known facts. Upon reflecting on the mutual relations of these facts, and in seeking the principle of which they were the results, I was led to the discovery of that which I have named the “Law of Simultaneous Contrast of Colours.” Thus this work is the fruit of the method _à posteriori_: facts are observed, defined, described, then generalized in a simple expression, which has all the characters of a law of nature. This law, once demonstrated, becomes a means, _à priori_, of assorting coloured objects so as to obtain their best possible effect, according to the taste of the person who arranges them; it becomes also a means of estimating whether the eyes are well organized for seeing and judging of colours; and whether painters have copied exactly the colours of known objects.

In reviewing the Law of Contrast with regard to its application, and in submitting to experiment all the laws which appear to me to result from it, I have been led to extend it to the arts of tapestry, to the various sorts of painting and printing, to illuminating, horticulture, &c. But, in order to anticipate the judgments of some readers, upon the value of the opinions I have advanced (2nd part, 2nd division) respecting the Gobelins and Beauvais tapestry and the Savonnerie carpets, I must state, that, being an entire stranger to the inspection and direction of the works which are executed in the Royal manufactories, as well as to the choice of models, my views and opinions should be regarded only as those of an individual who has had frequent occasion to see and examine various artistic productions, on the preparation of which he could exercise no influence, the duties which attach me to the Gobelins being exclusively those of Director of its Dye Works.

THE LAWS OF

Harmony and Contrast of Colours.