"A man who says the last word on a subject ought to be killed. He is a murderer; he has slain a topic."

It may, perhaps, be wondered whether one could possibly say a worse thing of anybody than that he has said ‘the last word’ on a subject. A man who says the last word on a subject ought to be killed. He is a murderer; he has slain a topic. The best kind of critic draws attention not to the finality of a thing, but to its infinity. Instead of closing a question, he opens a hundred.

-quoted in Return to Chesterton (by Maisie Ward)

(h/t gkcdaily.blogspot.com)