It tends to the gratification of England
and Europe, even in the face of its democratic demolition of feudalistic
survival, by sealing a certain cheap type of vulgarity with the national
stamp. One must, nevertheless, confess with regret that this type is
the embodiment of an "ideal" still only too commonly cherished in
America. The national type, I take it, is found in such characters as
Lincoln and Phillips Brooks, in Lee and Henry W. Grady, in Charles W.
Eliot and Edwin A. Alderman, and not in a provincial 'Connecticut
Yankee', jovial and whole--hearted though he be. I say this without
forgetting or minimizing for a moment the art displayed in effecting the
devastating and illimitably humorous contrast of a present with a
remotely past civilization. 'Joan of Arc' has no local association,
being a pure work of the heart, the chivalric impulse of a noble spirit.
'The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg', viewed from any standpoint, is a
masterpiece; but its significance lies, not in the locality of its
setting, but in the universality of its moral.
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