Cubism conscious aestheticism holds the field, for the Cubist theory is, in the main, aesthetic.  That is one reason why I cannot think that there is any great future for Cubism.  An artistic movement is unlikely to live long on anything so relevant to art; for artists, it seems, must believe that they are concerned with something altogether different.  Wherefore, I think it not improbable—­indeed, there are indications already [X]—­that, political progress having in the last few years somewhat outrun civilization, and the new democracy being apparently hostile to art and culture, artists will take to believing passionately in what they will call “order.”  If so, in the name of Napoleon and Louis XIV, but, let us hope, with the science and restraint of Poussin and Ingres, they will turn, most likely, to the classical tradition and, while endeavouring to create significant form, will assert vehemently that they are expressing their political convictions.

[Footnote X:  September 1920.]

[Illustration:  DERAIN (Photo:  Bernheim jeune)]

THE AUTHORITY OF M. DERAIN

Sooner or later the critic who wishes to be taken seriously must say his word about Derain.  It is an alarming enterprise.  Not only does he run a considerable risk of making himself absurd, he may make a formidable and contemptuous enemy as well.  “On ne peut pas me laisser tranquille!” grumbles Derain; to which the only reply I can think of is—­“on ne peut pas.”

Derain is now the greatest power amongst young French painters.  I would like to lay stress on the words “power” and “French,” because I do not wish to say, what may nevertheless be true, that Derain is the greatest painter in France, or seemingly to forget that Picasso’s is the paramount influence in Europe.  For all their abjurations most of the younger and more intelligent foreigners, within and without the gates of Paris, know well enough that Picasso is still their animator.  Wherever a trace of Cubism or of tete-de-negre, or of that thin, anxious line of the “blue period” is still to be found, there the ferment of his unquiet spirit is at work.  And I believe it is in revolt against, perhaps in terror of, this profoundly un-French spirit that the younger Frenchmen are seeking shelter and grace under the vast though unconscious nationalism of Derain.

For the French have never loved Cubism, though Braque uses it beautifully.  How should they love anything so uncongenial to their temperament?  How should that race which above all others understands and revels in life care for an art of abstractions?  How, having raised good sense to the power of genius, should France quite approve aesthetic fanaticism?  What would Poussin have said to so passionate a negation of common sense?  Well, happily, we know the opinion of Moliere: 

  La parfaite raison fuit toute extremite,
  Et veut que l’on soit sage avec sobriete.