| Description | 19 March 1893
Private
2 Holland Park Road, Kensington
Dear Mr Quilter
Thanks for your letter received yesterday. How foreign to all my aims and faiths in Art is the movement known under the vague and misleading name of 'Impressionism'. I need hardly say I think, say and if as you tell me, and as I learn on other sides, the press has of late largely embraced it (attack and sarcasm lend themselves to so much smart writing!) I deplore it sincerely; - this phase of fashion will, however, no doubt run out its course - as fads do - and a healthier sane tone will I hope in time replace the present rather hysteric frame of mind. Meanwhile I shall, I fear, disappoint you if I say that I do not believe in any 'remedy' for such a state things - it is for those who are not '[-]' to endeavour in their work to uphold this faith; for the rest I hope you will pardon me if I say that the course you suggest would seem to me both undignified and worse than ineffectual, undignified because, we - the heads of Institutions - represent in our persons the views on which contumely is, I understand, poured; and worse than ineffectual because any attempt on our part to silence criticism aimed in part at ourselves would, I think rightly, fall back on our heads and only give fictitious importance to the attack. Fads, surely, are ephemeral.
In haste
Yours faithfully
Fred Leighton
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