An Estimate of the Value and Influence of Works of Fiction in Modern Times Part 1

An Estimate of the Value and Influence of Works of Fiction in Modern Times.

by Thomas Hill Green.

PREFACE

_For a good many years I have used this essay of Green's with an advanced cla.s.s in the theory of prose fiction. It has worked well. It always arouses discussion, and in doing so it has the great virtue that it imperiously leads the argument away from superficialities and centers it upon fundamentals. Its service as a stimulus to high thinking cannot easily be overestimated. For any student, and especially for one who has known only the unidea'd criticism of fiction so popular today, it is a fine thing to come in contact with a high-minded, st.u.r.dy, and uncompromising thinker such as Green is. As Green says of the hearer of tragedy,_ "He bears about him, for a time at least, among the rank vapors of the earth, something of the freshness and fragrance of the higher air." _I trust that this reprint, by making the essay more easily accessible than it has been heretofore, will help to raise the grade of student thought and taste and criticism._

F. N. S.

_University of Michigan December 1, 1910._

INTRODUCTION

Thomas Hill Green was born in Birkin, Yorks.h.i.+re, April 7, 1836. His early education was acquired first at home under his father, the rector of Birkin, then at Rugby, where he was sent at the age of fourteen. In 1855 he entered Balliol College, Oxford, and came under the influence of Jowett, afterwards famous as Master of Balliol and translator of Plato.

Though he matured early, Green was not a brilliant student. On the contrary, he appeared to be indolent and sluggish. "No man," wrote one of his fellow-students in 1862, "is driven with greater difficulty to work not to his taste.... He wrote some of the best college essays: he never sent them in on the right day, and might generally be seen on the Monday pondering over essays which every one else had sent in on the Friday night." These traits, however, as it proved later, were the index not of a vagrant mind, but of independence of thought and of preoccupation with weightier matters. To quote again from the tribute of a fellow-student: "On everything he said or wrote there was stamped the impress of a forcible individuality, a mind that thought for itself, and whose thoughts had the rugged strength of an original character wherein grimness was mingled with humor, and practical shrewdness with a love for abstract speculation." In the end, his solid qualities of mind and character made so strong an impression upon the University authorities that in 1860 he was elected fellow of Balliol. At the same time he became lecturer on ancient and modern history. Though from the beginning of his student life he had been drawn to an academic career and especially to the study of philosophy, he was now for a period undecided what to make his life-work. At one time he thought of going into journalism in India. In 1864, having accepted a place with the Royal Commission on Middle Cla.s.s Schools, he prepared a valuable report upon the organization of high schools and their relation to the university. Finally, however, in 1866, his indecision was brought to an end. Obtaining an appointment in that year to a position on the teaching staff of Balliol College, he settled down to the work of a tutor in philosophy. When Jowett was made Master of Balliol, Green became, under him, the responsible manager of the college, performing the manifold small duties of the position with patience, thoroughness, and tact.

In 1871 he was married to Miss Charlotte Symonds, sister of John Addington Symonds.

Twice Green was candidate for a professors.h.i.+p; once in 1864 when he applied for the chair of moral philosophy at St. Andrews, and again in 1867 when the Waynflate professors.h.i.+p of moral and metaphysical philosophy fell vacant at Oxford. In both cases he was unsuccessful. It was not until 1878, by his election to the Whyte's professors.h.i.+p of moral philosophy, that he obtained the position and the independence he had long deserved. His enjoyment of the honor was brief. He died of blood-poisoning, after an illness of only ten days, March 26, 1882.

Green's character was compounded of a variety of elements. The shyness and reserve characteristic of many cultivated Englishmen, was accentuated in his case by a natural austerity and an absorption in serious thought. But though his temper was puritanic and inclined to moroseness, there was no sourness or cynicism in it. "If," he wrote to Miss Symonds, "I am rather a melancholy bird, given to physical fatigue and depression, yet I have never known for a moment what it was to be weary of life, as the youth of this age are fond of saying that they are. The world has always seemed very good to me." Grim though he might be outwardly, he had a keen sense of humor and a warmth of interest in his fellows that made him, for those who broke through his reserve, a charming companion. His most characteristic quality was elevation of mind. In the essay that is here reprinted he speaks of "that aspiring pride which arises from the sense of walking in intellect on the necks of a subject crowd." Something of this elevation, this aloofness from the vulgar, characterized all of his utterances and gave to them at times a solemn fervency akin to that of the Hebrew prophets. This trait is finely portrayed in the following description of the tutor Grey (a thin disguise for Green) in Mrs. Ward's 'Robert Elsmere:'

"In after years memory could always recall to him at will the face and figure of the speaker, the ma.s.sive head, the deep eyes sunk under the brows, the midland accent, the make of limb and features which seemed to have some suggestion in them of the rude strength and simplicity of a peasant ancestry; and then the n.o.bility, the fire, the spiritual beauty flas.h.i.+ng through it all! Here, indeed, was a man on whom his fellows might lean, a man in whom the generation of spiritual force was so strong and continuous that it overflowed of necessity into the poorer, barrener lives around him, kindling and enriching."

Green's contributions to philosophy were partly constructive, partly (and perhaps mainly) critical and destructive. On the critical side, his greatest effort was his attack upon the philosophy of Hume in two masterly Introductions to an edition of Hume's 'Works,' published in 1874-5. English philosophical thinking, so Green held, had stuck fast in the scepticism of Hume. Such forward movement in thought as there had been since the 18th Century, had come mainly through the writings of men like Wordsworth and Sh.e.l.ley--men who having seen deeply into life, had expressed themselves in imaginative, not in philosophical ways. To set the stagnant tide of speculative thinking in motion, involved a two-fold task: on one side the breaking down of the barriers erected by the sensationalist and materialist schools of the 17th and 18th centuries, and on the other side the letting in of a current of fresh ideas from some source outside of England. The first, or destructive, task Green performed with remarkable success in the two Introductions. For the new and truer ideas which were to displace the old, he naturally looked to Germany, whose methods of research were just coming into vogue at Oxford through the influence of Pattison and Jowett. And since to speculative thinkers of that time German philosophy meant the philosophy of Hegel, Green's fundamental conceptions were derived by Hegelian modes of thinking. In other words, he was a neo-Hegelian. But, as his biographer notes, he never committed himself unreservedly to the Hegelian credo.

"While he regarded Hegel's system as the 'last word of philosophy,' he did not occupy himself with the exposition of it, but with the reconsideration of the elements in Kant of which it was the development." That is, he was a neo-Kantian as well as a neo-Hegelian.

Of his constructive thinking in these channels the most complete embodiment is his 'Prolegomena to Ethics.'

Though naturally his contributions to philosophy are first in bulk and importance, Green's writings cover a considerable range of subjects.

Listed in the order of publication, they are as follows: 'The Force of Circ.u.mstances,' published in _Undergraduate Papers_, 1858; 'An Estimate of the Value and Influence of Prose Fiction,' published as a prize essay, 1862; 'The Philosophy of Aristotle' and 'Popular Philosophy in its relation to Life,' _North British Review_, Sept., 1866, and March, 1868; Introductions to 'Hume's Treatise of Human Nature' 1874-5; 'The Grading of Secondary Schools,' _Journal of Education_, May, 1877; Review of E. Caird's 'Philosophy of Kant,' _Academy_, Sept. 22, 1877; 'Mr.

Spencer on the Relations of Subject and Object,' _Contemporary Review_, Dec., 1877; 'Mr. Spencer on the Independence of Matter,' _ibid._, March, 1878; 'Mr. Lewes' Account of Experience,' _ibid._, July, 1878; review of J. Caird's 'Introduction to the Philosophy of Religion,' _Academy_, July 10, 1880; 'Answer to Mr. Hodgson,' _Contemporary Review_, January, 1881; review of J. Watson's 'Kant and his English Critics,' _Academy_, September 17, 24, 1881; 'Liberal Legislation and Freedom of Control,'

1881; 'The Work to be done by the New Oxford High School,' 1882; 'Prolegomena to Ethics,' 1883; 'The Witness of G.o.d' and 'Faith'

(delivered in 1870 and 1877, and at the time printed for private circulation), 1884.

All of the foregoing, with the exception of the 'Prolegomena to Ethics,'

are included in the 'Works' edited by R. L. Nettles.h.i.+p (3 Vols., 1885, 2d Ed. 1889, Longmans). The 'Works' contain, in addition, the following writings not previously published: An essay on 'The Influence of Civilization on Genius'; an essay on 'Christian Dogma'; an article on 'Mr. Lewes' Account of the Social Medium,' written for the _Contemporary Review_, but not used; four lectures or addresses on the New Testament; four lectures on 'The English Commonwealth'; a series of lectures on 'The Philosophy of Kant,' on 'Logic' and on 'The principles of Political Obligations'; a lecture on 'The Different Senses of Freedom as Applied to Will and to the Moral Progress of Man'; and a fragment on 'Immortality.'

Aside from occasional references to poetry and art in his philosophical writings, as, for example, in the opening paragraphs of the 'Prolegomena,' the essay on fiction here reprinted is Green's only venture in the field of aesthetic criticism. When we remember that it was one of his earliest productions, having been submitted for the Chancellor's prize in 1862, when Green was but 26 years of age, the maturity of both style and contents seems remarkable. It is in fact a monumental piece of literary criticism, sufficient to establish the reputation of many a lesser writer. At the same time, however, there is about it an air of constraint which shows that the author was not at ease in this kind of speculation. He was fencing, so to speak, with his left hand. His mind was so absorbed in the metaphysical, ethical, and religious aspects of experience that upon the aesthetic as such he had little attention to bestow. When he approached aesthetic problems at all it was for the purpose of obtaining data which he could employ in other fields of thought. He was obviously not in sympathy with the aims of English novelists. He had no expert knowledge of the history of fiction in England, and no knowledge at all, so far as appears, of its history in other countries. Probably he misunderstood the relation, in certain particulars, of the novel to the epic. Nevertheless, his appreciation of concrete works of art was so genuine and profound, his insight so clear, his expressed judgments so candid, that any contact of his mind with art, literary or other, could not fail to be illuminating. Whatever its limitations, the essay has at least one distinguis.h.i.+ng merit: in it a fundamental principle of criticism is applied with merciless rigor to the solution of a literary problem. The products of such a method are certain to be interesting and valuable. Whether we agree with the author's conclusions or not, we can at least see whence he derives them and feel the stimulus which always comes from the spectacle of a powerful mind grappling in deadly earnest with momentous questions of art and life.

AN ESTIMATE of the Value and Influence of Works of Fiction in Modern Times

I. PRINCIPLES OF ART

A. EPIC, DRAMA, AND NOVEL

1. We commonly distinguish writings which appeal directly to the emotions from those of which the immediate object is the conveyance of knowledge, by applying to the former a term of conveniently loose meaning, "works of imagination." Of the kinds included in the wide denotation of this term there are three, between which it seems difficult at first sight to draw a definite line; which appeal to similar feelings, and excite a similar interest, in the different ages to which each is appropriate. These are the epic poem, the drama, and the novel. Each purports to be, in some sort, a reflex of human life and action, as obeying certain laws and tending to a certain end. In each men are represented, not as at rest, or in contemplative isolation, but in co-operation or collision. In each there is a combination of two elements, an outer element of incident, an inner of pa.s.sion and character. In view of these common features, we might be tempted at first sight to suppose the difference between the three kinds to be merely one of form, merely the difference between the vehicle of prose and the vehicle of metre. We shall find, however, on deeper inquiry, that to the true artist, who does not find his materials in the world, but creates them according to the inner laws by which the world and himself are governed, the vehicle is not more a part of his creation than the "impa.s.sioned truth" which it conveys. Here, as elsewhere, form and substance are inseparable; and the difference of form that distinguishes the novel from the other kinds of composition which it seems for the present to have superseded, symbolises, or rather is identical with, a different potency in the art by which the substance is created.[1]

FOOTNOTE:

[1] "Though in its most general sense the substance and matter of all fine art is the same, issuing from the common source of the human desire for expression, yet the region of fancy corresponding to each medium of utterance is molded by intercourse with that medium, and acquires an individuality which is not directly reducible to terms of any other region of aesthetic fancy. Feeling, in short, is modified in becoming communicable; and the feeling which has become communicable in music is not capable of re-translation into the feeling which has become communicable in painting. Thus the arts have no doubt in common a human and even rational content--rational in so far as the feelings which are embodied in expression, for expression's sake, arise in connection with ideas and purposes; but each of them has separately its own peculiar physical medium of expression and also a whole region of modified feeling or fancy which const.i.tutes the material proper to be expressed in the medium and according to the laws of each particular art."--B.

Bosanquet, 'The Relation of the Fine Arts to One Another' (_Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society_).

B. IMITATION vs. ART

2. Mere copying is not art. The farther the artist rises above the stage of imitation, the higher is his art, the more elevating its influence on those who can enter into its spirit. If the landscape-painter does nothing more than represent nature as seen by the outward eye, the vulgar objection against looking at pictures--"I can see as fine a view as this any day"--is unquestionably valid. But if the painter is anything better than a photographer, he does far more than this. He brings nature before us, as we have seen it, perhaps, only once or twice in our lives, under the influence of some strong emotion. He does that for us which we cannot do for ourselves; he reproduces those moments of spiritual exaltation in which "we feel that we are greater than we know"--moments which we can remember, and of which the mere memory may be the light of our lives, but which no act of our own will can bring back. It is not till the distinction has been appreciated between nature as it is and nature as we make it to be, between that which we see and that which "having not seen we love," that any branch of art can be reckoned in its proper value.

C. NATURE THE CREATION OF THOUGHT

3. In one sense of the the word, it would no doubt be true to say that nature is simply and altogether that which we make it to be. Modern philosophy has discarded the language which represented our knowledge of things as the result of impressions and the transmission of images.[2]

If we still not only speak but think of ourselves as primarily pa.s.sive and in contact with an alien world, this arises simply from the difficulty of conceiving a pure spontaneous activity. Driven from the crude imagination which found the primary condition of knowledge in the reception of "ideas" from without, "common sense" took refuge in the more refined hypothesis of unknown objects, which cause our sensations, and through sensations our knowledge.[3] But this standing-ground has been swept away by the consideration that such a cause may be found within as well as without, in the laws of the subject's activity as well as in objects confessedly beyond the reach of cognition. Our ultimate a.n.a.lysis can find no element in knowledge which is not supplied by ourselves in conformity to a ruling law, or which exists independently of the action of human thought.

FOOTNOTES:

[2] As, _e.g._, in the philosophy of Locke.

[3] Probably referring to Herbert Spencer.

D. THE "OUTWARD" ASPECT OF NATURE

4. But though the world of nature is, in this sense, a world of man's own creation, it is so in a different way from the world of art and of philosophy. Thought is indeed its parent, but thought in its primary stage fails to recognize it as its own, fails to transfer to it its own attributes of universality, and ident.i.ty in difference. It sees outward objects merely in their diversity and isolation. It seeks to penetrate nature by endless dichotomy, glorying in that dissection of unity which is the abdication of its own prerogative.[4] It treats outward things as ministering to animal wants, as the sources of personal and particular pleasures and pains; and thus induces the sense of bondage, of collision with a world in which it has not yet learnt to find itself.

It places the end of human life not in harmony with the law which is the highest form of itself, but in happiness, _i.e._, in the extraction of the greatest possible amount of enjoyment from a world to which it seems to be accidentally related. The view of things corresponding to this stage of thought is what we commonly call their outward aspect. It is the aspect of matter-of-fact, of logic, of "mere morality," as opposed to that of art, of philosophy, and religion.