Things must be faced, even
in order to be forgiven; the great objection to "letting sleeping dogs
lie" is that they lie in more senses than one. But in Mr. Jerome's
Passing of the Third Floor Back the redeemer is not a divine detective,
pitiless in his resolve to know and pardon. Rather he is a sort of divine
dupe, who does not pardon at all, because he does not see anything that is
going on. It may, or may not, be true to say, "Tout comprendre est tout
pardonner." But it is much more evidently true to say, "Rien comprendre
est rien Pardonner," and the "Third Floor Back" does not seem to
comprehend anything. He might, after all, be a quite selfish
sentimentalist, who found it comforting to think well of his neighbours.
There is nothing very heroic in loving after you have been deceived. The
heroic business is to love after you have been undeceived.
When I saw this play it was natural to compare it with another play which
I had not seen, but which I have read in its printed version. I mean Mr.
Rann Kennedy's Servant in the House, the success of which sprawls over so
many of the American newspapers. This also is concerned with a dim, yet
evidently divine, figure changing the destinies of a whole group of
persons.
Pages:
192
193
194
195
196
197
198
199
200
201
202
203
204
205
206
207
208
209
210
211
212
213
214
215
216