plied) he is to expect no honours from the State, he may
not at least look forward to the delights of popularity?
Praise, you will tell me, is a savoury dish. And in so
far as you may mean the countenance of other artists,
you would put your finger on one of the most essential
and enduring pleasures of the career of art. But in so far
as you should have an eye to the commendations of the
public or the notice of the newspapers, be sure you would
but be cherishing a dream. It is true that in certain
esoteric journals the author (for instance) is duly criti-
cised, and that he is often praised a great deal more
than he deserves, sometimes for qualities which he
prided himself on eschewing, and sometimes by ladies
and gentlemen who have denied themselves the privilege
of reading his work. But if a man be sensitive to this
wild praise, we must suppose him equally alive to that
which often accompanies and always follows it--wild
ridicule. A man may have done well for years, and then
he may fail; he will hear of his failure. Or he may
have done well for years, and still do well, but the critics
may have tired of praising him, or there may have
sprung up some new idol of the instant, some "dust a
little gilt," to whom they now prefer to offer sacrifice.
Here is the obverse and the reverse of that empty and
ugly thing called popularity. Will any man suppose it
worth the gaining?

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