He may lay down rules and devise principles, and
to rules and principles it will perhaps for years lie in
subjection; and then, haply without any warning of revolt, there
comes a time when it will no longer consent to 'harrow the valleys,
or be bound with a band in the furrow'--when it 'laughs at the
multitude of the city, and regards not the crying of the driver'--
when, refusing absolutely to make ropes out of sea-sand any longer,
it sets to work on statue-hewing, and you have a Pluto or a Jove, a
Tisiphone or a Psyche, a Mermaid or a Madonna, as Fate or
Inspiration direct. Be the work grim or glorious, dread or divine,
you have little choice left but quiescent adoption. As for you--
the nominal artist--your share in it has been to work passively
under dictates you neither delivered nor could question--that would
not be uttered at your prayer, nor suppressed nor changed at your
caprice. If the result be attractive, the World will praise you,
who little deserve praise; if it be repulsive, the same World will
blame you, who almost as little deserve blame.
'Wuthering Heights' was hewn in a wild workshop, with simple tools,
out of homely materials.
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