Bache.] [May 15, what I deem the interest of Philadelphia, which I love; of literature, which I also love, and of art generally, which has been my never-ceasing pleasure throughout life. Mr. Moulton's merits are enthusiasm and elocutionary ability, his faults extravagance and defective logical perception. The result is seen in unbridled imagination soaring over the fields of literature, where, however entertaining, he is not a safe guide to dwellers on the average plane of life in mind, thought, training, and all that goes to form the individual as he stands. I proceed, after this necessary preamble, to the discussion of a few statements made by him on the occasion to which I have referred, not relating at all to the point that I have mentioned, but involving what many others as well as myself deem the greatest heresy against tenets fundamental in literature, safely leaving to the sober second-thought and calm review of the literarily educated among his audience the justification of the opinion that I have expressed as to the general tenor and defect of his instruction. Mr. Moulton opened his lecture with the strange remark that, whereas his own regard is especially reserved for literature in itself, doubtless that of the great majority of his hearers was concentrated upon the author. This was wholly irreconcilable with the fact of the presence of the large audience that greeted him upon that occasion for the ostensible purpose for which it had assembled. Interest in authors, among any portion of the reading public, is always subordinate to interest in literature. That public stands in exactly the same category, if not in exactly the same relation, to literature and authors, as does Mr. Moulton himself. He himself could not, if he would, divest himself of interest in individual authors compatibly with being interested in their works, the one interest with everybody being exactly proportional to the other. He protested too much in his intended exaltation of literature, more than it is human to feel, for there is, upon the assumption of individual love for literature, no other category than one inclusive of the highest teacher and the lowliest scholar, in all that regards the relativeness of literature and the author. If Mr. Moulton's statement were correct, as representing a possible condition of mind, it would be futile to address any mixed audience assembled for literary entertainment and instruction, except by first endeavoring to convert its component individuals from the error of their way of 1891.] [Bache. thinking, that the author is more interesting than his book. But that was evidently not the intention of the lecturer, as set forth in his printed Syllabus of the lecture course, but to make critical study of specimens of the higher literature, upon the assumption of general knowledge of, love for, or at least capacity to learn to appreciate, the productions of master minds in the various provinces of literary art. A statement in Mr. Moulton's lecture, much more worthy of notice, however, because it involved a dangerous thing to say before a mixed audience, without due qualification to forestall any possible misunderstanding as to the limited reach of the declaration, was contained in his repudiation of all authority for the laws of grammar, clinching the assertion by the remark that in England they do not "set so much store as we in America by Lindley Murray." He declared unreservedly, and proceeded to argue, that so-called laws of grammar are not binding, so repeatedly enforcing the point by using the expression of one of his correspondents, whom he cited as charging that Browning's Caliban "speaks bad grammar," as to impress the listener with the belief that he himself regards that expression as good English. That the sentiment was quite agreeable to some scattered groups among the audience was very evident from the gentle murmur of assent and the incipient stir of applause that arose among them. He went on to say that the popular impression that grammatical law is binding arises from confounding two different senses in which the word is used as defining two diverse things. Now, the idea of law, as everywhere apprehended, however imperfectly formulated as a statement of fact or obligation, however even provisional, has, as a term, but one signification. Relating to physical phenomena, it contains the affirmation of correspondence between cause and effect, authoritative with man. Relating to man, whether as supernally or humanly ruled, it contains the assertion of authority as defining conditions and imposing upon him obedience. Whether, then, the idea is expressed with reference to nature beyond or within man's control, the term corresponds with it, and always relates to that which he regards as authoritative. Most unfortunate for Mr. Moulton's plea was the distinction which he attempted to draw between legislative laws and the law of custom in language. The essential difference between them, Bache.] [May 15, he affirmed, lies in the fact that legislative laws are imposed by authority under penalty, whereas the so-called laws of grammar, being derived from language, and not it from them, are not of any binding authority whatever. But, just as a general consensus of opinion in a community is by legislative action reflected in the concrete form of legal enactment, so a similar consensus of opinion in a community as to language is reflected concretely in the forms in accepted general usage in speech. Back of all laws of language, as well as of all legislative laws, are mandate and penalty, none the less in the first because they are not there formally expressed. Human laws, whether legislative or otherwise, are, in a word, the expression of the will of the community. The laws of speech, as existing in a particular community, are therefore in their sphere as mandatory as are those of a legislature; nor is their infraction possible without incurring and suffering penalty. Attached to their infraction is the penalty resulting from less comprehensibility in written and oral speech, less ability to secure the widest audience, less possibility of communion with one's fellow-men, and at the lower depths, the absolute impossibility of maintaining the best social status. Because all peoples themselves make language, they cannot be bound by that which they create, is an untenable proposition, seeing that in the evolution of human affairs practice comes first, and then custom, and then the formulation of custom in the unwritten law of precedent, if not in the shape of written law. It is the individual that is bound by the law of grammar as well as other law, not the community creative of correspondent language, and failure to discriminate between the essentially different agencies as, on the one hand, representing authority, and on the other obedience, leads from specious view to specious statement. It may be frankly admitted that Caliban has a right to a grammar of his own, without at the same time admitting that there is no law of grammar, when it is considered that we find all men, up to their individual capacity, using speech with recognition of law incorporate in every individual tongue. Another unfortunate statement made by Mr. Moulton in the lecture referred to, was when he answered certain criticisms upon Browning, that no matter how he varies his theme, he is generally obscure and ever identifiable through his mask. Mr. Moulton asserted as to these strictures, that every great author 1891.] [Bache. necessarily has his medium through which he must address his world, and it is for his world, if it incline to love him, to study to become familiar with the medium in which the message of the seer is at first enshrouded. But even undeniable greatness in literature, and such is Browning's, does not depend upon obscurity, but must needs be lessened, not increased by obscurity. Neither does personality, inseparable from utterance, enhance, but, on the contrary, it limits literary greatness. Unless we are to renounce existing standards, obscurity cannot be admitted as a merit, but must be recognized as a defect. Mr. Moulton mentioned The Ring and the Book as perhaps the greatest of all poems, and therefore, inferentially, Browning as perhaps the greatest of all poets. The work is marvelously fine, despite fitful, but by no means continuous obscurity, despite portions in which its style is too Hudibrastic to suit the graveness of the theme, and most notably of all (because it might so easily have been otherwise by a halt in time), despite the lameness of its ending. Browning himself says, in the very first line of the superfluous last part of the poem, "Here were the end, had anything an end;" yet relentlessly goes on to reflections of the late actors on the scene, now tame and uninteresting, with even mention that Guido died penitent (with short shrift it must have been, an hour or so at most, including the procession to the place of execution); for which the reader cares not a jot, such terrorized reconciliation of life with death being the common end of darkest criminality in face of unexpected retribution. Fearful is the anticlimax, with its additional Byronic looking towards and mention of the "British Public," when, merely by omission, the grandest possible climax lay just before the author, where the doomed miscreant, Guido, renouncing on the instant his mock heroics and blatant atheism, as he hears his executioners at his cell's door, every shred of pretense falling from his naked hideousness, cries, "Abate,-Cardinal,Christ, Maria, God, . . . . Pompilia, will you let them murder me?" The tale is told. There is a natural ending, beyond which extension is but injury: even the epilogue is out of date. But such things apart, can it possibly be thought as worthy of existence as the first part of Faust, which, if men remain as men now are, must endure until earth, grown cold and lifeless, still rolls on through space. To address his world, a limited world, a less than the greatest type of author may be obscure and must be personal through his writings, but to address the whole world, to be greatest in literary art, one must so dominate it in clearness and impersonality as though behind the Olympian clouds, where almost alone stands Shakespeare. The grand epic traits of Homer, all but his equal among the immortals, admit of no direct comparison between them, but speaking broadly, there is nothing to choose between them on the score of clearness and impersonality. It is recognized that what is superlatively great in art is known as such by all orders of men: the fact is thus determined. Before such works no veil of obscurity hangs, but supreme greatness in them is revealed, if not equally, at least as a presence to all men. This law of perception, however, does not exist for science and the highest scientific men. Herbert Spencer has toiled through a long life generally unknown, and wholly unremunerated with this world's goods, although, with wellpoised brain and feet firmly set on logical procedure, he has made a march of progress, barring his agnosticism, joined by thousands who have taken fire from his torch to millions beyond unaware of whence came the light. But art is for all the world, by the simple avenues of sense, with much or little intellect, while science, the possession of the few, must ever remain beyond the ken of the multitude save in diluted forms of knowledge. Yet, in entire forgetfulness of the present civilized standpoint in science, Mr. Moulton declared that the savage's knowledge of nature far exceeds that of the civilized man. The ground taken for the assertion was the savage's recognized capacity in woodcraft, following trails, and other skillfulness of the most primitive sort, forced upon him by his daily needs, and not to be spoken of in the same breath with the larger acquaintance with nature possessed by civilized man for centuries, especially that represented by the late wondrous civilized advance through study of the highest physical laws. The omne admirari is as pernicious a phase of the human intelligence as is that of the nil admirari attitude of mind. To be catholic in taste is not to embrace all creeds and proselytize to every faith. To enjoy truly, with exalted sense, is to discriminate. To have the highest æsthetic enjoyment throughout life depends upon holding one's self in the attitude of receptivity for |