The moral life of man forms part of the subject-matter of the artist, but the morality of art consists in the perfect use of an imperfect medium. No artist desires to prove anything. Even things that are true can be proved.
The nineteenth century dislike of romanticism is the rage of Caliban not seeing his own face in a glass.
Vice and virtue are to the artist materials for an art.
When critics disagree, the artist is in accord with himself.
Thought and language are to the artist instruments of an art.
An ethical sympathy in an artist is an unpardonable mannerism of style. No artist is ever morbid. The artist can express everything.
There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well written, or badly written.
Those who go beneath the surface do so at their peril.
To reveal art and conceal the artist is arts aim.
Diversity of opinion about a work of art shows that the work is new, complex, and vital.
They are the elect to whom beautiful things mean only beauty.
From the point of view of form, the type of all the arts is the art of the musician.
All art is at once surface and symbol.
OSCAR WILDE
This is a fault.
We can forgive a man for making a useful thing as long as he does not admire it. The only excuse for making a useless thing is that one admires it intensely.
Those who read the symbol do so at their peril.
All art is quite useless.
The artist is the creator of beautiful things.
From the point of view of feeling, the actors craft is the type.
The Preface
It is the spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors.
No artist has ethical sympathies.
The highest as the lowest form of criticism is a mode of autobiography. Those who find ugly meanings in beautiful things are corrupt without beingcharming.
The critic is he who can translate into another manner or a new material his impression of beautiful things.
That is all.
Those who find beautiful meanings in beautiful things are the cultivated. For these there is hope.
The nineteenth century dislike of realism is the rage of Caliban seeing his own face in a glass.
