صفحة 468 من 1391

Shakespeare has taught us how great men should speak and act; he

has drawn characters of a wonderful purity and depth; he has

ennobled the human mind, but, like Homer (Rep.), he 'has left no

way of life.' The next greatest poet of modern times, Goethe, is

concerned with 'a lower degree of truth'; he paints the world as

a stage on which 'all the men and women are merely players'; he

cultivates life as an art, but he furnishes no ideals of truth

and action. The poet may rebel against any attempt to set limits

to his fancy; and he may argue truly that moralizing in verse is

not poetry. Possibly, like Mephistopheles in Faust, he may

retaliate on his adversaries. But the philosopher will still be

justified in asking, 'How may the heavenly gift of poesy be

devoted to the good of mankind?'