you or by some one else, than has ever yet been known. All I purpose
to-night is to show you how certain laws of dramatic construction
asserted themselves from time to time as we were making the changes in
this play; how they thrust themselves upon our notice; how we could not
possibly ignore them. And you will see how a man comes to understand any
particular law, after he has been forced to obey it, altho, perhaps, he
has never heard of it or dreamed of it before.

And let me say here, to the students of Harvard--I do not presume to
address words of advice to the faculty--it is to you and to others who
enjoy the high privileges of liberal education that the American stage
ought to look for honest and good dramatic work in the future. Let me
say to you, then: Submit yourselves truly and unconditionally to the
laws of dramatic truth, so far as you can discover them by honest mental
exertion and observation. Do not mistake any mere defiance of these laws
for originality. You might as well show your originality by defying the
law of gravitation. Keep in mind the historical case of Stephenson. When
a member of the British Parliament asked him, concerning his newfangled
invention, the railroad, whether it would not be very awkward if a cow
were on the track when a train came along, he answered: "Very ark'ard,
indeed--for the cow." When you find yourself standing in the way of
dramatic truth, my young friends--clear the track! If you don't, the
truth can stand it; you can't. Even if you feel sometimes that your
genius--that's always the word in the secret vocabulary of our own
minds--even if your genius seems to be hampered by these dramatic laws,
resign yourself to them at once, with that simple form of Christian
resignation so beautifully illustrated by the poor German woman on her
deathbed. Her husband being asked, afterward, if she were resigned to
her death, responded with that touching and earnest recognition of
eternal law: "Mein Gott, she had to be!"