Dr. Tillich has stated that “the principles which constitute the universe must be sought in man,” and the converse is true, that what is found in man’s experience is to some extent a reflection of what is true in the universe. This can be clearly illustrated in art. A picture is never beautiful if it is not honest, and to the extent that it is honest, that is, represents the immediate, deep and original perceptions and experience of the artist, it will have at least the beginnings of beauty.
This is why the art work of children, when it is an expression of their simple and honest feelings, is almost always beautiful: any line one makes as a free, spontaneous person will have in it the beginning of grace and rhythm. The harmony, balance and rhythm which are principles of the universe, present in the movement of stars as well as atoms, and underlying our concepts of beauty, are likewise present in the harmony of rhythm and balance of the body as well as other aspects of the self. But at the moment the child begins to copy, or to draw to get praise from adults, or to draw by rules, the lines become rigid, constricted, and the grace vanishes.
The truth in the “inner light” tradition in religious history is that one must always begin with himself. “No one has known God,” said Meister Eckhart, “who has not known himself—fly to the soul, the secret place of the Most High.” Relating this truth to Socrates, Kierkegaard writes, “In the Socratic view each individual is his own center, and the entire world centers in him, because his self-knowledge is a knowledge of God.” This is not the whole story of ethics and the good life, but certainly if we do not start there we will get no place.