XI.

the original sense of the word as a deed or CHAPTER thing done, only in so far as this action or deed is capable of being acted (in the secondary sense) that is, played. Now, as all action or vital movement is not fit for representation, does not afford scope for what, in the artistic sense, is known as acting, it is not strictly accurate to say that the drama is so called because of the activity which it embodies. In all art there is an embodied activity. Still it is a fact that, when we think of the drama as action, we do not confine ourselves to the idea of action as mimetic. If acting or vicarious action be the peculiar pro- The double perty of the drama, it is at the same time true the word that we have a natural tendency to regard applied to action (using the word now in its original sense of something done) as also its property. The reason is that all such movements as are fit for dramatic show must have in them an emphasis and decision which seems to entitle them peculiarly to the name of action. Just as we give the name of working classes to a special class

culty in ascertaining that the old Greek verb Spâv, from which drama comes, had the same double range of meaning. The dictionaries I have glanced at, all miss it, including Liddell and Scott. Hence an argument that since the name of the drama comes from a verb which had no reference to acting in the

mimic sense, the action to which
it refers is action in the original
sense of the word, that is, any
display of energy. But see

Aristotle's famous definition of
tragedy in the sixth chapter of
the Poetics, where the verb is
evidently used in the secondary
sense of playing a part.

meaning of

action as

the drama.

CHAPTER of workers, and as we call men of action men

XI.

who act in a particular way, so in art we deem that class of movements which are fit for the purposes of the drama as especially entitled to the name of action. Perhaps, in the last analysis, this is but a question of words. I maintain that the drama is so called, not because it means action in the original sense of the word—that is, a display of energy--but because it means action in the secondary sense-that is, a display of mimicry. On the other hand, I am obliged to allow that a display of mimicry is possible only when there is an emphatic display of energy to be the subject of mimicry.

But the sum of all is that the dramatic is in a peculiar sense a show of strong action, and that in the development of a strong action it educes that mixed or painful pleasure which it has been the object of this chapter to identify with strength of action.

CHAPTER XII.

PURE PLEASURE.

S there such a thing as

pleasure-pleasure which is

from pain?

void of pain, but also something dis- Is pleasure tinct from riddance of pain? The poetical, and even free perhaps too, the common answer to the question is given by Metastasio.

Entra l'uomo, allor che nasce,

In un mar di tante pene,

Che s'avvezza dalle fasce

Ogni affanno a sostener.

Ma per lui si raro è il bene,

Ma la gioja è cosi rara

Che a soffrir mai non impara
Le sorprese del piacer.

These lines will be found in the sacred drama of Isacco, and are spoken by Abraham. Sarah had seen him return from the sacrifice with the bloody knife in his hand, and had no doubt that

VOL. II.

F

CHAPTER her only son had been slaughtered. This she

XII.

of the common doctrine.

bore; she had schooled herself to bear it. But when she learns that her son lives, it is more than she can bear; the joy of it is beyond her; she breaks down; and Abraham is calm enough to moralize upon the event. Man, he Man, he says, is born to trouble, and is so trained in adversity, that pain he can always endure; but good comes to him so seldom, and joy is so rare, that the . Probably Statement shock of pleasure is insufferable. this, the gloomy view of life, is the prevalent one. It is certain that we talk more of our miseries than of our joys, and there are moments of agony, which, while they last, seem to outvie whole ages of bliss. In the next chapter, I shall have to point out one of the most important laws of pleasure that may account for the tendency of the human mind to make much of its woes, to think little of its delights, and to regard pain as the normal condition of life. Here we have only to consider the question Is there such a thing as pure pleasure, pleasure free from any shadow of pain?

Plato main

tains the

Sir William Hamilton has overstated Plato's existence of doctrine of enjoyment in describing it as only pure plea the negation of pain. In point of fact no one more

sure.

clearly than Plato acknowledged the reality of pleasure, pure and unmixed; and as I opened the subject of mixed pleasure by quoting Kant's account of it, so now I cannot do better than

XII.

open up this subject of unmixed enjoyment, by CHAPTER starting from Plato's account of it, which is to be found in the dialogue called after Philebus, and which I present in Mr. Poste's translation.

logue in

"SOCRATES. In the natural order after the The diaMixed pleasures, we proceed by necessary which this sequence to the Unmixed in their turn.

"PROTARCHUS.-We ought.

"SOCRATES.-I will try to start in a fresh direction and point them out; for those who say that pain alleviated is the whole of pleasure seem to me to be mistaken. However, I use these persons, as I said, as witnesses that some pleasures are apparent but unreal, and that others, which are seemingly great, are really blended with pain, and alleviation of the pangs of bodily and mental distress.

"PROTARCHUS.-And true pleasures, Socrates, which are they?

"SOCRATES.-Those from beautiful colours, as they are called, and from figures, and most of those from odours, and those from sounds, and any objects whose absence is unfelt and painless, while their presence is sensible and productive of pleasure.

"PROTARCHUS.-And what answer to this

description?

"SOCRATES.-I confess they are not obvious,

doctrine is urged.