The pleasure we feel in criticizing robs us from being moved by very beautiful things.
The most accomplished literary work would be reduced to nothing by carping criticism, if the author would listen to all critics and allow every one to erase the passage which pleases him the least.
Criticism is as often a trade as a science, requiring, as it does, more health than wit, more labour than capacity, more practice than genius.
The pleasure of criticizing takes away from us the pleasure of being moved by some very fine things.
