Yet, in the case of Mallarmé and of a literary group, the idea of decadence has been assimilated to its exact opposite--the idea of innovation. Such judgments have made a particular impression upon men of one generation because, doubtless, we ourselves were involved and foolishly flouted by "right-minded" critics; they were, however, merely the clumsy and decrepit modern version of those decrees with which the mandarins of every age have sought to curse and to crush the new serpents breaking their shell under the ironical eye of their old mother. Diabolical intelligence laughs at exorcisms, and the University has been no more able than the Church to disinfect it with its holy water. In the past a man rose up--buckler of the faith--against heresies and novelties. He was the Jesuit. To-day it is too often the Professor who arises as champion of the rules. Here again we have the antinomy which surprises us in Voltaire and the Voltairian of yesterday. The same man, so courageous where justice or political liberty is concerned, recoils the moment it is a matter of literary novelty or liberty. When, reaching Tolstoy and Ibsen, he alludes to their glory, he adds (in a note): "Are these reputations--especially Ibsen's--firmly established? The question whether the author of _Ghosts_ is a mystifier or a genius has not yet been settled."[2] Such, confronted with the unknown--with the not yet seen or read--is the attitude of a writer who, in the very volume here quoted, proves that he possesses praiseworthy independence of judgment. I need not add that, in his pages, the "decadents" are scouted on every occasion. How, after this, can we be surprised at the dull raillery of lesser minds? A new way of stating the eternal truths is always a scandal for men--especially for men who are too well-educated. They feel a sort of fright, and to recover their assurance they have recourse to denial, to abuse, to derision. It is the natural attitude of the human animal in the presence of physical danger. But how have we come to regard as a peril every real innovation in art or in literature? Why, above all, is this assimilation one of the maladies peculiar to our time--perhaps the gravest of all, since it tends to restrict movement and to obstruct life?