not escape. This was true of many
of the greatest characters in classical
tragedy, and it is true also of many
of the characters in modern tragedy.
The world looks with bated breath
on a struggle of the noblest heroism,
in which men and women, matched
against overwhelming social forces,
bear their part with sublime and un-
faltering courage, and by the com-
pleteness of their self-surrender assert
their sovereignty even in the hour
when disaster seems to crush and
destroy them. To these striking
figures, isolated by the greatness of
their fate, the heart of the world has
always gone out as to the noblest
of its children. Solitary in the pos-
session of some new conception of
duty or of truth, separated from the
mass of their fellows by that lack
of sympathy which springs from im-

[[222]]

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v?