110 



REALISM AND IDEALISM 



Realism dares not separate itself from the Ideal, because 

 the Ideal is a permanent factor, and the most important 

 factor, in the reality of life. The Ideal is the manifesta- 

 tion of consciousness to itself, the pledge to the race of our 

 existing in a process of development. Evolution shows that 

 life is in continual progress ; and progress from one point 

 to another implies (in a highly complex animal like man) 

 the sense of a better to which the being tends ; in other 

 words, involves Idealism. How can the realistic artist afford 

 then to exclude so weighty and indestructible an element of 

 his main subject-matter ? What indeed has he to do but to 

 seek out and represent the whole reality of human nature, 

 extenuating nothing, setting nothing down in malice ? 

 His object is to reach and to express the truth. He may not 

 shirk what is ugly and animal in his fellow-creatures. 

 But he ought not to dote upon these points. Far less 

 ought he to repudiate those select qualities which men in 

 their long struggle with themselves and their environment 

 have gained as the most precious spoils of a continued 

 battle. 



Furthermore, it is worth considering whether the artist, 

 if he dares and wishes to escape from Idealism, is able to do 

 so. I am convinced that he cannot, and this conviction 

 emboldens me to attempt once more the treatment of a 

 threadbare problem. 



II 



He must indeed be a bold man who invites the world to 

 listen while he talks about Idealism and Realism. The very 

 terms have an obsolete scholastic flavour, like those famous 

 hobby-horses of the metaphysicians, Subject and Object. 

 Worse even : they suggest the impostures of aesthetic 

 coteries, the sermonising of self-consecrated priests con- 

 cerning mysteries no mind has clearly grasped. Plain people 

 are not unjustified in turning from such discussions with a 

 shrug of the shoulders and a yawn. 



And yet there still remains something to be studied in 

 this hackneyed antithesis. Just as Subject and Object stand 



