No one, it is hoped, will suppose that by what is here said I
countenance the notion which is held by some authors--a notion implying
either arrogant self-sufficiency or mercenary servility--that to
succeed, a man should write down to the public. Quite the reverse. To
succeed, a man should write up to his ideal. He should do his very
best; certain that the very best will still fall short of what the
public can appreciate. He will only degrade his own mind by putting
forth works avowedly of inferior quality; and will find himself greatly
surpassed by writers whose inferior workmanship has nevertheless the
indefinable aspect of being the best they can produce. The man of
common mind is more directly in sympathy with the vulgar public, and
can speak to it more intelligibly, than any one who is condescending to
it. If you feel yourself to be above the mass, speak so as to raise the
mass to the height of your argument. It may be that the interval is too
great. It may be that the nature of your arguments is such as to demand
from the audience an intellectual preparation, and a habit of
concentrated continuity of thought, which cannot be expected from a
miscellaneous assembly. The scholarship of a Scaliger or the philosophy
of a Kant will obviously require an audience of scholars and
philosophers. And in cases where the nature of the work limits the
class of readers, no man should complain if the readers he does not
address pass him by to follow another. He will not allure these by
writing down to them; or if he allure them, he will lose those who
properly constitute his real audience.

A writer misdirects his talent if he lowers his standard of excellence.
Whatever he can do best let him do that, certain of reward in
proportion to his excellence. The reward is not always measurable by
the number of copies sold; that simply measures the extent of his
public. It may prove that he has stirred the hearts and enlightened the