o, evidence on the whole
favourable to their case. Be that as it may, this theory, which once
seemed paradoxical, quite loses its fantastic air when considered in the
light of our discovery. Had art anything to do with opinion it would be
strange, indeed, if new art were ill-received by those who like their
opinions new. But as art has nothing whatever to do with such things
there is no more reason why a Radical should like new forms of art than
why he should like new brands of tea.

The essential qualities of a work of art are purely artistic; and since
politicians, if not too coarse by nature, soon make themselves so by
practice, to apprehend these they must, unless they can leave art alone,
seek its significance in what is unessential. Progressive politicians,
who have a way of taking ethics under their wing and even conceive
themselves the active promoters of good, are apt to seek it in morals.
One might have supposed that a message was to be found as easily in
new forms of art as in old; but, unluckily, new forms are to most
incomprehensible. And though to a hardened sinner here and there what
is incomprehensible may be nothing worse than disconcerting, to him
who seeks good in all things, and is constantly on the look-out for
uplifting influences, whatever disappoints this longing is positively
and terribly evil. Now, a new and genuine work of art is something
unmistakably alive and, at the same time, unprovided, as yet, with moral
credentials. It is unintelligible without being negligible. It comes
from an unfamiliar world and shakes a good man's belief in the obvious.
It must be very wicked. And the proper reaction to what is wicked is a
blind fury of moral indignation. Well, blind fury is blind. So no one
could be much worse placed than the political moralist for seeing
whatever there may be to be seen in what is, at once, strange and
subtle.

We are in a position now to clear up another difficulty, which has
distressed so deeply the best and wisest of men that to get rid of
it some have felt justified in tampering with the truth. If art had
anything to do with politics, evidently art should have flourished most
gloriously in those ages of political freedom which do us all so much
credit. The necessity of this inference has been felt strongly enough by
Liberal historians to make them accept without demur the doctrine that
the age of Pericles was the great age of visual art, and repeat it
without mentioning th