The last works of a great artist have always a peculiar interest, and when they are the works of his old age they often show a peculiar change. The g… - Florence Melian Stawell

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The last works of a great artist have always a peculiar interest, and when they are the works of his old age they often show a peculiar change. The greatest artists do not copy themselves: stereotyping is fatal to creation. For creation, it cannot be denied though frequently forgotten, is always the production of something new, and this is why so often it is neglected or scorned by contemporaries. The creative artists, though their work corresponds with experience, are always outstripping experience, stretching forward to something they have never fully known, entering fresh worlds only half realised. Beethoven, Rembrandt, Titian, Sophocles, Shakespeare, Milton, Goethe, all show this in various ways. There is something unearthly in their closing work, and at the same time they are more at peace with this earth than ever. Nor is this because the world appears less terrible to them than it did, but because they seem to discern something more which countervails the terror.