conceived of it, so Arnold, so Pater, so, somewhat less austerely, did William Morris.
Oscar Wilde will always be of great historical interest because he was the heir of all that the æsthetic movement had achieved up to 1880, and because, attempting to improve his inheritance, he wasted and well-nigh ruined it. He began by throwing out nature, which Ruskin had brought into fresh relationship with art; by throwing out religion, which Arnold had brought into fresh relationship with poetry; by throwing out moral conduct, which Pater had associated with music; by throwing out the social and altruistic feelings and the welfare of the laboring masses, which all the great leaders from Ruskin to Morris had associated with the possibility of an artistically productive epoch.
Wilde was proud of his "improvements." He plumed himself on the divorce which he had effected between art and life. He asked applause for his invention of an art which was a pure protest against life and the strenuous passions of life, an art which was as beautiful and was intended to be as sterile as a collection of blown birds' eggs. He thought his improvements would make the æsthetic movement popular—with the smart set; and they did. But, of course, we shall have nothing but smart-set art as long as the æsthetic movement is conducted by the smart set.
I wish to say a word about what sentimental biographers call "the tragedy of Oscar Wilde." By that phrase sentimental biographers refer to his spending some years in prison and ending his life in disgrace. But surely a man's real tragedy is to fail in what he attempts to perform, and Wilde never attempted, never seriously attempted, to keep out of prison. On the
