In
ordinary occupations, a man offers to do a certain thing or to
produce a certain article with a merely conventional
accomplishment, a design in which (we may almost say) it is
difficult to fail. But the artist steps forth out of the crowd and
proposes to delight: an impudent design, in which it is impossible
to fail without odious circumstances. The poor Daughter of Joy,
carrying her smiles and finery quite unregarded through the crowd,
makes a figure which it is impossible to recall without a wounding
pity. She is the type of the unsuccessful artist. The actor, the
dancer, and the singer must appear like her in person, and drain
publicly the cup of failure. But though the rest of us escape this
crowning bitterness of the pillory, we all court in essence the
same humiliation. We all profess to be able to delight. And how
few of us are! We all pledge ourselves to be able to continue to
delight. And the day will come to each, and even to the most
admired, when the ardour shall have declined and the cunning shall
be lost, and he shall sit by his deserted booth ashamed. Then
shall he see himself condemned to do work for which he blushes to
take payment.
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