it? That's what I
want to know." "But isn't it fine, and worth having, and aren't you glad
it was written?" I pleaded. "Well, if I knew what it was...." And so the
argument ran for hours. Until he had subsumed the article under certain
categories he had come to accept, appreciation was impossible for him. I
have many arguments with my classicalist friend. This time it was about
George Moore's "Ave." I was trying to express my delight. "It isn't a
novel, or an essay, or a real confession--it's nothing," said he. His
well-ordered mind was compelled to throw out of doors any work for which
he had no carefully prepared pocket. I thought of Aristotle, who denied
the existence of a mule because it was neither a horse nor an ass.

Dramatic critics follow Aristotle in more ways than one. A play is
produced which fascinates an audience for weeks. It is published and read
all over the world. Then you are treated to endless discussions by the
critics trying to prove that "it is not a play." So-and-so-and-so
constitute a play, they affirm,--this thing doesn't meet the
requirements, so away with it. They forget that nobody would have had the
slightest idea what a play was if plays hadn't been written; that the
rules deduced from the plays that have already been written are no
eternal law for the plays that will be.

Classicalism and invention are irreconcilable enemies. Let it be
understood that I am not decrying the great nourishment which a living
tradition offers. The criticism I am making is of those who try to feed
upon the husks alone. Without the slightest paradox one may say that the
classicalist is most foreign to the classics. He does not put himself
within the creative impulses of the past: he is blinded by their
manifestations. It is perhaps no accident that two of the greatest
classical scholars in England--Gilbert Murray and Alfred Zimmern--are
political radicals. The man whom I call here the classicalist cannot
possibly be creative, for the essence of his creed is that there must be
nothing new under the sun.

The United States, you imagine, would of all nations be the freest from
classicalism. Settled as a great adventure and dedicated to an experiment
in republicanism, the tradition of the country is of extending
boundaries, obstacles overcome, and pioneering exploits in which a
wilderness was subdued to human uses. The very air of America would seem
to be a guarantee against formalism. You would think that self-g