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Library of the
world's best literature
Charles Dudley Warner, Hamilton Wright Mabie, George
H. Warner, Edward Cornelius Towne
mons


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Lit 2020. 18

Harvard College
Library
ET
VENIR 1
CHRISTO
ECCLES
ADEMIA
TAS
IN. NO
1ay)
LESIAE
ONYA
FROM THE BEQUEST OF
Mary Osgood
OF MEDFORD, MASSACHUSETTS


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1
1


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THOMAS JEFFERSON,


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i
!


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LIBRARY
OF
THE
WORLD'S BEST LITERATURE
Ancient and Modern
CHARLES DUDLEY WARNER
EDITOR
HAMILTON WRIGHT MABIE, LUCIA GILBERT RUNKLE,
GEORGE H. WARNER
ASSOCIATE EDITORS
THIRTY VOLUMES
VOL. XIV
NEW YORK
R. S. PEALE AND J. A. HILL
PUBLISHERS


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Lit 2000:18
L
210,
R 35. 5
HARVARD COLLEGE
NOV 10 1916
LIBRARY
Mary Esgood fund
COPYRIGHT 1897
BY R. S. PEALE AND J. A. HILL
All rights reserved
*THE WERNER COMPAIRED
الم
PRINTERS
room
BINDERS


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THE ADVISORY COUNCIL
CRAWFORD H. TOY, A. M. , LL. D. ,
Professor of Hebrew, HARVARD UNIVERSITY, Cambridge, Mass.
THOMAS R. LOUNSBURY, LL. D. , L. H. D. ,
Professor of English in the Sheffield Scientific School of
YALE UNIVERSITY, New Haven, Conn.
WILLIAM M. SLOANE, Ph. D. , L. H. D. ,
Professor of History and Political Science,
PRINCETON UNIVERSITY, Princeton, N. J.
BRANDER MATTHEWS, A. M. , LL. B. ,
Professor of Literature, COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY, New York City.
JAMES B. ANGELL, LL. D. ,
President of the UNIVERSITY OF Michigan, Ann Arbor, Mich.
WILLARD FISKE, A. M. , Ph. D. ,
Late Professor of the Germanic and Scandinavian Languages
and Literatures,
CORNELL UNIVERSITY, Ithaca, N. Y.
EDWARD S. HOLDEN, A. M. , LL. D. ,
Director of the Lick Observatory, and Astronomer,
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, Berkeley, Cal.
ALCÉE FORTIER, Lit. D. ,
Professor of the Romance Languages,
TULANE UNIVERSITY, New Orleans, La.
WILLIAM P. TRENT, M. A. ,
Dean of the Department of Arts and Sciences, and Professor of
English and History,
UNIVERSITY OF THE SOUTH, Sewanee, Tenn.
PAUL SHOREY, PH. D. ,
Professor of Greek and Latin Literature,
UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO, Chicago, Iil.
WILLIAM T. HARRIS, LL. D. ,
United States Commissioner of Education,
BUREAU OF EDUCATION, Washington, D. C.
MAURICE FRANCIS EGAN, A. M. , LL. D. ,
Professor of Literature in the
CATHOLIC UNIVERSITY OF AMERICA, Washington, D. C.


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V
TABLE OF CONTENTS
VOL. XIV
LIVED
PAGE
IBN SINÂ (Avicenna)
980-1037
7835
BY THOMAS DAVIDSON
HENRIK IBSEN
1828-
7839
BY WILLIAM H. CARPENTER
The Pretenders
From A Doll's House)
From Peer Gynt'
ICELANDIC LITERATURE:
The Sagas, Ninth to Thirteenth Centuries
7865
BY WILLIAM SHARP
Háconamál
1796–1840
7896
KARL LEBRECHT IMMERMANN
A Wedding and a Betrothal (Oberhof)
INDIAN LITERATURE
7905
BY EDWARD W. HOPKINS
Hymns of the Rig-Veda: First Hymn Addressed to Agni,
the Sacrificial Fire; Hymn to the Deified Moon-Plant
Soma; Vedic Hymn to Indra, the Storm God; Vedic
Hymn to Dawn; Vedic Hymn to the Sun; Vedic
Hymn to Heaven (Varuna); Vedic Hymn to Earth
A Late Vedic Hymn to Starlit Night
Vedic Hymn to the Twin Horsemen, the Açvins (Dios-
kuroi)
A Late Vedic Hymn to Vāta, the Wind


## p. 7828 (#16) ############################################

vi
LIVED
PAGE
INDIAN LITERATURE -- Continuod :
Burial Hymn: To Yama; To the Dead
A Late Vedic Philosophical Hymn
A Late Vedic Hymn of Creation
A Late Vedic Mystic Hymn to Vāc (Speech, Logos)
An Incantation (Atharva-Veda')
Legend of the Flood (Çatapatha Brāhmana')
Dialogue of Yājñavalkya and Māitreyi (Upanishads')
The Wisdom of Death (Katha Upanishad')
Specimen of the (Dogmatic] Jain Literature: The Five
Vows (of the Jain Ascetic] (Acārānga-Sutra')
Citations from Buddhistic Literature (Dhammapada')
Conversation of the Herdsman Dhaniya and Buddha
The Death of Buddha
Epic Literature: Arjuna's Journey to Heaven (Mahābhā-
rata '); The Fatal Gambling (same); Specimen of the
Didactic Poetry of the Mahābhārata: The Divine Song
(Pantheism)
Specimen of the Rāmāyana: How Viçvāmitra the King
became a Priest
Specimen of Fable Literature: The Ass and the Jackal
(Pancatantra')
Specimen of Drama (Mricchakatikā')
Extract from Kālidāsa's Cakuntalā!
Song from the Lyric Act of the Vikramorvaçi'
Specimens of Lyric Poetry: From Kālidāsa's Cloud Mes-
senger'; From Kālidāsa's Union of Seasons): The
Summer; From Kālidāsa's Union of Seasons): The
Spring; Other of Kālidāsa's Lyric; From Bhartrihari's
Lyric; From Amaru's Lyric; The Bee's Dream; Other
Lyric Pieces.
Specimens of the Religious-Erotic Lyric of the Twelfth
Century (Gītagovinda'): Krishna's Dalliance; Rādhā's
Jealous Lament (same)
Specimen of the Religious Poetry of the Modern Sects
(Bible of the Dādū Pānthis, Sixteenth Century)
7968
JEAN INGELOW
1830-
Divided
Sand Martins
The High Tide on the Coast of Lincolnshire
Cold and Quiet
Lettice White (“Supper at the Mill')


## p. 7829 (#17) ############################################

vii
LIVED
PAGE
7982
BERNHARD SEVERIN INGEMANN
1789-1862
Carl of Rise and the Kohlman (Waldemar the Victorious')
Morning Song
WASHINGTON IRVING
1783-1859
7991
BY EDWIN W. MORSE
The Good Old Days of Knickerbocker Life (Knicker-
bocker's History of New York')
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow (“The Sketch Book')
A Moorish Palace ('The Alhambra')
The Stage Coach ('The Sketch Book')
1843-
8046
JORGE ISAAKS
The Jaguar Hunt (María')
8057
HELEN FISKE JACKSON (“H. H. ”)
Revenues
Habeas Corpus
My Hickory Fire
Poppies in the Wheat
1831-1885
Burnt Ships
Spinning
A May-Day in Albano ( Bits
of Travel')
1843-
8071
HENRY JAMES
The Madonna of the Future
JAMI
1414-1492
8110
BY A. V. WILLIAMS JACKSON
Love
Beauty
Zulaikha's First Dream
Silent Sorrow
8117
THOMAS ALLIBONE JANVIER
1849-
The Episode of the Marques De Valdeflores (Harper's
Magazine)
Love Lane ('In Old New York')
JAPANESE LITERATURE
8145
BY CLAY MACCAULEY
Archaic Writings: Why Universal Darkness Once Reigned
(Kojiki'); Why the Sun and the Moon do not Shine
Together (Nihongi'); Urashima Taro (Manyūshū'); A
Maiden's Lament (same); Husband and Wife; My Child-
ren; Elegy; To a Friend; Ode to Fuji-Yama; Spring


## p. 7830 (#18) ############################################

viii
LIVED
PAGE
JAPANESE LITERATURE - Continued :
(Kokinshū'); Summer (same); Autumn (same); Winter
(same)
Age of the Prose Classics: How the Sea was Calmed
(“Tosa Nikki'); Discovery of the Isle of Immortal
Youth, Mt. Hõrai (“Taketori Monogatari'); The Maid
of Unai (“Yamato Monogatari'); Court Festivals in the
Eleventh Century (Makura no Sōshi'); On the Char-
acter of Women (Genji Monogatari')
Mediæval Literature: Meditations of a Hermit (Hājāki');
Vagrant Reveries (“Tsure-zure Gusa '); The Dance of
the Moon Fairy (Hagoromo'); The True Samurai
(Dwarf Trees'); The Dominant Note of the Law
("Wasan')
Modern Literature under the Tokugawa Shogunate: Clos-
ing Scene from the Chiushingura'; Opening to
"Glimpses of Dreamlands'; On Painting ('Tama-
gatsuma)
JACQUES JASMIN
1798-1864
8187
BY HARRIET WATERS PRESTON
A Simple Story (My Souvenirs')
The Siren with the Heart of Ice (Françonette')
The Blind Girl of Castèl-Cuillè
JAYADEVA
About the Twelfth Century A. D.
8208
BY A. V. WILLIAMS JACKSON
Rādha and Krishna
8215
RICHARD JEFFERIES
1848–1887
Hill Visions ('The Story of My Heart')
The Breeze on Beachy Head ( Nature Near London')
THOMAS JEFFERSON
1743-1826
8229
BY PAUL LEICESTER FORD
The Declaration of Independence
On Fiction (Letter to Robert Skipwith)
The Moral Influence of Slavery (Notes on Virginia')
Letter to Mr. Hopkinson
Letter to Dr. Styles
Letter to James Madison


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ix
LIVED
PAGE
1803-1857
8257
Douglas JERROLD
The Tragedy of the Till
SARAH ORNE JEWETT
Miss Tempy's Watchers
The Brandon House (Deephaven')
1849-
8269
SAMUEL JOHNSON
1709-1784
8283
BY GEORGE BIRKBECK HILL
From The Vanity of Human Wishes'
Letter to Lord Chesterfield as to the Dictionary)
Dr. Johnson's Last Letter to His Aged Mother
From a Letter to his Friend Mr. Joseph Baretti, at Milan
Dr. Johnson's Farewell to his Mother's Aged Servant
To James Boswell, Esq. (Three Letters)
To Mrs. Lucy Porter in Lichfield
To Mr. Pe
From a Letter to James Boswell, Esq.
To Mrs. Thrale
A Private Prayer by Dr. Johnson
Wealth (The Rambler)
Old Age and Death (same)
A Study of Milton's Paradise Lost' ('Life of Milton')
RICHARD MALCOLM JOHNSTON
1822–
The Early Majority of Mr. Thomas Watts
8317
MAURICE JÓKAI
1825-
8331
BY EMIL REICH
The Landslide and the Train Wreck (“There is No Devil')
Ben JONSON
1573–1637
8341
BY BARRETT WENDELL
On Style (Timber, or Discoveries Made upon Men and
Matter)
On Shakespeare (same)
To the Memory of my Beloved Master, William Shake-
speare
From Sejanus
Soliloquy of Sejanus
From (The Silent Woman
)


## p. 7832 (#20) ############################################

Х
LIVED
PAGE
BEN JONSON - Continued :
Prologue from Every Man
in His Humour)
Song to Celia
Song — That Women are but
Men's Shadows
Song from Volpone!
An Epitaph on Salathiel Pavy
On my First Daughter
From Cynthia's Revels'
The Noble Nature
JOSEPHUS
37-100 A. D.
8361
BY EDWIN KNOX MITCHELL
Moses as a Legislator (Preface to Antiquities)
Solomon's Wisdom (Antiquities')
Alexander's Conquest of Palestine (same)
The Greek Version of the Hebrew Scriptures (same)
The Death of James, the Brother of our Lord (same)
Preface to the Jewish Wars'
Agrippa's Appeal to the Jews (Jewish Wars')
Josephus's Surrender to the Romans (same)
The Destruction of the Temple at Jerusalem (same)
The Hebrew Faith, Worship, and Laws (“Treatise Against
Apion')
Origin of the Asamonean or Maccabæan Revolt (Antiq-
uities')
JOSEPH JOUBERT
1754-1824
8385
BY THOMAS WENTWORTH HIGGINSON
Of Man
Of the Nature of Minds
Of Virtue and Morality
Of the Family
Of Education
Of the Passions
Of Society
Of Different Ages
Of Poetry
Of Style
Of the Qualities of the Writer
Literary Judgments
1813–1853
8399
SYLVESTER JUDD
The Snow-Storm (Margaret')
JUVENAL
60 A. D. ? -140 A. D. ?
8411
BY THOMAS BOND LINDSAY
Umbricius's Farewell to Rome (Third Satire)
Terrors of Conscience (Thirteenth Satire)
Parental Influence (Fourteenth Satire)


## p. 7833 (#21) ############################################

LIST OF PORTRAITS
IN VOL. XIV
Henrik Ibsen
Karl Lebrecht Immermann
Jean Ingelow
Bernhard Severin Ingemann
Washington Irving
Helen Fiske Jackson
Henry James
Thomas Allibone Janvier
Jacques Jasmin
Richard Jefferies
Thomas Jefferson
Douglas Jerrold
Sarah Orne Jewett
Samuel Johnson
Richard Malcolm Johnston
Maurice Jókai
Ben Jonson
Sylvester Judd
Full page
Vignette
Vignette
Vignette
Full page
Vignette
Full page
Vignette
Vignette
Vignette
Full page
Vignette
Vignette
Full page
Vignette
Full page
Full page
Vignette


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## p. 7835 (#23) ############################################

7835
IBN SÎNÂ
(AVICENNA)
(980-1037)
BY THOMAS DAVIDSON
care.
BU ALI AL 'HUSAIN ABDALLAH IBN SÎNÂ, known to the Western
world as Avicenna, the greatest of Eastern Muslim philoso-
phers and physicians, was born A. D. 980 at Afshena, near
Kharmaithan, in the province of Bokhara. His father, a Persian, was
for a time governor of Kharmaithan, but later settled at Bokhara,
where Ibn Sînâ, an extremely precocious child, was reared with great
At the age of ten he knew the Koran by heart, and had stud-
ied law and grammar. The elements of philosophy he learnt from a
private tutor, Abu Abdallah Natili. While still a mere boy he went
to the famous school of Bagdad, where he studied successively mathe-
matics, physics, logic, metaphysics, and finally - under a Christian
medicine. At the age of seventeen he had already gained such a
reputation that he was called to the sick-bed of Nu'h ibn Mansûr,
King of Bokhara. Having effected a cure, he was richly rewarded
by the King, and allowed free access to the palace library, which
enabled him to satisfy his thirst for knowledge. The library having
been burnt up some
ime after, he was ccused of setting it on re
in order to obtain a monopoly of knowledge. At the age of twenty-
two, having lost both his patron and his father, and being unpopular
in Bokhara, he left that city and wandered about for several years,
finally settling at Jorjân, where, having been presented with a house,
he opened a school and gave lectures. At the same time he began
to write his great medical work, the Kanûn(Canon). Becoming
uncomfortable at Jorjân, he removed to Hamadân (Ecbatana), whose
king, Shems ed-Daula, made him wasîr. In this position he again
became unpopular, possibly on account of his opinions; so much so
that the soldiers seized him, and but for the strenuous intervention of
the King would have put him to death. Having remained in labori-
ous retirement for some time, he was recalled to court as physician
to the crown prince. Here he composed his great philosophic cyclo-
pædia, the Shefâ. ' His life at this time was very characteristic,
being divided between study, teaching, and reveling. Every evening
he gave a lecture, followed by an orgy continued far into the night.
Shems ed-Daula having died, Ibn Sînâ fell into disfavor with his


## p. 7836 (#24) ############################################

7836
IBN SÎNÂ
successor through entering into correspondence with his enemy the
Prince of Ispahan, and was imprisoned in a fortress for several years.
Finally escaping from this, he fled to Ispahan, where he became at-
tached to the person of the prince, accompanying him on his various
expeditions. Having resumed his double, wasteful life, he soon wore
out his body, whose condition he aggravated by the use of drastic
medicines. Feeling himself at last beyond remedies, he repented, dis-
tributed alms, and died at Hamadân a good Muslim, in July 1037, at
the age of fifty-seven. He left a brief biography of himself. A longer
one was written by his pupil Jorjâni.
Ibn Sînâ was a complex, versatile character, leading a double life,
- that of the patient, profound student and thinker, and that of the
sensual worldling, -and perishing in the attempt to combine the
two. He seems a combination of Bacon, Bruno, and Goethe, with the
best and worst traits of all three. He appears among the mighty
in Dante's Limbo.
Works. — His literary activity was prodigious. He wrote over a
hundred treatises, covering all branches of knowledge, and in such
a masterly way as fairly to deserve his title, the Supreme Teacher
(Sheikh ar-rais). His chief productions are:-(i. ) The Kanûn,' a
medical work of enormous bulk, dealing with man as part of the
organism of the world, and comprising all the medical knowledge of
the time. It was translated into Latin in the twelfth century, and
into Hebrew in the thirteenth; and was for several hundred years
the chief medical authority in the civilized world. (ii. ) The (Shefâ'
(Healing), an encyclopædia of philosophic sciences in eighteen vol-
umes. The subjects are distributed under four heads: (1) Logic,
(2) Physics, (3) Mathematics, (4) Metaphysics. This work, in the ori-
ginal, exists almost entire in the Bodleian Library, but it is little
known as a whole. Parts of it were translated into Latin in the
twelfth century, and into Hebrew in the thirteenth, and exercised a
powerful influence on the schoolmen, as well as on Arab and Hebrew
thinkers. In 1495, 1500, and 1508 there appeared at Venice a collec-
tion of these, including (1) Logic, (2) Sufficiency, (Physics! ) (3) On
Heaven and Earth, (4) On the Soul, (5) On Animals, (6) On Intelli-
gences, (7) On Intelligences, (by Al Fârâbî! ) (8) On Metaphysics.
Other portions of the “Shefâ' have appeared at different times under
different titles. (iii. ) The Najâh,' an abridgment of the Shefâ,'
omitting the mathematical part. (iv. ) On Oriental Philosophy,'
that is, mysticism; a work frequently referred to by Western Arab
writers and by Roger Bacon, but now lost. (v. ) A poem, 'On the
Soul,' translated by Hammer-Purgstall in the Vienna Zeitschrift für
Kunst, 1837. There exists no complete edition of Ibn Sînâ's works,
and no complete bibliography; nor is there any exhaustive mono-
graph on him.


## p. 7837 (#25) ############################################

IBN SÎNÂ
7837
PHILOSOPHY,- Valentine Rose's verdict, “Plotinus and Aristotle,
that is the whole of Arab philosophy,” is not quite true of the phi-
losophy of Ibn Sînâ. As in life, so in thought, the Persian Muslim
tried to combine two utterly incompatible things: in the latter,
Muslim orthodoxy with Neo-Platonic, emanational Aristotelianism, or
even with Persian and Hindu mysticism. To the orthodox he wished
to appear orthodox; to the philosophers, a philosopher of the popular,
Aristotelian sort; and to the Mazdeans, a Mazdean mystic, - being in
reality it seems the last.
Like Scotus Erigena and others, he believes
that revelation, being a mere anticipation of philosophy for the
benefit of the masses, must be interpreted by philosophy in accord-
ance with the laws of reason. His chief merit as a philosopher is
that he makes clear and systematic what Aristotle had left dark and
confused; and this he does chiefly through Neo-Platonic conceptions.
Accepting from Aristotle the classification of Being into necessary,
actual, and possible, he spreads it over his geocentric universe, and
classifies the sciences according to it. At the summit of this uni-
verse is the necessary Being, God, the subject of Metaphysics; at
the other end are sublunary things, merely possible, the subject of
Physics; and between the two are things possible made necessary by
the first cause, and therefore actual,—the spheres and their moving
intelligences, the subject of Mathematics, i. e. , Arithmetic, Geometry,
Music, Mechanics, Optics (cf. Dante, Banquet,' ii. 14, 15). He seeks
to combine the Aristotelian doctrine of the (derived) eternity of mat-
ter and the world with Neo-Platonic emanationism, holding the latter
to be a timeless process. The Supreme Being being one, can pro-
duce but one thing, the First Intelligence or Word; but this, having
a triple consciousness, (1) of God, (2) of its own actuality, (3) of its
own possibility, produces by the first, the Second Intelligence; by the
second, the first spheral soul; and by the third, the first moving
sphere, as the body to this soul. This process goes on, producing
ever greater and greater multiplicity, until the sphere of the moon is
reached (cf. Dante, 'Paradise,' ii. 112 seq. ). Here is produced finally
the “active intellect” (see Aristotle, De Anima, iii. 5, 1), and the
physical world with its manifold souls, including the human. The
human soul is not actually, but merely potentially intelligent, being
dependent for actual thought upon the “active intellect,” which is
thus the same for all men; just as the sun is the same for all colors.
In the sublunary world prevails generation, whose function is to pre-
pare souls for the action of the active intellect. ” This action, like
that of the spheral intelligences, is not physical, but like that which
a beloved object exerts upon a lover (see Aristotle, Metaph. ' xi. 7:
1072b 3). Hence there prevails throughout the universe not only
an outward action from God down to the lowest extremity of being,
but also an inward return action, due to love, up to God (see Dante,


## p. 7838 (#26) ############################################

7838
IBN SÎNÁ
>
(Paradise,' i. 103 seq. ). This is the Ma'ad, (sometimes translated
Resurrection, Hereafter ! ) which plays so important a par in subse-
quent thought, giving the practical formula for mysticism. Through
love, any soul may rise above sublunary matter from sphere to sphere,
until at last it loses itself in the superessential unity of God,- the
Nirvana of Buddhism (cf. Dante, Paradise,' as a whole). Though
holding these pantheistic emanational views, Ibn Sînâ maintains the
immortality of the individual soul; a fact hardly due to deference for
Muhammad, since in spite of him he pointedly denies the resurrection
of the body and maintains the freedom of the will. How he recon-
ciled the latter view with his belief in sphere influences is hard to see.
Ibn Sînâ's general view of the world and of man's relation to it
is on the whole Neo-Platonic. In logic he follows Aristotle and Al
Fârâbî, but champions a conceptualist doctrine of universals. He
is the author of the favorite scholastic maxim, “It is the intellect
that gives universality to the forms of thought” (Intellectus in formis
agit universalitatem). In Psychology he gives definiteness and sys-
tem to the doctrines of Aristotle, and has some original views, e. g.
on the psychology of prophecy. He thinks that whereas man gen-
erally derives his knowledge from the phantasms of the senses, as
illuminated by the active intellect,” in certain extraordinary cases
the process is reversed. Then the active intellect,” under the influ-
ence of God, rouses phantasms, and these are the stuff of prophecy
(see Dante, “Purgatory,' xvii. 13 seq. ).
The influence of Ibn Sînâ upon the thought of the Middle Age,
among Arabs, Jews, and Christians alike, was wide and deep. Men
like Albertus Magnus and Thomas Aquinas, while cursing Ibn Rushd
(Averroës), spoke of Ibn Sînâ with respect, perhaps because he main-
tained the immortality of the soul. Yet he was bitterly attacked
on all sides: by the Muslim orthodox Al Gazâlî and heterodox Ibn
Rushd, by the Jewish Maimonides, and by Christian thinkers gener-
ally. Especially obnoxious were his doctrines of (1) the eternity of
the world, which conflicted with the orthodox notions of creation, and
(2) the unity of the “active intellect,” which seemed to preclude the
freedom and responsibility of man. It was against these, especially
as formulated by Ibn Rushd, that the chief efforts of scholasticism
in its best period were directed. And though these efforts were for-
mally successful, yet the influence of the great Persian remained and
remains. It may be said that Dante's great poem is soaked in it, and
it had much to do with the great heretical movements of the Middle
Age, from the days of Joachim of Floris onward. It lives even to-day.
oflavar barisht
1


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6
1


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ம
ராமாரு
29
HENRIK IBSEN.
NO


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1
1


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1


## p. 7839 (#31) ############################################

7839
HENRIK IBSEN
(1828-)
BY WILLIAM H. CARPENTER
A
ENRIK IBSEN was born March 20th, 1828, at the little village of
Skien, in the south of Norway, where his father conducted
an extensive business as a general merchant. His ancestors
for generations had been shipmasters; and the original Ibsen, the
poet's great-great-grandfather, had come to Norway from Denmark.
His great-grandmother was of Scotch, his grandmother and mother
of Gerinan descent; so that in the veins of the poet there is not a
drop of pure Norse blood. When the boy was eight years old, busi-
ness reverses compelled his father to give up the comfortable con-
dition that had hitherto prevailed, and the family moved to a farm
just outside the town, where they lived during the succeeding six
years in economy and retirement. When Ibsen was fourteen they
moved back into Skien, where the boy in the mean time had attended
the scientific school. In his sixteenth year he went as an apothe-
cary's apprentice to Grimstad, a village even smaller than Skien, on
the southeast coast.
The following five years that he spent in Grimstad were import-
ant ones, not only as a period of unrest and development, but in that
within them are found the first visible beginnings of his literary
career. His first printed literary work is the poem Hösten,' con-
tained in the Christiania Posten in 1849. His first dramatic attempt,
the three-act play (Catilina,' was also written in Grimstad.
It was
published in Christiania in 1850, under the pseudonym of Brynjolf
Bjarme. It attracted however but little attention, and only some
thirty copies were sold; the rest of the edition being subsequently
disposed of by the author to a huckster, who used it as wrapping-
paper for his wares. This same year Ibsen left Grimstad for Christi-
ania with the intention of entering the University, which he did in a
few months by the way of Heltberg's school. His university career,
however, was but brief. During the Whitsuntide holidays he wrote
the one-act drama “Kjæmpehöjen' (The Warrior's Mound), which was
produced at the Christiania Theatre this same year. After the pro-
duction of his play, Ibsen abandoned all thought of the University.
With several associates he began, early in 1851, the publication of a


## p. 7840 (#32) ############################################

7840
HENRIK IBSEN
weekly paper called Manden (Man), subsequently renamed Andhrim-
ner, the name of the mythical cook of the gods in Walhalla. It had
a precarious existence of only nine months, when it was forced to
suspend. Ibsen's own contributions were, besides poetry and criti-
cism, a three-act political satire called Norma,' which appeared
anonymously. In November of this same year, 1851, after living for
a year and a half in Christiania, Ibsen was called as stage manager to
the newly opened Norwegian theatre in Bergen. The following year
.
he received a meagre traveling stipend and three months' leave of
absence, that he might study stage management abroad. In Germany
he wrote his next play, Sankthansnatten' (St. John's Night), which
was produced at the Bergen Theatre in 1853. It was not a success,
and has never been printed.
With his next play, however, Ibsen's dramatic career may be
said to have fairly and successfully begun. This was the first of
the national historical dramas, Gildet paa Solhaug' (The Banquet at
Solhaug), 1856; which was produced in Bergen with enthusiastic ap-
plause, and was subsequently given in Christiania, Copenhagen, and
Stockholm. This same year he also wrote the romantic drama Olaf
Liljekrans, which was produced at the Bergen Theatre twice during
the following year, but has never been printed. The same year, 1857,
he left Bergen to accept the directorship of the Norwegian theatre
in Christiania; a position he held until the summer of 1862, when
the theatre became bankrupt and was forced to close. Several plays
belong to this period. The historical drama Fru Inger til Österaat'
(Lady Inger of Österaat), and Hærmaendene paa Helgeland' (The
Vikings at Helgeland), appeared in 1857 and 1858 respectively; and
Kjærlighedens Komedie (The Comedy of Love), a satirical play in
rhymed verse, in 1862. To this same period belong also the long-
est of his minor poems, Paa Vidderne (On the Mountain Plains)
and 'Terje Vigen'; published the one in 1860, the other in 1862. From
the beginning of 1863 Ibsen received a small stipend as artistic
adviser of the Christiania Theatre. He endeavored presently to obtain
the “poet's salary,” which had been granted to Björnson this year;
but the demand was refused, and he was forced to put up with a
small traveling stipend, allowed him for the purpose of collecting the
popular poetry of Norway. It was afterwards proposed by his friends
to procure for him a subordinate position in the custom-house, but
this came to naught. When the war broke out between Denmark
and Germany, Ibsen beheld with indignation and scorn the attitude
of Norway, and he made up his mind to break away from condi-
tions which he felt so belittling. He applied for a traveling stipend,
which was ultimately allowed him; and in April 1864, the year of
the appearance of 'Kongs-Emnerne) (The Pretenders), his masterpiece
(


## p. 7841 (#33) ############################################

HENRIK IBSEN
7841
.
among the historical dramas, he left Christiania not to return for
many years. Abroad, Ibsen lived first in Germany and subsequently
in Trieste and Rome. In 1866 he sent back to Norway the great
dramatic poem Brand'; and the Storthing, on the strength of it,
found but little difficulty in granting him the “poet's salary » which
had before been refused. For twenty-seven years Ibsen lived abroad,
with only occasional visits to Norway; although when he left he had
intended to return, and his position as artistic adviser at the Chris-
tiania Theatre was for some time kept open for him. From Rome,
besides Brand,' he sent home in 1867 the dramatic poem Peer
Gynt. ' The next year he removed to Dresden, and the two summers
following he made short visits to Stockholm and Copenhagen. His
next work, the political comedy De Unges Forbund' (The League
of Youth), appeared in 1869; his longest work, the drama Kejser og
Galilær) (Emperor and Galilean), followed in 1873. The year after,
1874, he returned for a short time to Norway after an absence of ten
years, and was everywhere received with ovations. Subsequently to
this, until his final return to Norway in 1891,- since which time he
has lived in Christiania, — Ibsen spent the greater part of the time in
Germany, and principally in Munich. These last years have contrib-
uted the major part of the fame of the poet outside of Norway; for
within them fall all the modern social dramas that are immediately
connected with his name, and have even made Ibsenism »
a dis-
tinctive characterization in literature. Of these, (Samfundets Stötter)
(The Pillars of Society) appeared in 1877; Et Dukkehjem (A Doll's
House), in 1879; "Gjengangere (Ghosts), in 1881; En Folkefiende
(An Enemy of the People), in 1882; Vildanden' (The Wild Duck), in
1884; Rosmersholm,' in 1886; (Fruen fra Havet' (The Lady from the
Sea), in 1888; Hedda Gabler,' in 1890; Bygmester Solness' (Master
Builder Solness), in 1892; and finally Lille Eyjolf' (Little Eyjolf), in
1894. To complete the list of his works, a volume of poems had fur-
thermore appeared in 1871, with the title (Digte) (Poems).
Ibsen's dramas fall naturally, in the light of both subject and
chronology, into several groups, which mark with tolerable exactness
the successive phases in the development of his art. After the first
tragedy, Catilina,'—— which, crude though it is, has in it undoubted
elements of strength, — his work at the outset was romantic. This
phase culminated in the lyrical drama in verse, the Banquet at
Solhaug '; which was at the same time the first of the plays whose
subjects were taken from Norwegian history, that now followed in
succession until interrupted by the Comedy of Love. ' The materials
for the Banquet at Solhaug' Ibsen found in old Norwegian folk-
songs and ballads. Lady Inger of Österaat,' which later on
almost entirely rewritten, is a tragedy from Norwegian life in the
XIV-491
(C
C
was


## p. 7842 (#34) ############################################

7842
HENRIK IBSEN
(
sixteenth century. In the Vikings at Helgeland Ibsen turns for his
material to the ancient sagas, several of which are drawn upon for the
main plot and incidents. This play marks a definite break, once for
all, with Ibsen's youthful romanticisin, which afterward may scarcely
be said to reappear.
It is however in the last of the historical
dramas, the Pretenders,' that he reaches his height in this kind of
writing. The action of the play falls within the thirteenth century,
the “pretenders” being the two claimants to the throne of Sverre,
King of Norway,– Hakon and Skule. Ibsen in this drama exhibits an
unmistakable dramatic power, and his treatment of the psychological
contrast involved in the self-sufficiency of the King and the vacillation
of the Duke is among his surest dramatic effects. Some of his critics
have seen in Skule the reflection of many of the poet's own traits of
character. From a dialogue between Skule and Jatgeir the skald,
Ibsen himself has been well called “the poet of doubt,” — a charac-
terization that particularly fits him as the writer of the social dramas
yet to come.
Ibsen meantime, it will be remembered, — before the appearance
of the Pretenders,' which had been taken up and then tempo-
rarily laid aside,— had written his first distinctly satirical play, the
'Comedy of Love. This was in several ways a remarkable change
in the direction he had been following; but it marks simply a grow-
ing maturity of power in his art, and the consciousness already of
what was to be its ultimate mode of expression. It was in reality
the first definite formulation of what we now know as Ibsenism. In
Norway it was received with a storm of protest, such as the subse-
quent social dramas have not failed to evoke there and elsewhere.
The problem of the Comedy of Love,' like that of so many others
of Ibsen's dramas, is the marriage relation. Here the theme is the
manner in which love must of necessity die out in a union entered
into through affection alone. The play is a “defense of the rational
marriage as opposed to the marriage of inclination”; and the lovers,
Falk and Svanhild, at the end voluntarily renounce each other to
escape the common fate.
In Italy, whither Ibsen ultimately went after leaving Norway in
1864, he first took up the studies that were subsequently embodied in
Emperor and Galilean. ' His thoughts, however, seem irresistibly to
have gone back to the North upon which he had turned his back in
indignation; and this work was laid aside for what to most Norsemen
are the greatest of his works, the dramatic poems (Brand and Peer
Gynt. ' The two poems, although essentially unlike, mark a distinct
phase in the poet's development, in that they belong to what may be
called his polemical period. Both are intensely national, and in both
he applies unsparingly the scourge to his country's foibles. He rises


## p. 7843 (#35) ############################################

HENRIK IBSEN
7843
in them to an unexpected height of strength, and in them he has left
to Norwegian literature works which for all time to come will be
reckoned among its greatest classics. (Brand' is really a protest
against the half-heartedness of his countrymen.
« That which thou art, be it completely;
Not merely piecemeal and discreetly. ”
The hero, the young clergyman Brand, is himself an embodiment
of this protest against the spirit of Compromise. With his motto
“Everything or nothing,” he scorns the religion of the day and
declares a bitter though futile war against it; until, heavy laden with
sorrow and defeat but with unbroken will, he is overwhelmed in
the snow of the avalanche. Peer Gynt,' on the other hand, is the
embodiment of the spirit itself against which Brand' protests. The
hero accordingly is to Ibsen's mind the typical Norseman. It is not a
complimentary picture that the poet has so fearlessly painted of the
national character, for Peer Gynt is a man of dreams and of idle
inaction; he is cynically indifferent, selfish, sordid, superstitious, and
withal mendacious. He realizes at the end that he has never been
himself; that he is in fact no one, and is only fitted, although his
destiny is after all left undecided in the poem, to go into the melting-
spoon of the mysterious Button-Molder, who is to melt him over into
fresh material from which to stamp new souls. In manner the two
poems have but little in common. (Brand) is solemn and monotonous;
Peer Gynt varied and witty. Although both are as Norwegian as
well may be, each one is capable of universal application. Peer
Gynt' has been called the Scandinavian Faust'; for it too, like
Goethe's poem, is the story of the human soul.
Ibsen's polemics did not end with these two great poems; but the
phase was continued in the prose comedy (The League of Youth,'
which was the next to follow. This is a satire on the politics of
Norway, its parties and their motives; and is directed particularly
against democracy, which to Ibsen has always been in ill favor.
'Emperor and Galilean,' which had been begun and laid aside, was
next taken up and completed. The whole is made up of two dramas,
Cæsar's Apostasy' and the Emperor Julian,' each having five acts.
It is written throughout in prose. Although perhaps the most ambi-
tious of all of Ibsen's works, it is not as a whole an artistic success.
It was the last of the historical dramas; and though apparently far
removed from the modern social plays that were now to follow, there
is nevertheless a link between it and them. In none of them does
he so unmistakably formulate the creed that we find embodied in the
action of the later plays.
(


## p. 7844 (#36) ############################################

7844
HENRIK IBSEN
new
C
The dramas of modern life, which outside of Scandinavia are most
closely connected with the name of Ibsen, next followed in unbroken
succession. Although this is at first sight almost absolutely a
tendency, the poet none the less definitely follows a direction that all
through his earlier work is frequently enough indicated. It is found
in Catilina,' the first dramatic work, as well as in Emperor and
Galilean,' the last, and the League of Youth' prefigures it almost
completely. In some ways it is however a new development. Hence-
forth Ibsen is the pathologist who unerringly, and with cruel direct-
ness, makes his diagnosis of the ills of the social body; and although
the setting of his plays is Norwegian, their application is as universal
as are the conditions of modern society itself. The Pillars of Soci-
ety,' the first of the group, attacks the hypocrisy of the principal
supporters of a community, here typified in particular by the rich
Consul Bernick, the local magnate in a small Norwegian town. Ber-
nick ultimately avows his real character; he shows how he has
brought about his own personal aggrandizement at the expense of
the community of which he has been a vaunted pillar, and stands at
last for the first time on the firm ground of truth. « The spirits of
Truth and Freedom,”— it is declared at the end, — "these are the
Pillars of Society. ”
A Doll's House,' the next play, is concerned with the problem of
marriage as a failure. To answer the question, it furnishes an illus-
tration of the customary sacrifice of the individuality of the woman
to that of the man to whom she is married. Nora, the doll of this
particular doll's-house, is one of the most distinctive of Ibsen's crea-
tions, as is the drama one of his most pronounced successes. She is
an undeveloped child in mind and morals, and eventually, unthinking
of consequences, sacrifices honor to love, and forges her father's name
to a document in order to help her husband. At the end her illus-
ions have all vanished. She sees and understands the doll's-house
in which she has lived, and determines for her children's sake and
her own to leave it.
"Ghosts) is in some respects a complement to A Doll's House. )
It shows in reality, in its own way and with wholly different setting,
what might have happened had Nora Helmer remained with her hus-
band and children. The play is the most thrilling and dreadful of
all of Ibsen's works. Its fundamental idea is the awful consequences
of hereditary vices, which are ghosts to revisit the scenes of their
past existence. Oswald Alving, the son of a vicious father whose
memory has been cloaked by his wife after his death, becomes a
mere physical wreck, and begs his mother in the last awful scene to
give him the morphia that shall end his torment. It is left uncertain
whether this is or is not done, but it scarcely mitigates the horror of
(


## p. 7845 (#37) ############################################

HENRIK IBSEN
7845
the end. (Ghosts' raised a howl of protest, but its drastic strength
cannot be questioned.
(An Enemy of the People' is to a great extent a personal polemic
due to the reception accorded “Ghosts. Its hero, Dr. Stockmann,
simply tells the truth in regard to the corruption of the medicinal
waters that had brought visitors and prosperity to a little town in
Norway. Every one knows that it is the truth, and he is stoned and
driven out for uttering it. The play as a whole is inferior to the
rest.
(The Wild Duck) receives its name from a bird that is kept
captive in a garret, and is the fondest treasure of a little girl
of fourteen, Hedwig. The play is gloomy and despairing. Hedwig,
ultimately, instead of killing the wild duck as she is advised to do,
turns the bullet into her own heart.
Rosmersholm) is the story of the clergyman Rosmer, the last of
his race, whose wife had committed suicide, and who had fallen under
the influence of her former companion Rebecca West. The relation-
ship between them, except in name, is love, tender but passionless.
Idle scandals arise, and Rosmer offers marriage, which Rebecca's con-
science does not allow her to accept. Both put an end to their con-
fused lives by throwing themselves into the mill-dam.
“The Lady from the Sea' is the daughter of a light-house keeper
who has become the second wife of Dr. Wangel, the physician of a
little coast town. She has however been mysteriously betrothed to a
seafaring man, a Finn, who finally comes back to claim her. When
her husband at her own request leaves her to choose between him
and the sailor, and tells her that she must bear the individual
responsibility for her action, she decides with rapture to remain.
Hedda Gabler' seems to be the only one of the social dramas
without a problem. Hedda is a woman of the modern literary type,
-- vain, pleasure-loving. undomestic, and selfish. As the wife of Dr.
,
Tisman she lures back to his destruction her old friend Lövborg, who
had once grievously insulted her. When in despair he threatens to
kill himself, she offers him one of her pistols. He is afterward found
dead with Hedda's pistol discharged, and she, fearful of the scandal
that will arise, ends her life with the other.
(Master Builder Solness) tells the story of the price of success: the
ruin of many for the benefit of the one, and the impoverishment in
heart and affections of the one, who must thus pay the penalty for
his successes. Halvard Solness, the builder, step by step has fought
his way to success; and in his desire to keep what he has gained he
is wary and jealous of any possible competitor, and particularly of
the coming generation, whom he recognizes as his enemies. His first
concession to youth, in the person of Hilda Wangel, brings about his


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