Furthermore let the _soi-disant_ disciples ponder this
explicit statement of the Master: "Given the conditions I haye tried to
explain as constituting good art,--then, if it be devoted further to the
increase of men's happiness, to the redemption of the oppressed, or the
enlargement of our sympathies with each other, or to such presentment of
new or old truth about ourselves and our relation to the world as may
ennoble and fortify us in our sojourn here, or immediately, as with
Dante, to the glory of God, it will also be great Art." Yes, if Pater
protested against "the vulgarity which is dead to form," he was no less
contemptuous of "the stupidity which is dead to the substance."
("Postscript to Appreciations.") If he fought shy of the Absolute, if he
denied "fixed principles," and repudiated "every formula less living and
flexible than life" ("Essay on Coleridge"), he could still sympathise
passionately with Coleridge's hunger for the Eternal.
So much for the literary art. But even in painting, where the
self-sufficiency of style is proclaimed somewhat more speciously, the
purveyor of Chelsea ware will find scant countenance in the adored
Master. Nowhere can I find him preaching "Art for Art's sake," in the
jejune sense of the empty-headed acolytes of the aesthetic.
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