England is
not an artistic country, in the sense that Latin countries are artistic,
and no end can be served by pretending that it is. Its serious interests
are political and moral. Personally, I fail to see how politics and morals
can be separated from art. I should be very sorry to separate my art from
my politics. And I am convinced that the conductors of the new organ will
perceive later, if not sooner, that political and moral altercations must
not be kept out of their columns. At any rate they will have to be
propagandist, pugilistic, and even bloodthirsty. They will have to
formulate a creed, and to try to ram it down people's throats. To print
merely so many square feet of the best obtainable imaginative stuff, and
to let the stuff speak for itself, will assuredly not suffice in this
excellent country.
* * * * *
My mind returns to the exceeding difficulty of obtaining the right
contributors. English editors have never appreciated the importance of
this. As English manufacturers sit still and wait for customers, so
English editors sit still and wait for contributors. The interestingness
of the _New Age_, if I may make an observation which the editorial pen
might hesitate to make, is due to the fact that contributors have always
been searched for zealously and indefatigably.
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