ll welcome an allusion to Dickens almost as
much as one to Aristotle) the higher Podsnappery. "Thus happily
acquainted with his own merit and importance, Mr. Podsnap settled that
whatever he put behind him he put out of existence.... The world got up
at eight, shaved close at a quarter past, breakfasted at nine, went to
the City at ten, came home at half-past five, and dined at seven."

Mr. Roosevelt, with his multifarious American experience as soldier and
cowboy, hunter and historian, police-captain and President, comes far
nearer the ideal spectator, for this play at least, than Mr. Walkley.
Yet his enthusiasm for it has been dismissed by our critic as
"stupendous _naivete_." Mr. Roosevelt apparently falls under that class
of "people who knowing no rules, are at the mercy of their undisciplined
taste," which Mr. Walkley excludes altogether from his classification of
critics, in despite of Dr. Johnson's opinion that "natural judges" are
only second to "those who know but are above the rules." It is
comforting, therefore, to find Mr. Augustus Thomas, the famous American
playwright, who is familiar with the rules to the point of contempt,
chivalrously associating himself, in defence of a British rival, with
Mr. Roosevelt's "stupendous _naivete_."

"Mr. Zangwill's 'rhapsodising' over music and crucibles and statues of
Liberty is," says Mr. Thomas, "a very effective use of a most potent
symbolism, and I have never seen men and women more sincerely stirred
than the audience at _The Melting Pot_. The impulses awakened by the
Zangwill play were those of wide human sympathy, charity, and
compassion; and, for my own part, I would rather retire from the theatre
and retire from all direct or indirect association with journalism than
write down the employment of these factors by Mr. Zangwill as mere
claptrap."

"As a work of art for art's sake," also wrote Mr. William Archer, "the
play simply does not exist." He added: "but Mr. Zangwill would not dream
of appealing to such a standard." Mr. Archer had the misfortune to see
the play in New York side by side with his more cynical _confrere_, and
thus his very praise has an air of apologia to Mr. Walkley and the great
doctrine of "art for art's sake." It would almost seem as if he even
takes a "work of art" and a "work of art for art's sake" as synonymous.
Nothing, in fact, could be more inartistic. "Art for art's sake" is one
species of art, whose right to existence the author has