Omaha daily bee., 1895-10-13

and perspective: forgotten to subordinate the
weak and accidental TO the strong and es-
sential, and from vast mass OF facts make
no selection of what is vital and interesting
but serve all indiscrlmnately. AS in the
ballad Of Pasha Bailey Ben:
They bring us onions strung on ropes,
And cold boiled beef and telescopes,
And balls of string and shrimps and guns,
And chops and tacks and hats and buns.
And candlesticks and potted quails,
And capstan bars and scales and weights
And ornaments for empty CRATES.
and expect us to be as grateful as If they
appealed to the almost universal love for the
marvellous and strange, which Mr.. Howell
declares is characteristic Of only primitive
natures-the young and the savage. But
surely the pitiful awe and care of humanity,
the desire for Justice, the hope that there is
a purpose in life beyond what we can see, the
belief that the men of today like the men of
all time, are capable of strong self-sacrifce
and unselfsh living, Of heroic deeds and
noble thoughts; surely these are not charac-
teristic OF undevelopment, of youthfulness, or
IL so youth is a glorious fault and one we
would all have. And yet these yearnings for
what is highest and best, the longing to
cherish the dreams Of our youth even after
the ardor and fire have died out of them, to
hold to our kinship with the infinite and keep
the light that never was on land or sea. these,
with the desire for the expressions of the
deep primitive passions which never fail TO
touch humanity deeply, are, say their. op-
ponents, what the realsts have failed to sat
isfy
Devotng themselves to their realities
known thro' the senses. they have neglected
tho no less real tho elusive verities of the
spirit; describing the surface and superfciai
elements of life, its appearances, they have
failed to speak to the highest in man-to
arouse those indefinable emotions which
Novalis calls the anonymous feelings of the
soul.
Their theory is that the noveist's duty Is
to portray and reproduce the life of his time;
not to let his personality color the facts
which ne wishes to record but to paint them as
they are-dull. drab, dreary, coTcerniEg him
self not with the plot, for there is none; not
with the selection Of his subject or charac-
ters, for the more common and general the
story is the better it is then typical, but with
the manner of its treatment. for to write
badly Is the greatest crime of which they can
conceive. And in part they have done a good
work; they have given us pieces of faithful
portraiture, they have striven to do away
with the reproach implied in Emerson s
words: Life lies about us dumb; the day
as we know 1t has not yet found voice."
But in their efforts to be precise and exact,
in their eagerness TO avoid the delicate exag-
geration by which pictures of life gain color,
sound, perfume, they have too often selected
the mean and sordid, the dull and dense, and
shown us only the terrible ineffeedvspess of
dead motives, the unfulilled longings, with
out showing the other side Of the picture,
where Life behind its accidents stands
strong and sef-sustainlng, the human fact
transcendng all the losing and the gaining"
OF course, no man can put the whole Of life
into play or a book, but the realism which
leads its advocates to select the sad and shall
low and petty, unlighted by the dealzation
Of life and sentiment found everywhere, is
grossly untrue. The battle between the soul
Of man and its environment, the strife be-
tween the inward desire and the outward ne
eessity, often results in the conquest Of the
higher, finer elements by the baser but not
always, and life may be broadening and
deepening in its effect, as well as corrosive
and corrodng. In applying the scientific
methods TO the literary analysis Of man and
nature, making their work as far as possible
impersonal, they have ignored the fact that
in all the great masterpieces the personality
Of the creator dominates, no matter what
form II has taken, as a means OF expression
that the poets have set their own hearts to
music. and that the great painters have put
into their pictures a something which the
reality had not. and that this something is
what distinguishes the great achievements
from the mediocre. "Oh, the little more and
how much 1t is and the little less and what