er
of La Gioconda. It is in Beethoven, not so much in the 'Pathetique' or
in the 'Pastorale,' as in the man who, through his deafness, could still
hear the songs of eternity. Special and general were they all; one comes
to think that genius is together an infinite capacity for seeing all
things, and an infinite capacity for ignoring all things but one.

II

Life goes marching on, who shall claim the laurel wreath that time
cannot wither? So many, still living or recently dead, have postured so
well that it is hard to say what will be left when they have been
discounted at the Bank of Posterity. Politicians, writers, men of
science, highly prized by their fellows ... what living court is cool
enough to judge them? Who shall say whether Rodin will remain upon a
pedestal, or whether he will fall to a rank as low as that of Lord
Leighton? Likewise, Dr Ehrlich saw the furrow he ploughed crossed by
other furrows; it may be that the turbulent, inquisitive mind of Mr
Edison may have developed only fascinating applications, and not have,
as we think, set new frontiers to the field of scientific thought. Those
are men difficult to fix, as are also men such as Lord Kitchener and
Henry James, because they are too close to us as persons to be seen
entirely, and yet too far for us to imagine the diagrams of their
personalities. We are closer to some others, to people such as Mr Thomas
Hardy, even though he stopped in full flight and gathered himself
together only to produce the _Dynasts_ in a medium which is not quite
the one he was born to. We are fairly close, too, to Mr Anatole France,
to his gaiety, his malignancy, his penetration without excessive pity.
Mr Anatole France is one of the great doubtfuls of our period, like the
Kaiser and Mr Roosevelt. Like both, he has something of the colossal,
and like both he suggests that there were, or may be, taller giants.
For as one reads Mr Anatole France, as he leads one by the hand through
Ausonian glades, the shadow of Voltaire haunts one wearing a smile
secure and vinegary. Likewise, when we consider the Kaiser, where depth
has been transmuted into area, where responsibility to his own pride
borders upon mania, appraisal is difficult. The Kaiser, judging him from
his speeches and his deeds, appears to have carried the commonplace to a
pitch where it attains distinction. He has become as general as an
encyclopaedia; he is able to embrace in a single brain theocracy and
local governm