Jacob Burckhardt, Force and Freedom: An Interpretation of History said:
The word "amateur" owes its evil reputation to the arts. An artist must be a master or nothing, and must dedicate his life to his art, for the arts, of their very nature, demand perfection.
In learning, on the other hand, a man can only be a master in one particular field, namely as a specialist, and in some field he should be a specialist. But if he is not to forfeit his capacity for taking a general view, or even his respect for general views, he should be an amateur at as many points as possible, privately at any rate, for the increase of his own knowledge and the enrichment of his possible standpoints. Otherwise he will remain ignorant in any field lying outside his own speciality and perhaps, as a man, a barbarian.
But the amateur, because he loves things, may, in the course of his life, find points at which to dig deep.
Jacob Burckhardt, Force and Freedom: An Interpretation of History, was originally delivered as a series of lectures at Basel in 1868-1871. This Archival Quality Quotation appears in the Meridian Books edition, J. H. Nichols, ed., 1955, p. 89.
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