Art and the “Serious Cause.”

And then, from yet another point of view, we might think of advertising as the use of art and allurement in the service of commerce. That is what it is coming to be more and more. We need have no surprise in seeing art serving a serious cause like this, because art has served serious causes before. For centuries art was employed entirely in the cause of religion, and you have only to think for a moment to see how much public affairs have been shaped by the powers and persuasion of the spoken word. The French revolution was produced in France by words, and it was fended off from England—again by words. Mr. Baldwin, who tells us that he distructs and despises rhetoric, yet falls into it when he wishes to shape public opinion, and I should have taken “Give us peace in our time, O Lord,” for a very good attempt at a slogan.

But the subject of art and advertisement is a thorny one. I said a little time ago that advertising did not always enter into salesmanship. But salesmanship always enters into advertising. Art in advertising is art for the sake of selling. That leads us sometimes to go further and to swear in our wrath that if an advertisement sells the goods it is ipso facto—no matter how it may offend our sense of decorum and design—a good advertisement. This is nearly true but not quite, because you cannot be sure that a more seemly advertisement might not have sold the goods better or just as well. Neither is it precisely true to say that an advertisement is necessarily bad because it has failed to sell the goods. The goods themselves may be unsaleable. In that case it is not the art which has been bad, but the advice.

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It is the work of the advertising agent to express enthusiasm. Enthusiasm is the article in which he deals. But it is his duty sometimes to check it. I have known this done. My mind goes to the livest spirit I have ever known in advertising. I think of his devouring zeal and his drive. I think of his habit of living with the problems of his clients. And then I think—and I think still more—of the times when I have heard him say “No,” and seen him discourage some proposal in which there could be nothing but failure and waste.