age. Yet we allow our historical sympathy to override our
aesthetic discrimination. We offer flowers of approbation when
the artist is safely laid in his grave. The nineteenth century,
pregnant with the theory of evolution, has moreover created
in us the habit of losing sight of the individual in the species.
A collector is anxious to acquire specimens to illustrate a period
or a school, and forgets that a single masterpiece can teach us
more than any number of the mediocre products of a given
period or school. We classify too much and enjoy too little.
The sacrifice of the aesthetic to the so-called scientific method
of exhibition has been the bane of many museums.

The claims of contemporary art cannot be ignored in any
vital scheme of life. The art of to-day is that which really
belongs to us: it is our own reflection. In condemning it we
but condemn ourselves. We say that the present age possesses
no art:--who is responsible for this? It is indeed a shame that
despite all our rhapsodies about the ancients we pay so little
attention to our own possibilities. Struggling artists, weary
souls lingering in the shadow of cold disdain! In our self-
centered century, what inspiration do we offer them? The
past may well look with pity at the poverty of our civilisation;
the future will laugh at the barrenness of our art. We are
destroying the beautiful in life. Would that some great wizard
might from the stem of society shape a mighty harp whose
strings would resound to the touch of genius.