and make me see, by a single word, in what respects one cabhorse differs from the fifty others that follow and precede him." Style I have set forth elsewhere his ideas on style. They are in accord with the theory of observation which I have just explained. Whatever be the thing one wishes to say, there is only one word to express it, only one verb to give it life, only one adjective to qualify it. One must search therefore until these have been discovered that noun, that verb, that adjective,—and never rest content with approximating it, never resort to tricks, however happy, or to buffooneries of language to evade the difficulty. We can interpret and make clear the most subtile things by bringing to bear that line of Boileau: D'un mot mis en sa place enseigna le pouvoir. There is no need of the bizarre, complicated, distended, and Chinese vocabulary imposed upon us today under the name of artistic writing, to enable the fixation of every shade of thought; but we must discern with extreme clarity all variations in the value of a word according to the place it occupies. Let us have fewer nouns, verbs, and adjectives with almost incomprehensible meanings, but more distinctive sentences, diversely constructed, ingeniously struck out, full of sonorities and skilful rhythms. Let us require ourselves to be excellent stylists rather than collectors of rare terms. It is, in fact, more difficult to manage a sentence to one's liking, to make it express everything, even that which it does not say, to fill it with intimations, with hidden and unformulated intentions, than to invent new expressions or to seek out in the depths of old unknown books, all those which have lost their usage and signification, and are for us but dead words. The French language, moreover, is a pure stream which mannerists have never been and will never be able to trouble. Each century has thrown into the limpid current its fashions, its pretentious archaisms, and its preciosities, without any of these futile attempts and impotent efforts coming to the surface. The nature of this language is to be clear, logical, and vigorous. It does not suffer itself to be enfeebled, obscured, or corrupted. Those who today write descriptions without careful attention to abstract terms, those who make the hail or rain fall upon the cleanness of the window-panes, can also throw stones at the simplicity of their fellow workers. They may hit, perhaps, their fellow workers, who possess bodies, but they will never reach the simplicity, which has none. THE BLIGHT By MELVILLE DAVISSON POST Why is it one writer or one magazine becomes greatly popular while others never obtain any consider able hearing? Literary A writer like Poe is universally read. The imitators of Poe, Conan Doyle, and the like, continue to enjoy great popularity, while our most conspicuous modern writers, claiming an elevated literary standard, remain with their pages uncut. Certain magazines published in this country run swiftly into a circulation of millions, while others, long established, are barely able to find a few hundred thousand readers. Those of the first class become great and powerful; those of the second fall into decay. The explanation does not lie wholly in the superior energy and business ability of the one as against the other. It would scarcely do to affirm that the popularity of Poe and Doyle arose from a superior skill in advertising. It is a complete answer to say that these authors and these popular magazines give the public what it wants. And here one reaches a vital interest-confining the inquiry to fiction: What is it the public does want? The reader is not looking for any form of instruction. If he wishes information in this day he goes to a textbook. The primary object of all fiction is to entertain the reader. If, while it entertains, it also ennobles him this fiction becomes a work of art; but its primary business must be to entertain and not to educate or instruct him. These latter benefits are incidental. They can never be the direct object of fiction. Nor must it appear that the intent of fiction is to ennoble the reader. All attempted uplift is instinctively resented. Did not Thoreau say that if he should hear that one was coming to his house to do him good he Reprinted from the Saturday Evening Post of December 26, 1914, by special permission of the Editor and of the Author. Mr. Post is a West Virginia lawyer who has long been known as a writer of stories of adventure and mystery. would flee as for his life? The great primary object, then, in all fiction is to entertain. What sort of fiction is it that has the most nearly universal appeal? Our interest in problems If one reflects one will immediately see that the human mind everywhere is engaged almost exclusively with problems. It is the problem that holds the mind with a consuming interest. The astronomer, as Mr. Lowell so aptly puts it, is merely a detective of the heavens ; the chemist, a detective of the laboratory; the biologist, a student of clews. We are encircled by a frontier of vast mysteries. We advance by finding the solutions to these mysteries. The human mind is essentially an implement for the solving of problems and the untangling of mysteries. This being true, it would seem to be also true that the writer who presents a problem to be solved or a mystery to be untangled will be offering those qualities in his fiction which are of the most nearly universal appeal. False literary ideals Immediately one meets the reply that literature of this character is not of the highest order. Writers and magazine publishers who avoid these elements of universal interest, we are told, are dealing with a higher type of literature. This idea has been very deeply rooted. It has happened that certain men who had the public attention-men of culture, of education and refinement-have taken this position. They have inspired the textbooks taught in the schools and thereby given this theory wide credence. It has also happened that the mystery or problem story, from the very fact that it contained elements of the most nearly universal appeal, has been the vehicle usually chosen by the unskilful. This has given such fiction a general air of inferiority. Persons of refinement and culture wish to distinguish themselves by producing something unlike that produced by the incompetent. Thus it has happened in this country that a few men, commanding the older and more established publications, have in a measure created the impression that the absence of the problem or mystery in a work of fiction is in some sense a distinguishing mark of the elevated literary class. The result was that the writers and magazines who adopted this course lost their audience and restricted themselves to a narrow hearing. It was a tremendous loss; and, unless they gained something of a superior value-markedly and conspicuously superior-the thing was suicidal. Pride and the desire to be distinguished are not enough to justify a magazine in moving toward bankruptcy or an author toward a single edition. These men must be certain that the fiction which omits the problem or mystery is superior to that which contains it; and their case must be established beyond all doubt to justify the enormous losses it entailslosses of money and of popularity. It is not an answer to cite Mr. Galsworthy's story of the popular author who was urged by a critic to write "literature,' and who continued to write better and better "literature," omitting the elements of popular appeal, until he finally produced a piece so excellent that not even the critic could read it! Nor can we dodge it with the single comment : "I do not know whether the gentlemen of this school have any talent, for I cannot read their books; but I do know there has been no genius in this country since Edgar Allan Poe." With the possible exception of Hawthorne, there has been no genius in this country since Edgar Allan Poe; but men of ability and talent may produce literature in the absence of genius, and it is with the literature produced by these men that we are primarily concerned. Let us inquire into the statement that the highest order of literature omits the problem or mystery. Aristotle High-standing names count for much; but a high-standing name that produces literature omitting the problem or mystery will not take precedence over an equally high-standing name which discusses literature with no air of special pleading. In the fifth century before the Christian era there flourished along the Aegean Sea a race of people that not only produced |