foundation, in the same way as every
sentiment is connected with ideas. The artist takes his subjects from
the external world, from life, and from the events of all ages. He
also utilizes the progress of science for the mechanism of his art.
But, to transform the material into a complete picture, with a unity
of action, where the different sentiments harmonize; to transform the
work of art into a symbol of something human; to make the whole work
speak to every mind capable of comprehending it, all this can only be
the work of a great artist with creative genius.

=Art and Morality.=--True art is in itself neither moral nor immoral.
Here we can well say--to the pure everything is pure. In the mirror of
an impure mind, every work of art may appear as a pornographic
caricature, while to the high-minded it is the incarnation of the
noblest ideal. The fault is not with art and its products, but with
nature and the peculiarities of many human brains, which deform
everything they perceive, so that the most beautiful works of art only
awaken in their pornographic minds cynical sexual images.

=Art and Pornography.=--After having enunciated the preceding
fundamental principles, we must examine the following facts, which
have a special importance for the question with which we are dealing.
Under the banner of art are grouped a number of human enterprises
which are far from deserving this honor. There are few great artists,
but thousands of charlatans and plagiarists. Many of those who have
never had the least idea of the dignity of art, pander to the lower
instincts of the masses and not to their best sentiments. In this
connection, erotic subjects play a sad and powerful part. Nothing is
too filthy to be used to stimulate the base sensuality of the public.
Frivolous songs, licentious novels and plays, obscene dances,
pornographic pictures, all without any trace of artistic merit,
speculate on the erotic instinct of the masses in order to obtain
their money.

In these brothels of art, the most obscene vice is glorified, even
pathological. Unfortunately, this obscenity spoils the taste of the
public and destroys all sense of true and noble art. At the bottom of
all this degeneration of the sentiment of art and its products in the
sexual domain, we always find on close examination, corruption by
money and brutalism by alcohol. I say advisedly, the sentiment of art
and the products of art, for it is not sufficient for true artist