who declare they do not understand this or do not admire that, as if their want of taste and understanding were rather creditable than otherwise, and were decisive proofs of an author’s insignificance.  But this reproof, which is telling against individuals, has no justice as against the public.  For—­and this is generally lost sight of—­the public is composed of the class or classes directly addressed by any work, and not of the heterogeneous mass of readers.  Mathematicians do not write for the circulating library.  Science is not addressed to poets.  Philosophy is meant for students, not for idle readers.  If the members of a class do not understand—­if those directly addressed fail to listen, or listening, fail to recognise a power in the voice—­surely the fault lies with the speaker, who, having attempted to secure their attention and enlighten their understandings, has failed in the attempt?  The mathematician who is without value to mathematicians, the thinker who is obscure or meaningless to thinkers, the dramatist who fails to move the pit, may be wise, may be eminent, but as an author he has failed.  He attempted to make his wisdom and his power operate on the minds of others.  He has missed his mark.  MARGARITAS Ante PORCOS! is the soothing maxim of a disappointed self-love.  But we, who look on, may sometimes doubt whether they were pearls thus ineffectually thrown; and always doubt the judiciousness of strewing pearls before swine.  The prosperity of a book lies in the minds of readers.  Public knowledge and public taste fluctuate; and there come times when works which were once capable of instructing and delighting thousands lose their power, and works, before neglected, emerge into renown.  A small minority to whom these works appealed has gradually become a large minority, and in the evolution of opinion will perhaps become the majority.  No man can pretend to say that the work neglected today will not be a household word tomorrow; or that the pride and glory of our age will not be covered with cobwebs on the bookshelves of our children.  Those works alone can have enduring success which successfully appeal to what is permanent in human nature—­which, while suiting the taste of the day, contain truths and beauty deeper than the opinions and tastes of the day; but even temperary success implies a certain temporary fitness.  In Homer, Sophocles, Dante, Shakspeare, Cervantes, we are made aware of much that no longer accords with the wisdom or the taste of our day—­temporary and immature expressions of fluctuating opinions—­but we are also aware of much that is both true and noble now, and will be so for ever.

It is only posterity that can decide whether the success or failure shall be enduring; for it is only posterity that can reveal whether the relation now existing between the work and the public mind is or is not liable to fluctuation.  Yet no man really writes for posterity; no man ought to do so.