It is a mistake to be too yielding and shy in expressing a conviction which has been gravely formed on serious grounds. Those who love the more austere and splendid parts of literature will always find themselves in a minority in every collection of persons. It is probable that if the prestige of _Paradise Lost_ had to depend upon popular suffrage, no majority of citizens in any part of the English-speaking world would be willing honestly to admit that they admired it or could read it with pleasure. That does not prevent it from being one of the most glorious, most enviable and unique possessions of the race. On questions of the literary standard it is the majority which is always wrong. The majority likes a warm easy book, without pretension, unambitiously written, on a level with the experience of the vast semi-educated classes of our society. "One man, one vote," extended to the domain of literary taste, would mean the absolute and final extinction of all distinguished masterpieces. But in every generation there is a remnant which occupies itself with beauty and distinction. The individuals of this little group fight among themselves about the details of excellence, but they guard, as in a pyx or shrine, the primal idea of that excellence and a general sense of its formal character. Outside this small class of experts there is a large body of the public which recognizes its authority and is docile to its directions. Again, outside is the vast concourse of persons competent to read and write, but no more capable of forming an opinion than is the dog that barks at their shadow or the discreeter cat that curls at their fireside and says nothing. It has often occurred to me as a grave speculation how long this vast dumb force of untrained readers will be content to be silent. How long will they have the good nature to pretend to respect the things which they cannot enjoy? Flattered as the average man or woman is in these days, accustomed to hear the voice of democracy praying for votes on every subject, how soon will the average reader pluck up courage to say to himself, "I do not like the novels of Thackeray nearly so much as I do those of E. P. Roe, and I do not intend to allow anybody to persuade me that they are better?" Questioning the standards of taste, refusing to bow to traditional canons of criticism--this is the Red Spectre which I dread to see arise in the midst of our millions of half-trained readers.