competent mathematician. But truly it does not matter whether he is a
moralist or not. Let nobody dream for a moment that what is wrong with
the Censorship is the shortcoming of the gentleman who happens at any
moment to be acting as Censor. Replace him to-morrow by an Academy of
Letters and an Academy of Dramatic Poetry, and the new and enlarged
filter will still exclude original and epoch-making work, whilst passing
conventional, old-fashioned, and vulgar work without question. The
conclave which compiles the index of the Roman Catholic Church is the
most august, ancient, learned, famous, and authoritative censorship in
Europe. Is it more enlightened, more liberal, more tolerant that the
comparatively infinitesimal office of the Lord Chamberlain? On the
contrary, it has reduced itself to a degree of absurdity which makes a
Catholic university a contradiction in terms. All censorships exist
to prevent anyone from challenging current conceptions and existing
institutions. All progress is initiated by challenging current concepts,
and executed by supplanting existing institutions. Consequently the
first condition of progress is the removal of censorships. There is the
whole case against censorships in a nutshell.

It will be asked whether theatrical managers are to be allowed to
produce what they like, without regard to the public interest. But that
is not the alternative. The managers of our London music-halls are not
subject to any censorship. They produce their entertainments on their
own responsibility, and have no two-guinea certificates to plead if
their houses are conducted viciously. They know that if they lose their
character, the County Council will simply refuse to renew their license
at the end of the year; and nothing in the history of popular art
is more amazing than the improvement in music-halls that this simple
arrangement has produced within a few years. Place the theatres on the
same footing, and we shall promptly have a similar revolution: a whole