Youth is always an enemy to the old.
Although the primitive in art may be both interesting and impressive, as portrayed in American fiction it is conspicuous for dullness alone. Drab persons living drab lives, observed by drab minds and reported in drab writing.
Doesn't all experience crumble in the end to mere literary material?
After all, you can't expect men not to judge by appearances.
To mourn was distressing, but to endeavor to mourn and fail was worse than distress.
Mediocrity would always win by force of numbers, but it would win only more mediocrity.