contemporaneous valuation put on a book, since the book itself
remainsand its valuemay always be re-tested,and thusultimately the author rather than the critic holds the field . It must be evident that literary criticism has its own history; that the prevailing tendency in England in the early nineteenth
century was to indulge in slashing personalities ; that the criti cisms of the middle of the century were characterized by an over whelming display of the erudition of the critic;while to -day many reviews resemble tables of errata , so punctiliously has the critic
focused his microscope on every line; that while the tendency of the English reviewers has been towards undue censure, that of American reviewers has of late been towards undue praise. Matthew Arnold notes the fundamental differences between the French and the German critics. In Sainte-Beuve he found
an unrivalled guide to a knowledge of the French genius and literature and that to the “ merits of mental independence , industry ,measure, lucidity, his criticism adds the merit of happy temper and disposition . Goethe long ago noticed that, whereas
Germans reviewed one another as enemies whom they hated , the critics of the Globe reviewed one another as gentlemen .” 57
These are but suggestions of the wide range of time and of nationalities involved in criticism ; theories of the functions of
criticism have varied ; standards of criticism have differed at different times; criticism has changed from age to age. But back
of all criticism lies the critic and he too changes, as also does the opinion of the public towards him . The contemptuous verdict ofMr. Phoebus in Lothair, — that “ critics are the men who have failed in literature and art,” - was probably Disraeli's own. Nadal credits no author as appearing " to think that a critic has a soul, or that it is a matter of the least consequence what becomes of it.” 58 Hazlitt wrote to Gifford : “ When you
say that an author cannot write common sense or English , you mean that he does not believe in the doctrine of divine
right . . . Your praise or blame has nothing to do with the merits of a work, but with the party to whom the writer 67 Matthew Arnold , “ Sainte-Beuve," Essays in Criticism , III, 137– 150. 68 E . S . Nadal, “ Newspaper Literary Criticism ,” Essays at Home and Elsewhere, 261 –281.
