The important thing about a picture, however, is not how it is painted,
but whether it provokes aesthetic emotion. As I have said, essentially,
a good Post-Impressionist picture resembles all other good works of art,
and only differs from some, superficially, by a conscious and deliberate
rejection of those technical and sentimental irrelevancies that have
been imposed on painting by a bad tradition. This becomes obvious when
one visits an exhibition such as the _Salon d'Automne_ or _Les
Indépendants_, where there are hundreds of pictures in the
Post-Impressionist manner, many of which are quite worthless.[4] These,
one realises, are bad in precisely the same way as any other picture is
bad; their forms are insignificant and compel no aesthetic reaction. In
truth, it was an unfortunate necessity that obliged us to speak of
"Post-Impressionist pictures," and now, I think, the moment is at hand
when we shall be able to return to the older and more adequate
nomenclature, and speak of good pictures and bad. Only we must not
forget that the movement of which Cézanne is the earliest manifestation,
and which has borne so amazing a crop of good art, owes something,
though not everything, to the liberating and revolutionary doctrines of
Post-Impressionism.

The silliest things said about Post-Impressionist pictures are said by
people who regard Post-Impressionism as an isolated movement, whereas,
in fact, it takes its place as part of one of those huge slopes into
which we can divide the history of art and the spiritual history of
mankind. In my enthusiastic moments I am tempted to hope that it is the
first stage in a new slope to which it will stand in the same relation
as sixth-century Byzantine art stands to the old. In that case we shall
compare Post-Impressionism with that vital spirit which, towards the end
of the fifth century, flickered into life amidst the ruins of
Graeco-Roman realism. Post-Impressionism, or, let us say the