While, as
for objects of use, they are bought mainly because they are sold; they
are forced upon us as a conjurer forces a card. We think we like them
while they remain the fashion; but soon they are like women's clothes of
two years ago, if they last long enough to be outmoded. It is vain for
us to reproach either the artist or the tradesman. The fault is in
ourselves; we have as a whole society yielded to the most subtle
temptation of Satan. We have lost the power of knowing what we
like--that is to say, the power of loving. We value nothing for itself,
but everything for its associations. The man of culture buys a picture,
not because he likes it, but because he thinks it is art; at most what
he enjoys is not the picture itself but the thought that he is cultured
enough to enjoy it. That thought comes between him and the picture, and
makes it impossible for him to experience the picture at all. And so he
is ready to accept anything that the painter chooses to give him, if
only he believes the painter to be a real artist. This is bad for the
painter, who has every temptation to become a charlatan, and to think of
his art as a sacred mystery which no one can understand but himself and
a few other painters of his own sect. But in this matter the man of
culture is just like the vulgar herd, as he would call them. Their
attitude to the arts of use is the same as his attitude to pictures.
They do not buy furniture or china because they like them, but because
the shopman persuades them that what they buy is the fashion.
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