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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.— SUPPLEMENT. 



most applicable test is perhaps to be found in the 

 nature of the alleged motive. When a man says 

 or insinuates that his primary object is the good 

 of the world, we may reasonably set him down 

 as a humbug. The transparency of the pretext 

 is too obvious ; and the implied belief that his 

 final success is really a result in which the world 

 at large can be seriously interested, indicates a 

 vanity too gigantic to be quite innocent. In 

 truth, there are two and only two excuses which 

 can be accepted as a sufficient justification for 

 adding to the masses of existing literature. One 

 is, that you want money ; the other, that you can- 

 not help it. Johnson went so far as to say that 

 any man must be a fool who wrote for anything 

 but money. The statement is a little too sweep- 

 ing ; but we must admit — when it is genuine — the 

 plea of necessity. Writing, at all events, is an 

 honest trade, provided that the author does not 

 lie or flatter base passions. It is rather difficult 

 for a professional author to comply with that pro- 

 viso ; but, so long as he supplies good, whole- 

 some food, sells his wares for what they are 

 worth, and pretends to no higher motive, he is an 

 innocent and even useful member of society. He 

 may rank with other honest tradesmen, and is at 

 least as well employed in selling his literary tal- 

 ents to publishers as a lawyer in selling his rhe- 

 torical powers to attorneys. 



The best work, indeed, is probably ascribable 

 to loftier motives. It has been accomplished not 

 under pressure of want, but because an active 

 mind, dominated by new thoughts, or set on fire 

 by an imaginative impulse, is constrained to utter 

 itself in some way to the world. It must speak 

 or burst ; action of some kind is an imperative 

 necessity; and it is a question of circumstance 

 and character whether the impulse spends itself 

 in producing philosophy, or poetry, or art, or 

 practical activity. The spontaneity characteris- 

 tic of such work is the quality which determines 

 whether a poem is to live or to die ; it is the dis- 

 criminating mark between the manufactured ar- 

 ticle and the genuine organic growth. The test, 

 of course, covers that other variety of literature 

 — including much of the very highest — in which 

 the writing is considered not as an end, but a 

 means ; where the polished style and strict order 

 are the symptoms of an intense desire to accom- 

 plish some ulterior object — to strike down a pes- 

 tilent fallacy, to encourage the supporters of a 

 good cause, to disseminate ideas which may lift 

 mankind to a higher social order. In such cases 

 a man may be excused if he is eager for some 

 testimony of success. The degree of attention 



which he excites is the measure of the work which 

 he has done. He looks for praise as the artillery- 

 officer looks for the cloud of dust which shows 

 that his shot has struck home at the right point 

 of the hostile lines. Unluckily, there are many 

 people who seem to be content so long as they 

 can make the dust fly, without reference to the 

 means adopted or to the purpose contemplated. 



This is, in fact, the motive which is excluded 

 by our suggested tests. The affected desire to do 

 good to the world means really a desire that the 

 world may sing our praises. The love of praise 

 as praise, the simple appetite for incense, as thick 

 and stupefying as may be, is the really bad symp- 

 tom, as it is the bane, of our modern literature. 

 This is the true mark of the charlatan, and the 

 natural fruit of that kind of vanity which deserves 

 all the contempt that can be poured upon it. No 

 stings can be too severe which help to kill clown 

 the noxious swarm of parasites which find their 

 natural food in the fulsome stream of adulation. 

 For, unluckily for us, there was never a time 

 when this weakness was so prevalent, because 

 there never was a time when the power of adver- 

 tising, and therefore of winning notoriety without 

 attaining excellence, was so enormous. The evil 

 tends to corrupt the highest and most sensitive 

 natures. A man can scarcely keep his head, 

 when the voice of real sympathy is drowned by 

 the chorus of insincere jubilation. By an anach- 

 ronism — which has too many parallels — we are 

 still employed in denouncing an excess which has 

 long been supplanted by its contrary. We abuse 

 the severe critics who quench youthful genius. 

 The true evil is different. The really mischievous 

 persons are those appreciative and generous critics 

 who force all eminent writers to live, whether 

 they wish it or not, in an atmosphere so thick 

 with the fumes of incense as to be enervating to 

 the strongest constitutions. A clique is notori- 

 ously bad ; with our customary twaddle about 

 generous criticism, We are going far to make the 

 whole literary world into one gigantic clique. 

 Youthful genius is no longer crushed — it is puffed 

 into imbecility. We long for some of the bracing 

 air of the old slashing criticism, which, if it caused 

 much useless pain, did at least promote the growth 

 of tough fibres instead of fatty degeneration of 

 tissue. 



But, leaving this aside, let us assume that a 

 man's vanity is harmless and his ambition pure. 

 He really thinks that he can bestow upon his 

 fellow-men gifts of truth and beauty. He fancies, 

 to put the case distinctly, that he can produce a 

 new "Hamlet." He sees that he must choose be- 



