PART ONE

LITERATURE AND ART

I

THE DEGRADATION OF BEAUTY

Some time ago I found myself at an exhibition of Post-Impressionist
pictures, under the aegis of an artist who was himself of that
persuasion. Indeed, he was one of the exhibitors, and I was
constrained to express my opinions in the form of questions. We passed
before a picture which to my untutored eyes was formless, meaningless
and ugly. It was by a well-known artist, and my instructor admired it.
He said it was the head of a woman, and he indicated certain hook-like
marks in the painting which to him distinctly suggested the nose, the
mouth and the neck of a woman, reduced to their simplest terms. After
he had fully explained the picture, I asked him if the result was in
any sense beautiful to him.

"Beautiful!" he exclaimed, with something of disdain in his voice.
"Why should it be beautiful? I do not require that a picture should be
beautiful."

He had not finished, but I was relieved by the first part of his
reply. As I cannot hope to appreciate more than a certain number of
things in the world, I am willing, so far as pictures are concerned,
to be limited to beautiful pictures, and to be proved ignorant and
obtuse in regard to all others. For the same reason I have long since
reconciled myself to the fact that there are some branches of science
and natural history which I shall never master. I shall always
endeavour to follow clever writers like Shaw and Brieux whose plays
have, as the former puts it, "a really scientific natural history" for
their basis. But I cannot hope to acquire the whole of knowledge or
reform the whole of the world, and there are books which contain a
great deal of sound knowledge and urgent opinion for which I have no
use. Moreover, I deny Mr. Shaw's right to interfere with my enjoyment
if I turn to literature which teaches nothing and serves no
utilitarian or reforming purpose. It is only when I am in the
scientific frame of mind that I desire accurate natural history, or
when I am in the reforming frame of mind that I desire earnest
exhortations to improve society. In the same way I am only drawn to
the Post-Impressionists when I want, not beautiful pictures, but an
agreeable sense of the impudence and imbecility of professional
craftsmen. But when I am in the mood for literature and art, I demand
something that shall appeal to my sense of beauty; and I refuse to be
shamed into believing that I ought to p