Not long ago I assisted at the unexpected end of an adventure, which, after it had just missed being a tragedy, concluded in an almost comic fashion. Although I was only cast for a very small part, as a simple spectator, my heart was too much mixed up in it for me to-day not to feel in similar circumstances the bitter sensation of the irony of things, which may be either cruel or beneficial. It is the chill of the steel which cuts you, though it cures you too. It has occurred to me to make the adventure into a story. Obviously it would be more reasonable to go on with one of my unfinished pictures, “The Pardon of Psyche,” for instance, which has been standing on the easel for years, or one of those inanimate objects: old furniture, silver, and books, which will comprise the series called “Humble Friends.”
“A painter,” my master, Miraut, used to say, “should only think brush in hand.” It is my opinion, from numerous illustrious examples including Miraut himself, that he should not think at all. But I know only too well, I am but half a painter, an artist in intention rather than in temperament, the outline of a Fromentin of 6the twelfth rank. That is a singular feeling of sadness too: the feeling that one is but an inferior double of another, a small and poor proof of a block already printed, a sample of humanity in the likeness of a model who has already lived, and in whose destiny it is possible to read beforehand one’s own destiny! But not all one’s own destiny! For I am only too well aware that I suffer from the same failings as Fromentin without possessing his brilliance. But the brush was not sufficient for this complex and elaborate master. He wanted, with the nervous hand which transmitted colours to canvas, to put ink upon paper, and what was the result? We other painters said his painting was too literary, and literary men said his literature was too technical, too pictorial, and not intellectual enough.
In my own case at each exhibition of my work for years past my fellow-painters’ reserve, and their praise particularly, have signified to me that I lack a real artist’s original and visionary nature. But I do not require my fellow artists’ judgment; what does my own conscience say? If I really expressed myself with my brush alone, should I have brought back from Spain, Morocco, Italy and Egypt as many pages of notes as sketches? I have for fifteen years, wandered between numberless contradictory forms of art and mind. I have wandered from country to country seeking the sun and health; from museum to museum seeking ?sthetic revelations, and later from art school to art school seeking an artist’s creed, and from 7dream to dream in search of a love. My affairs of the heart have all been incipient and abortive for the same reason as my affairs of the mind: my irremediable incapacity to make up my mind and stand firm, in which to-day I recognize the strange originality of my character.
When we see with what infrangible conditions nature surrounds us, is it not best to accept them? At least, I have made up my mind upon an essential point, my work. That is something. I have promised myself to fret no more over vain ambitions. I will be a mediocre painter; that is all. In that case why should I deny myself the pleasure of writing, a thing which formerly discipline forbade? As it is certain that the name of M. Vincent la Croix will never shine in the sky of glory with the names of Gustave Moreau, of Puvis de Chavannes, and of Burne-Jones, why should M. Vincent la Croix deprive himself of this compensation: wasting his time after his own fashion, like the rich amateur, the dilettante and the critic he is? That is the reason why, when about to live over again in thought the episodes of a real little romance, into which chance introduced me, I have prepared paper, a pen, and ink. Here is a fresh proof that I shall always lack spontaneous and gushing geniality; I have gone out of my way to explain my motives at the beginning of this story, instead of starting it simply and boldly. I can see its most minute details before me, so what need have I of excusing in my own eyes a work which tempts me? I shall be at liberty to destroy 8it if I am too ashamed of it when it is finished. Many a time have I painted out a canvas which I considered bad! This time two logs in the fireplace and a match will suffice. That is one of the unspeakable superiorities of literature over painting.