IV 



CRITICISM AND THE MAN 



TT looks as though, we were never to get to the 

 -*- end of the discussion about criticism — its scope, 

 aims, functions, any more than we are likely to get 

 to the end of the discussion of any real question in 

 philosophy, ethics, or religion. 



Is the aim of literary criticism judgment, or in- 

 terpretation, or analysis, or description ? May it not 

 have all these aims ? For myself, I am disposed to 

 answer in the affirmative. 



I doubt if there will ever be a critical method 

 which all may apply. Every man will have his own 

 method, as truly as he has his own manners. The 

 French critic Sch^rer inclines to " the method which 

 sets to work to comprehend rather than to class, to 

 explain rather than to judge," or which asks as the 

 first step to possess itself of the author's point of 

 view. This is substantially Pope's dictum that a 

 work is to be read in the spirit in which it was writ- 

 ten, and it accords with Heine's saying that the critic 

 is to ask, " "What does the artist intend ? " This is a 

 part of, but does it sum up, the critical function ? 



A man's writing upon the works of another takes 



