The Critical Spirit. September 7
“Judge nothing before the time.” This is a hard saying. Who can hear it? There never was a time in which the critical spirit was more thoroughly in the ascendant. Every man now is an independent critic. To accept fully, or as it is now called, to follow blindly; to admire heartily, or as it is now called, fanatically—these are considered signs of weakness or credulity. To believe intensely; to act unhesitatingly; to admire passionately; all this, as the latest slang phrases it, is “bad form”; a proof that a man is not likely to win in the race of this world the prize whereof is, the greatest possible enjoyment with the least possible work.
The Critical Spirit. 1871.