Why should it be the central point around which their tales revolve? When we look about us in the world we know, we cannot think that love is taking up much time and attention in people's lives. It dominates gloriously for a brief period,—or for brief periods,—and then makes way for other engrossing influences. Its might and authority are recognized; but the recognition does not imply constant concern. The atmosphere of life is not surcharged with emotion, as is the atmosphere of fiction. Society is not composed of young men and women falling madly but virtuously in love with one another, nor of married men and women doing the same thing on less legitimate lines.
To these rational arguments, which have been urged by restless critics before now, M. Paul Bourget makes answer that novelists deal with love because, under its white heat, all characteristics become more vividly alive, and are brought more actively and more luminously into play. Man is never so self-revealing as when consumed by passion. We see into his heart, only when it is lit by the
