THE RELATIONS OF BELLES-LETTRES 539 



spirit that these poems infused into contemporary Scots remains still 

 the source of their descendants' pride. Centuries after its composition, 

 Robert Barns wrote of the story of Wallace: "It poured a tide of 

 Scottish prejudice into my veins that will boil along there till the 

 Mood-gates of life close in eternal rest." Surely no historian can leave 

 such literature out of consideration in estimating the bases of Scot- 

 tish nationality. Is it not, then, literature of power? 



We should do well to seek more in history the influence of popular 

 legends, old poetic imaginings that have fostered love of country, 

 tightened racial ties. It was no vain appeal that Bjornson made to 

 his countrymen when he justified their patriotism by singing of the 

 "saga-night that has spread dreams" over their land. Such dreams 

 in general possession yield the secret of that common social impulse 

 which is a nation's strength. Through literature is often made mani- 

 fest the halo of a nation, which, representative of its spiritual glory, 

 commands reverence and devotion. 



It is, nevertheless, difficult to generalize about the immediate 

 relations of literature to national movements. There seems no fixed 

 rule apparent. With the exception of some orations, the American 

 Revolution was neither preluded nor followed by any literary works 

 <if note, while the French Revolution presents a situation exactly 

 the opposite. Wherein lies the difference? What has this country 

 lost by the absence of an oracle of its former spirit? What has France 

 gained by the concern of its writers with the form of its government? 



Some historians are disposed to calculate the greatness of a nation 

 by the number of great men it has produced, and the method is not 

 to be wholly blamed. Great men are but the mouthpiece of great 

 spirit, and that is usually the spirit of their time. We are justified 

 in denying unusual uplift to the spirit of a nation when it reaches 

 to no superior heights in sifted individuals. Grant that the originality 

 of a people is not to be measured by its records in letters alone, but 

 in the other arts as well, in social and intellectual progress, in the 

 advancement of civilization variously apparent; yet an age when 

 literature is weak, when it is frivolous, cheap, and insincere, rot to 

 say vulgar or depraved, is an age which the future historian will 

 find it hard to call great, no matter how proudly that age may have 

 vaunted itself on a high general level of education, or a prosperous 

 mediocrity of culture. 



It is appalling to consider how little direct influence literature has 

 as literature on the multitudes that embrace our civilization. Frankly, 

 if we had any way to discover how many of the eighty million 

 American citizens read books with any concern for them as works 

 of art. with any conception of what makes them good or bad in the 

 eyes of the trained, with any power to discriminate on their own 

 behalf, we should probably be ashamed to state the results of our 



