inadequate; but I think that perhaps they excel our modern efforts in a certain reserve and dignity, and in a more matured thoughtfulness.

If criticism is an art, such as I have described it, and is subject to certain rules and conditions; if good criticism is appreciative, proportionate, appropriate, strong, natural, and bonâ fide, and bad criticism is the

reverse of all this, why, you will ask, cannot the art be taught by some School or Academy; and if criticism is so important a matter as you say, surely the State might see to it?  I must own I am against it.  Mr. Matthew Arnold, who is much in favour of founding an academy, which is not only to judge of original works but of the criticisms of others upon them, states the matter very fairly.  He says, “So far as routine and authority tend to embarrass energy and inventive genius, academies may be said to be obstructive to energy and inventive genius; and, to this extent, to the human spirit’s general advance.  But then this evil is so much compensated by the propagation on a large scale of the mental aptitudes and demands, which an open mind and a flexible intelligence naturally engender; genius itself in the long run so greatly finds its account in this propagation, and bodies like the French Academy have such power for promoting it, that the general advance of the human spirit is perhaps, on the whole, rather furthered than impeded by their existence.”

But I do not accede to this opinion.  It is under the free open air of heaven, in the wild woods and the meadows that the loveliest and sweetest flowers bloom, and not in the trim gardens or the hot-houses, and even in our gardens in England we strive to preserve some lingering traits of the open country.  I believe that just as the gift of freedom to the masses of our countrymen teaches them to use that freedom with care and intelligence, just as the abolition of tests and oaths makes men loyal and trustworthy, so it is well to have freedom in literature and criticism.  Mistakes will be made and mischief done, but in the

long run the effect of a keen competition, and an advancing public taste will tell.  I don’t hesitate to assert, without fear of contradiction, that critical art has improved rapidly during the last twenty years in this country, where a man is free to start a critical review, and to write about anybody, or anything, and in any manner, provided he keeps within the law.  He is only restrained by the competition of others, and by the public taste, which are both constantly increasing.  No doubt an author will write with greater spirit, and with greater decorum, if he knows that his merits are sure to be fairly acknowledged, and his faults certain to be accurately noted.  But this object may be attained, I believe, without an academy.  On the other hand, what danger there is in an academy becoming cliquey, nay even corrupt.  We have an academy here in the painting art, but except that it collects within its walls every year a vaster number of daubs than it is possible for any one ever to see with any degree of comfort, I don’t know what particular use it is of.  As a school or college it may be of use, but as a critical academy it does very little.

I have thus endeavoured to show what I mean by my six divisions of criticism, and I have no doubt you will all of you have divined that my six divisions are capable of being expressed in one word, Criticism must be true.  To be true, it must be appreciative, or understanding, it must be in due proportion, it must be appropriate, it must be strong, it must be natural, it must be bonâ fide.  There is nothing which an Englishman hates so much as being false.  Our great modern poet, in one of his strongest lines, says—

“This is a shameful thing for men to lie.”

And he speaks of Wellington—

“Truth teller was our England’s Alfred named,
Truth lover was our English Duke.”

Emerson notices that many of our phrases turn upon this love of truth, such as “The English of this is,” “Honour bright,” “His word is as good as his bond.”

“’Tis not enough taste, learning, judgment join;
In all you speak let truth, and candour shine.”

I am certain that if men and women would believe that it is important that they should form a true judgment upon things, and that they should speak or write it when required, we should get rid of a great deal of bad art, bad books, bad pictures, bad buildings, bad music, and bad morals.  I am further certain that by constantly uttering false criticisms we perpetuate such things.  And what harm we are doing to our own selves in the meantime!  How habitually warped, how unsteady, how feeble, the judgment becomes, which is not kept bright and vigorous through right use.  How insensibly we become callous or indolent about forming a correct judgment.  “It is a pleasure to stand upon the shore and see the ships tossed upon the sea; a pleasure to stand in the window of a castle and to see a battle and the adventures thereof below: but no pleasure is comparable to the standing upon the vantage ground of truth (a hill not to be commanded and where the air is always clear and serene) and to see the errors and wanderings and mists and tempests in the vale below, so always that this prospect be with pity and not with swelling or pride.  Certainly it is heaven upon earth to have a man’s mind move in charity, rest in Providence, and turn upon the poles of truth.”

In conclusion, I am aware that I have treated the subject most inadequately, and that others have treated the same subject with much more power; but I am satisfied of the great importance of a right use of the critical faculty, and I think it may be that my mode of treatment may arrest the attention of some minds which are apt to be frightened at a learned method, and may induce them to take more heed of the judgments which they are hourly passing on a great variety of subjects.  If we still persist in saying when some one jingles some jig upon the piano that it is “charming,” if we say of every daub in the Academy that it is “lovely,” if every new building or statue is pronounced “awfully jolly,” if the fastidious rubbish of the last volume of poetry is “grand,” if the slip-shod grammar of the last new novel is “quite sweet,” when shall we see an end of these bad things?  And observe further, these bad things live on and affect the human mind for ever.  Bad things are born of bad.  Who can tell what may be the effect of seeing day by day an hideous building, of hearing day by day indifferent music, of constantly reading a lot of feeble twaddle?  Surely one effect will be that we shall gradually lose our appreciation of what is good and beautiful.  “A thing of beauty is a joy for ever.”  Ah! but we must have eyes to see it.  This springtime is lovely, if we have the eyes to see it; but, if we have not, its loveliness is nothing to us, and if we miss seeing it we shall have dimmer eyes to see it next year and the next; and if we cannot now see beauty and truth through the glass darkly, we shall be unable to gaze on them when we come to see them face to face.

II.  ON LUXURY.

An eminent lawyer of my acquaintance had a Socratic habit of interrupting the conversation by saying, “Let us understand one another: when you say so-and-so, do you mean so-and-so, or something quite different?”  Now, although it is intolerable that the natural flow of social intercourse should be thus