"Amateur writer!" Well should I deserve the reproach, had I ventured ever beyond the precincts of my own science—and fatal would have been the exposure, as you, with heedless boldness, have unwittingly proven.
Art tainted with philanthropy—that better Art result!—Poet and Peabody!
You have been misled—you have mistaken the pale demeanour and joined hands for an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual earnestness. For you, these are the serious ones, and, for them, you others are the serious matter. Their joke is their work. For me—why should I refuse myself the grim joy of this grotesque tragedy—and, with them now, you all are my joke!
Freeing a Last Friend
Bravo! Bard! and exquisitely written, I suppose, as becomes your state.
The World, June 3, 1888. Letter to Mr. Swinburne.
The scientific irrelevancies and solemn popularities, less elaborately embodied, I seem to have met with before—in papers signed by more than one serious and unqualified sage, whose mind also was not narrowed by knowledge.
I have been "personal," you say; and, faith! you prove it!
Thank you, my dear! I have lost a confrère; but, then, I have gained an acquaintance—one Algernon Swinburne—"outsider"—Putney.