Censorship and Art | Page 6

first to resent. It is
true that Societies of artists and the proprietors of Galleries are subject
to the prosecution of the Law if they offend against the ordinary
standards of public decency; but precisely the same liability attaches to
theatrical managers and proprietors of Theatres, in whose case it has
been found necessary and beneficial to add the Censorship. And in this
connection let it once more be noted how much more easily the
ordinary standards of public decency can be assessed by a single person
responsible to no one, than by the clumsy (if more open) process of
public protest. What, then, in the light of the proved justice and
efficiency of the Censorship of Drama, is the reason for the absence of
the Censorship of Art? The more closely the matter is regarded, the
more plain it is, that there is none! At any moment we may have to look
upon some painting, or contemplate some statue, as tragic,
heart-rending, and dubiously delicate in theme as that censured play
"The Cenci," by one Shelley; as dangerous to prejudice, and suggestive
of new thought as the censured "Ghosts," by one Ibsen. Let us protest
against this peril suspended over our heads, and demand the immediate
appointment of a single person not selected for any pretentiously
artistic feelings, but endowed with summary powers of prohibiting the
exhibition, in public galleries or places, of such works as he shall deem,
in his uncontrolled discretion, unsuited to average intelligence or
sensibility. Let us demand it in the interest, not only of the young
person, but of those whole sections of the community which cannot be
expected to take an interest in Art, and to whom the purpose,
speculations, and achievements of great artists, working not only for
to-day but for to-morrow, must naturally be dark riddles. Let us even
require that this official should be empowered to order the destruction
of the works which he has deemed unsuited to average intelligence and
sensibility, lest their creators should, by private sale, make a profit out

of them, such as, in the nature of the case, Dramatic Authors are
debarred from making out of plays which, having been censured,
cannot be played for money. Let us ask this with confidence; for it is
not compatible with common justice that there should be any favouring
of Painter over Playwright. They are both artists--let them both be
measured by the same last!
But let us now consider the case of Science. It will not, indeed cannot,
be contended that the investigations of scientific men, whether
committed to writing or to speech, are always suited to the taste and
capacities of our general public. There was, for example, the
well-known doctrine of Evolution, the teachings of Charles Darwin and
Alfred Russet Wallace, who gathered up certain facts, hitherto but
vaguely known, into presentments, irreverent and startling, which, at
the time, profoundly disturbed every normal mind. Not only did
religion, as then accepted, suffer in this cataclysm, but our taste and
feeling were inexpressibly shocked by the discovery, so emphasised by
Thomas Henry Huxley, of Man's descent from Apes. It was felt, and is
felt by many to this day, that the advancement of that theory grossly
and dangerously violated every canon of decency. What pain, then,
might have been averted, what far-reaching consequences and
incalculable subversion of primitive faiths checked, if some judicious
Censor of scientific thought had existed in those days to demand, in
accordance with his private estimate of the will and temper of the
majority, the suppression of the doctrine of Evolution.
Innumerable investigations of scientists on subjects such as the date of
the world's creation, have from time to time been summarised and
inconsiderately sprung on a Public shocked and startled by the
revelation that facts which they were accustomed to revere were
conspicuously at fault. So, too, in the range of medicine, it would be
difficult to cite any radical discovery (such as the preventive power of
vaccination), whose unchecked publication has not violated the
prejudices and disturbed the immediate comfort of the common mind.
Had these discoveries been judiciously suppressed, or pared away to
suit what a Censorship conceived to be the popular palate of the time,
all this disturbance and discomfort might have been avoided.
It will doubtless be contended (for there are no such violent opponents
of Censorship as those who are threatened with the same) that to

compare a momentous disclosure, such as the doctrine of Evolution, to
a mere drama, were unprofitable. The answer to this ungenerous
contention is fortunately plain. Had a judicious Censorship existed over
our scientific matters, such as for two hundred years has existed over
our Drama, scientific discoveries would have been no more disturbing
and momentous than those which we are accustomed to