Aquinas on Beauty

Aquinas on Beauty explores the nature and role of beauty in the thought of Thomas Aquinas. Beginning with a standard definition of beauty provided by Aquinas, it explores each of the components of that definition. The result is a comprehensive account of Aquinass formal view on the subject, supplemented by an exploration into Aquinass commentary on Dionysiuss Divine Names, including a comparison of his views with those of both Dionysius and those of Aquinass mentor, Albert the Great. The book also highlights the tight connection in Aquinass thought between aesthetics and ethics, and illustrates how Aquinas preserves what is best about aesthetic traditions preceding him, and anticipates what is best about aesthetic traditions that would follow, marrying objective and subjective aesthetic intuitions and charting a kind of via media between the common extremes.