Sincerity in art (Croce)

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"La sincerità naturale, lo 'scrivete come parlate', in arte, è qualcosa di molto simile ai famosi diritti innati, spiritosa invenzione dei filosofi del secolo scorso, nell'etica: quei diritti innati, che'erano, viceversa, il frutto di lavoro di molte centinaia d'anni di storia, e che supponevano innati sol perché si metteva al posto dell'uomo naturale reale l'uomo ideale. La gente meno sincera, a che scrive meno come pensa, è la gente poca colta. E la pìu sincera, e quella che pìu ritrae nello scrivere del proprio pensiero, è la gente che ha ingegno e studio. Perché la sincerità (che in fatto d'arte è espressione metaforica = bellezza) è cosi fatta che, per arrivarci, fa d'uopo un lungo e tortuoso viaggio." -- Pensieri dell'arte (1885), XX

 Natural sincerity, the "write as you speak" in art, is very similar to the famous natural rights, the witty invention of philosophers of the last century, in ethics: the natural rights were, instead, the work of many centuries of history, and were supposed innate only because they replaced the natural man with the ideal man. The less sincere people, who write less as they think, are the uneducated. The more sincere, who more closely portray in their writing how they think, are the people with talent and education. Because sincerity (which in art is in fact a metaphor for beauty) is such that, to arrive at it requires a long and torturous voyage.

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