This is one kind of art, the art of play, of thinking out new plays, producing old ones and inventing new. That is a good thing, useful and valuable because it increases man’s joys. But it is clear that it is possible to occupy oneself with play only when sated. Thus society can only occupy itself with art, when all its members are sated. But as long as all its members are not sated, there can not be real art, there will be an art of the overfed, a deformed one, and an art of the hungry ones--rough and poor, just as it is now. And therefore, in the first kind of art--of play--only that part is of value which is attainable to all, which increases the joys of all. If it is like this, then it is not a bad thing, especially if it does not demand an increase of toil on the part of the oppressed, as happens now. (This could and should be expressed better.) But there is yet another art which _calls forth in man better and higher feelings_. I wrote this just now--something I have said many times--and I think it isn’t true. Art is only one and consists in this: to increase the sinless general joys accessible to all--the good of man. A nice building, a gay picture, a song, a story give a little good; the awakening of religious feelings, of the love of good brought forth by a drama, a picture, a song--give great good. The 2nd thing that I have been thinking about art, is that nowhere is conservatism so harmful as in art. Art is one of the manifestations of the spiritual life of man, and therefore, as when an animal is alive, it breathes and discharges the products of its breathing, so when humanity is alive, it manifests activity in art. And therefore, at every given moment it must be contemporaneous--the art of our time. One ought only to know where it is (not in the decadence of music, poetry, or the novel); and one must seek it not in the past, but in the present. People who wish to show themselves connoisseurs of art and who therefore praise the past classic art and insult the present, only show by this, that they have no feeling for art. 3) Rachinsky[57] says: “Notice that contemporaneous with the spread of the use of narcotics, since the 17th century, the astounding progress of science began, and especially of the natural ones.” Is it not because of this, I say to him, that the false direction of science has come, the studying of that which is not necessary to man, but is only an object for idle curiosity, or when useful, is not the only thing really necessary? Is it not because of this that from that time on there was neglected the one thing that was necessary, i.e. the settling of moral questions and their application to life? 4) What is the good? I only know a word in Russian which defines this idea. The good is the real good, the good for all, _le veritable bien, le bien de tous_, _what is good for everybody_.[58]