If Utrillo's paintings depicted actual scenes from life, if they were not imaginative pictorial fantasies, then the whole world would have had to be completely different. If Utrillo's representation was valid, then it would mean that mankind had regressed to an astonishing, almost unbelievable degree. All the things that Fitch believed man capable of enjoying — dignity, solitude, integrity — would have been experienced in the past. And that, he thought, was impossible. If men had ever possessed these benefits, they would never have given them up.

p. 12 - The Rebellers, (1963)