The Birmingham age-herald., 1907-11-11
MoLIERE'S FAME.
His Plays Are the Pleasure Ground of
 the World.

From the London Times.
 The plays of Mollere are the pleasure ground of all the world. No fame is se- curer than his, and only one or two more universal. So long as our civilization re- mains Moliere remains. So long as hu- man beings enjoy the speetable of human life, so long as they remain in possession of that distinguishing mark of civilization as opposed to barbarism, the capacity to be amused, they can never forget Moliere. So much we may say for the whole world of men and women who are so far civi- lized at any rate, as to have added social and intellectual pleasures to those of the senses and the passions. And for the elect whose civilization has gone a stage further, so that they find one of their keenest pleasures in the mere sight of a piece of work perfectly done, Moliere is all that he is for the rest and this besides. The particular thing that he set out to do is done, impeceably, unalterably, finally, so that just those who have most skill in such matters are the most certain that a thousand years of labor could not do TN~NNtf like a few big things in the worlds his- tory and few small like the "Aeneid" of Virgil, like the immortal trihes of Catullus, like Milton, like Jane Austen.
 The world outside France has remained rather cold In the presence of some of those whom France acclaims as her high est. but about the universal homage to Moliere there has never been any serious doubt. Now and then, especially at first, a pedant with a half-understood Aristotle under his arm has tried to persuade the worshppers that they had come to a false oracle which did not speak accord ing to the rules. But the crowd knows what 1t comes for and whether it goes away empty. Securus judicat orbs ter rarum. The house of Moliere will always be full and happy; and if any rule of art be cited against the legitimacy of the happiness. those who are tasting it will always dismiss the intrusive objector with their poets own question: "Je voudrais bien savolr s la Igrande regle de toutes les regles nest pas de plaire." After all, that is the test from which there is no appeal. The business of art Is to please, and, with only one qualification, that old and important one. semper, omnibus, ubique. 1t is safe to add that the art which pleases is good art.
 But Moliere's fame has no fear of those three great words. They may, indeed. have generally belonged to world out of his reach, but, in their plain and literal sense, there have been very few things to which they can be so truthfuly applied as they can to him and the universal pop ularity of his comedy. "Scapln" and "Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme'' were not the kind of thing that attracts crowds for two months and is unreadable in two years. Their author was popular in hs lifetime, and he has been popular ever since. He Is the glory of France, and the delight of all the world Today, as in his own day, people who read or see a play of his for the first time are con- stantly paying him La Fontane's instan- taneous tribute, Viola mon hommel There are many things he Is not. But that he is and will be, so long as our civilization lasts, the man whom everybody likes at once, and never stops liking.