since has bowed reverently and learned something and at the end of the sixteenth century the raised the sea banks and rescued their country from the and immediately art like the suddenly and everywhere and in a country no larger than greece thirty great painters were born within the little span of some thirty or forty years and since then there has been no further painting in holland and in the countries of and no preface xiii one is now found who can draw a nose with even tolerable decorum then whither in her flight from england will art herself eastward there are the russian and the german and behind them the chinese all europe has been visited and art never returns to where she has once been even italy cannot be in of this for in italy in roman times art was a greek and all the roman statues were the work of greek artists so whither will art go in what country will art suddenly appear in the or in the or will art rest for a space in this forlorn atlantic island re knitting herself to the tradition which existed before england was in gold ornaments and and in many tales of chivalry will there be a re of the ancient language or shall we save some accent of s tongue which has declined elsewhere into and that art has left england there can be no doubt art has left france and germany and russia it is still in and when xiv preface it leaves it must find another small nation one which has not yet achieved its destiny � a nation such as greece was before such as england was before the and again before n the western ireland is the only place which seems to fulfil these conditions but ireland maybe is still too poor to an art for although art wealth art needs some ease of life but ireland is just beginning to find her way into easy for the first time for centuries starvation and oppression seem fading from her face the language is serious poetry is beginning again and plays written without desire of gain for love of art are offered to the irish rather than to the english public it is impossible to write plays in england except for money and all that is done for money is it was with the that money came into art the did not build the for money nor did the french build cathedral for money the in either case was the joy of art and as money preface xv entered into art the work of the artist slipped out of his control into that of the mob it took four centuries to accomplish this change we had to wait four hundred years for a world fashioned according to the image and likeness of the mob and now in all save the individual arts such as poetry and pictures the face of the mob is plainly stamped the arts architecture and painting furniture painted and metal work have so declined that no one them as they are made now the most ordinary people have come to understand that they must buy century furniture and old silver and china and that a thousand pounds will not buy a design for a clock that is not an old one or a copy of an old one nor a design for a chair or a sofa or a pair of the mob has become rich and it its tastes and those who are not of the mob retire more and more into the past as life becomes numerous and rich it becomes and vulgar but though the modern appeal to ten times as large a custom as did the beautiful work of the xvi preface century still their custom is small compared to that from which the dramatic writer suffers so it is to dramatic writing we must look to discover the depths to which an art can sink when it is written and produced at the mutual of the gallery boy who for a shilling demands oblivion of his day s work and the who for los d demands such amusement as will enable him to safely his dinner all who write for the english stage must write practically at the of these two the same audience goes everywhere and the same fare is consequently served everywhere at the same prices and to the theatre from the of money is the truly great adventure which the rich man but the rich man does not choose a theatre for his charity a hospital a college or a picture gallery is chosen in preference the wisdom of leaving money to a hospital may not be questioned but it may be asked if a fine performance of shakespeare or or does not rouse the listener out of the of real life as preface xvii as a course of lectures on shakespeare or or or in which some learned professor superficial opinions regarding these writers let us ask ourselves if the gift of pictures and the gift of a gallery intellectual enterprise as much as the gift of a theatre if painting is not the most of all the arts if there are not a hundred men who can distinguish between good literature for one who can distinguish between the national gallery and the royal academy does not the ordinary man prefer a show or the work of the scene painter with and dresses to either it has been said that villagers would prefer a to a parish council this may be true but how much more true it is that ninety per cent of those who visit the or the national gallery prefer the old gallery to either and the old gallery not only pleased the public more than any other but it provided the public with more intellectual than any other the public is moved by and hardly at 