MODERN HISTORY OF LITERATURE 503 



degree of perfection. Much has been done, especially, in the way of 

 critical editions. It has been shown, however, by the monumental 

 Weimar edition of Goethe, that the adoption of principles applic- 

 able to classical and older German philolog}^ by no means suffices, 

 that we must seek our own way for our differently constituted tasks. 

 It would be desirable in this field to have greater uniformity in plan, 

 arrangement, and printing, whereby the utility and convenience of 

 our critical editions would be decidedly improved. A great deal of 

 self-sacrificing and unselfish work has been given to bibliographies, 

 reprints, and recently to indexes. This deserves hearty thanks, 

 although we do not believe that the powers of the present gener- 

 ation should be tired out and exhausted, in order to serve and help 

 future investigators. Research and accessory apparatus always 

 accompany each other; they aid each other mutually. Even at the 

 risk of making mistakes, the impulse to carry on research must be 

 kept constantly awake and alive. A generation of mere makers of 

 critical texts, etc., would make such work the end in itself, and only 

 produce more men able to do such work, but not investigators. 



The principle of the division of labor holds good in our subject, 

 as well as in all other subjects involving mental activity. Large 

 numbers of people seek work in our province. The German and Aus- 

 trian universities are filled beyond measure; they put every year 

 hundreds of new and vigorous workers in the field. It is well to 

 raise again the question, with Lichtenberg, whether the making of 

 books is after all the real purpose of study, and whether it is not 

 a nobler task to study in order to know, than to study in order to 

 write. Certainly all the foars with which men like Roschcr in their 

 time regarded the growth of seminars at the German universities 

 have not been groundless. They feared from them the nurturing of 

 premature and pretentious book-making, that lowers the students to 

 a more vehicle of propaganda. It is certainly neither a very healthy 

 nor a normal condition, when, in a subject like ours, which pre- 

 supposes years of wide rending and deep study, the veriest youngsters 

 take the lead, and write books involving such an astonishing mas- 

 tery of material that it would require twice the years of the writer 

 to possess any real knowledge of all the hooks cited and discussed. 

 Less would often mean more here: a question-mark left standing, 

 a little uncertainty, some missing detail, would often be more con- 

 vincing than the painful neatness that can only be attained by 

 perusing, consulting, collecting, etc. All of us. the older even to 

 a larger degree than the younger, lack the time and leisure for the 

 extensive and collective reading of the uTcat writers and whole 

 literary periods. As a rule, too much is read ad hoc, for a definite 

 purpose, and often for a predetermined result. Unbiased first- 

 hand impressions arc wanting, impressions that ought to form the 



