The exhibit is nothing if not true, or by way of becoming or being
recognized as true.
A technical standard in any one of the liberal or practical arts cannot
be applied as rigorously as can the standard of scientific truth,
because the standard itself is not so authentic. In all these arts many
differences of opinion exist among masters as to the methods and forms
which should be authoritative; and in so far as such is the case, the
individual must be allowed to make many apparently arbitrary personal
choices. The fact that a man has such choices to make is the
circumstance which most clearly distinguishes the practice of an art
from that of a science, but this circumstance, instead of being an
excuse for technical irresponsibility or mere eclecticism, should, on
the contrary, stimulate the individual more completely to justify his
choice. In his work he is fighting the battle not merely of his own
personal career, but of a method, of a style, of an idea, or of an
ideal. The practice of the several arts need not suffer from diversity
of standard, provided the several separate standards are themselves
incorruptible.
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