One of the most distinguished gatherings of musicians and music critics in American history rubbed shoulders with a number of faculty higher-ups and hordes of students yesterday afternoon in a Sanders Theatre filled to near-capacity for E. M. Forster's address on "The Raison d'Etre of Criticism in the Arts."

Setting the key for the three-day "Symposium on Music Criticism," the English novelist and critic discussed the basic differences between the critical and creative processes, in a forty-five minute speech that intermittently rocked the audience with laughter.

Forster defined the "creative state of mind" as one "nourished by the subconscious." The critical state, on the other hand, keeps everything conscious with its central aim being to consider a work of art in terms of itself rather than in terms of the rest of the world.

Although criticism can help an artist to avoid defects, "it cannot help him to substitute merits. Only inspiration, connected with the subconscious, can do that." According to Forster, criticism can never "place us inside a work of art."

In view of this fact, Forster believes that the "raison d'etre" of criticism can only be established on "miner grounds," such as its purely educational or analitical functions.

In its ideal state criticism should combine "innocence and experience," according to Forster. Works of art are intended to be heard "forever for the first time."

Featuring today's half of the symposium are talks by Virgil Thomson and Olga Samaroff at 10:30 o'clock in Sanders Theatre and a cheral concert at 6:30 o'clock this evening in Memorial Church.