Among the clever poses of this type of “stage player of the spirit,” as Nietzsche called them, is the pose of the _enfant terrible_. They are mightily concerned to shock the bourgeoisie, and are never so happy as when they have said something naughty, and actually got it into print. Now it is, of course, very stupid for the bourgeoisie to be shocked. The bourgeoisie would be wiser to yawn. But it argues a similar kind of stupidity—anti-stupidity—to wish to shock them. But we do not wish to shock them, they say! We are indifferent to the existence of the bourgeoisie! Our aim is simply to write freely as artists, and to be at liberty to publish our work for such as can understand it. Publishing, however, is a public act; and I agree with the bourgeoisie that the art of an intimate circle or group is not of necessity a public art. Between private and public morality, personal and public policy, individual and communal art, there is all the difference of two differing scales of value. Queen Victoria did not wish to be addressed by Mr. Gladstone as if she were a public meeting. A public meeting does not like to be addressed as if it were a party of personal friends. The introduction of personal considerations into public policy is felt to be an intrusion; and to treat your friends as if you were legislating on their behalf is an impertinence. From all this it follows that to thrust all private art into the public eye is to mix the two worlds. Only that part of private art that is in good public taste ought to be exhibited in public; the rest is for private, personal, individual consumption, and ought to be left unpublished, or circulated only privately. Let the artist write what pleases him; let him circulate it among his friends; the only criterion here is personal taste. But immediately he proposes to publish his work, he should ask himself, the question: Is this in good public taste?