What one feels so hopelessly
barren in declared pessimism is just its arrogance. It seems as if the
discovery made by many men at various times that there is much evil in
the world were a source of proud and unholy joy unto some of the modern
writers. That frame of mind is not the proper one in which to approach
seriously the art of fiction. It gives an author--goodness only knows
why--an elated sense of his own superiority. And there is nothing more
dangerous than such an elation to that absolute loyalty towards his
feelings and sensations an author should keep hold of in his most exalted
moments of creation.
To be hopeful in an artistic sense it is not necessary to think that the
world is good. It is enough to believe that there is no impossibility of
its being made so. If the flight of imaginative thought may be allowed
to rise superior to many moralities current amongst mankind, a novelist
who would think himself of a superior essence to other men would miss the
first condition of his calling. To have the gift of words is no such
great matter. A man furnished with a long-range weapon does not become a
hunter or a warrior by the mere possession of a fire-arm; many other
qualities of character and temperament are necessary to make him either
one or the other.
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