BRIEF ESSAYS 237 



fiction than Partridge in "Tom Jones," but Par- 

 tridge witnessing his iirst play at the theatre is 

 immortal. The meanest life has poetry in it, hut 

 it takes a poet to bring the poetry out. In writing 

 "Werther," Goethe said he succeeded in breathing 

 into the work "all that warmth which leaves no 

 distinction between the poetical and the actual." 

 Whether or not it was realistic, in the sense that it 

 was a faithful picture of the life of his times, is of 

 little moment compared with the question: Was it 

 vital and serious, or informed with real passion? 

 And if the passion of the story or poem is real, do 

 we care for any other reality? If the mood and 

 temper in which an author contemplates his subject 

 are genuine, his realism will take care of itself. 



Paradoxical as it may seem, it is only the idealist 

 who can adequately deal with the real, — who can 

 fuse it and use it and bring out its full significance. 

 There may be a barren realism, just as well as a 

 barren idealism; the proper marriage of the two is 

 the end and aim of art. To make the idea tangible 

 to us, whether in poetry or in prose, so that the 

 mind can rest upon it, and feel braced and excited 

 by it, — is not that also an end to be aimed at? 

 And, on the other hand, to make the actual, the 

 concrete, fluid and plastic, and inform it with mean- 

 ing and power, — is not that also to be striven for ? 

 In the same proportion in which literature is real, 

 must it also be ideal; just so much earth as there 

 is, just so much sky must arch over it. The actual 

 must be transmuted, the ideal must be embodied; 



