174 LITERATURE AND DRAMA 



The lady herself, to one who did not know her books, would 

 be as uninteresting, when seen by the light of these writings 

 only, as any famous author must be when met in the beaten way 

 of social converse. 



If we were not forewarned by the example of two or three 

 wonderful written lives, we should be in much danger of believing 

 that biography was worse than useless except in the case of those 

 whose actions, rather than their lives, were interesting. But in 

 truth we get no record of the lives of our thinkers or artists ; 

 we learn their actions and we read their opinions well or ill 

 expressed, but the record of actions is no record of the true life 

 of a man ; and opinions of novelist or philosopher are of small 

 importance except within that limited range where they have 

 probably expressed their views far more perfectly in their well- 

 considered writings. Even if we had a novelist's carefully con- 

 sidered verdict well expressed on architecture, law, medicine, oil 

 and water-colour painting, the decalogue, spirit-rapping, and the 

 home policy of statesmen, this would be no record of the life of 

 that man or woman ; it would possess, except as to style, no 

 other interest than that felt for the record of the interviews 

 published by clever journals . 



