I Will Try To Account

I Will Try To Account For The Degree Of My Aesthetic Emotion. That, I Conceive, Is The Function Of The Critic.

The Representative Element In A Work Of Art May Or May Not Be Harmful, But It Is Always Irrelevant. For To Appreciate A Work Of Art, We Must Bring With Us Nothing From Life, No Knowledge Of Its Affairs And Ideas, No Familiarity With Its Emotions.

Genius Worship Is The Inevitable Sign Of An Uncreative Age.

There Must Be Some One Quality Without Which A Work Of Art Cannot Exist; Possessing Which, In The Least Degree, No Work Is Altogether Worthless.

Only Reason Can Convince Us Of Those Three Fundamental Truths Without A Recognition Of Which There Can Be No Effective Liberty: That What We Believe Is Not Necessarily True; That What We Like Is Not Necessarily Good; And That All Questions Are Open.