ABSTRACT
As the condition of a man can only be judged by comparison with some valid picture of man as such, so the condition of art—and this applies to art as a whole and to every individual work of art—can only be judged by being measured against some valid conception of what constitutes a work of art. Both the art critic and the art historian should be clear about this, each should have some well-grounded and even profound doctrine on the matter. It is this permanently valid standard by which people must measure the art of their own day, nor can they possibly form a just estimate of it by applying to it the canon of any particular age, though that is what so many people are always trying to do. Above all, art must not be judged by some supposed faithfulness to nature, some imaginary correctness of representation.
