Thus Nature, in her drama, has no temporary pity, no regret. She sets before us the plots of life, and its characters, just as they are. The plots may or may not be laid bare; the characters often reveal themselves in speech and action. As the stream rises no higher than its fount, the ideal dramatist is not more learned than his teacher. He may know no more than you of his personages' secrets. Thackeray confessed, you remember, that Miss Sharp was too deep for him.
Tragedy, according to Aristotle and in Dryden's English, is "an imitation of one entire,Why tragedy elevates the soul. great, and probable action, not told but represented, which, by moving in us fear and pity, is conducive to the purging of those two passions in our minds." And so its reading of the book of life, even with our poor vision, is more disciplinary, more instructive in ethics and the conduct of life, than any theoretic preachment. The latter will be colored, more or less, by the temper of the preacher. Besides, through the exaltation to which we are lifted by the poet's large utterance, our vision is quickened: we see, however unconsciously, that earthly tragedies are of passing import,—phenomenal, formative experiences in the measureless progress of the human soul; that life itself is a drama in which we are both spectators and participators; that, when the curtain falls, we may wake as from a dream, and enter upon a life beyond terrestrial tragedies and which fears not even a disembodied phantom, "being a thing immortal as itself."
