fantasy, light irony. Yet beneath this outer covering of art there is
a serious meaning that, like murder, will out. If demonstration were
needed that Mark Twain is sealed of the tribe of moralists, that is
amply supplied by that masterpiece, that triumph of invention,
construction, and originality, 'The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg'.
Here is a pure morality, daring in the extreme and incredibly original
in a world perpetually reiterating a saying already thousands of years
old, to the effect that there is nothing new under the sun. It is a
deliberate emendation of that invocation in the Lord's Prayer "Lead us
(not) into temptation." The shrieking irony of this trenchant parable,
its cynicism and heartlessness, would make of it an unendurable
criticism of human life--were it accepted literally as a representation
of society. In essence it is a morality pure and simple, animated not
only by its brilliantly original ethical suggestion, but also by its
illuminating reflection of human nature and its graciously relieving
humour. In that exultant letter which the _Diabolus ex machina_ wrote
to the betrayed villagers, he sneers at their old and lofty reputation
for honesty--that reputation of which they were so inordinately proud
and vain. The weak point in their armour was disclosed so soon as he
discovered how carefully and vigilantly they kept themselves and their
children out of temptation. For he well knew that the weakest of all
weak things is a virtue that has not been tested in the fire. The
familiar distinction between innocence and virtue springs to mind. And
it is worthy of consideration that Nietzsche, and Shaw after him, both
point out that virtue consists, not in resisting evil, but in not
desiring it! 'The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg' is a masterpiece,
eminently worthy of the genius of a Swift. It proclaims Mark Twain not
only as a supreme artist, but also as eminently and distinctively a
moralist.