"I wish I were able to deny all this," said Felix. "Unfortunately we have no real society; and where we have the germs of one, actors are as a rule excluded from it. But though that part of your art that has to do with the representation of human beings and a characteristic imitation of life suffers from this, the higher branches still continue to be our domain; and if you compare the art of tragedy among the Italians or the French with our representations of Shakespeare and Goethe--"
"That is all very true," interrupted the actor; "in what is spiritual and belongs to an inner consciousness, we can always bear comparison with our neighbors. But only wait ten years longer and you will see that not a soul here in Germany will ever think of going to see a tragedy, and our classical theatre will be then just such another puppet-show as the Théâtre Français is now. Ought we to be surprised at this? All tragedy is aristocratic. Why should the hero leave this world with such sublimity and grandeur if it were not that he found it too miserable for him to feel comfortable in? But he who finds the world a wretched place insults all those to whom it appears most charming, because, with their low desires, they are able to take comfort in it. And inasmuch as the good of the masses will become more and more the watchword, as time goes on, therefore he who towers above the masses must not be disappointed if he finds that he cannot be of much use either in real life or behind the footlights. Tragical heroes are only possible where social differences exist; where the ordinary man looks on with a certain respect while a _Coriolanus_ conquers and falls, without thinking to himself: 'It served him right. Why did he insult us common folk?' But with our excellent, humane, democratic way of looking at things--"
"A depressing prospect, certainly! So the longer our nation goes on freeing itself from prejudices and conforming to true ideas of humanity, the less hope will there be that we shall ever be able to cut a good figure on the stage?"
"On the contrary, I think then is the time when we shall really first begin. Self-respect is one of the most important requisites even in the acting of a comedy. When we have once taken our place among the nations of Europe, when we have rid ourselves of our dullness and tactlessness in our dealings with the outside world, when we cease to be such wretched crawlers that we will go through any humiliation for our daily-bread's sake, and cannot conduct ourselves like gentlemen, then you will see how quickly we shall find the art of acting infused into our blood--we who have been for so many centuries mere zealous animals. To be sure, in regard to tragedy it is a question whether we shall ever succeed, in our better days, in attaining sufficient earnestness and reverence to enable us to keep in mind the fact that, as old Goethe says, 'awe is mankind's best quality'--"