Morality is not a source of pleasure, for the very reason that it is not meant to please. It is a device for rooting out what is displeasing; it is a function of disgust.
Art, on the other hand, is a vehicle for pleasure and nothing else, a fact strongly suggested if not absolutely defined by its having no practical purpose. It is prescribed neither to heal wounds nor salve conscience; it neither feeds nor shelters; neither conquers nor defends. And let the reader who imagines it an instrument of political and social change only reflect that Lenin arose on the heels of Dostoyevsky and Tchaikovsky, while Hitler thrived in the most intellectual country in Europe, full of persons no less eager to read and write novels, see and paint pictures, hear and compose music than the reader himself.
Art is not an anodyne, it is an emolument. Its preeminent quality is not truth, reason or justice, but beauty. And it is both the wonder and tragedy of our time that such a meaning could be thought false or undesirable.
