But now that the
performance is over, my good sir, just step into my private room, and
see that it is not all pleasure--this winning of successes. Cast your
eye over those newspapers, over those letters. See what the critics say
of your harmless jokes, neat little trim sentences, and pet waggeries!
Why, you are no better than an idiot; you are drivelling; your powers
have left you; this always overrated writer is rapidly sinking to, &c.
This is not pleasant; but neither is this the point. It may be the
critic is right, and the author wrong. It may be that the archbishop's
sermon is not so fine as some of those discourses twenty years ago
which used to delight the faithful in Granada. Or it may be (pleasing
thought!) that the critic is a dullard, and does not understand what
he is writing about. Everybody who has been to an exhibition has heard
visitors discoursing about the pictures before their faces. One says,
"This is very well;" another says, "This is stuff and rubbish;" another
cries, "Bravo! this is a masterpiece:" and each has a right to his
opinion. For example, one of the pictures I admired most at the Royal
Academy is by a gentleman on whom I never, to my knowledge, set eyes.
This picture is No.
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