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MODERNITIES

BY

HORACE B. SAMUEL

NEW YORK

E. P. DUTTON AND CO.

681, FIFTH AVENUE

1914

DEDICATED

TO

MRS. GEORGE JOSEPH

PREFACE

The ten studies which constitute this volume are devoted to individualswho are held out as being reasonably characteristic of that modernmovement of the last and present century which started with the FrenchRevolution. At any rate, they were all modern once. For the spirit ofmodernity enjoys, like the priest-god of the ancient grove, only atemporary reign, and is speedily killed by its inevitable successor.

It is somewhat difficult to find any common denominator for thesubjects of these studies. The essays must be left largely to speak forthemselves. If, however, an attempt were to be made to pronounce ofwhat the spirit of modernity really consists, one might suggest that itis a spirit of energy, of fearlessness in analysis, whose sole raisond'être and whose sole ideal is actual life itself.

The studies on Miss Marie Corelli and Herr Wedekind are here publishedfor the first time. Those on Disraeli, Heine, Stendhal, Schnitzler,Strindberg, the Futurists, and Verhaeren have appeared as articles inthe Fortnightly Review; while the essay on Nietzsche's "Genealogyof Morals" was first published in the English Review. I haveconsequently pleasure in expressing my thanks and acknowledgmentsto Mr. W. L. Courtney and Mr. Austin Harrison for their courtesy inallowing these articles to be reproduced in their present form. I havealso to thank the editor of the New Statesman for permission torepublish my translation from Marinetti's, "The Pope's Monoplane."

I have made additions to the essays on Schnitzler and the Futuristswith a view to incorporating some reference to the more recent works ofDr. Schnitzler and M. Marinetti.

HORACE B. SAMUEL.
Temple, October 1913.

CONTENTS

STENDHAL: THE COMPLEAT INTELLECTUAL
HEINRICH HEINE
THE PSYCHOLOGY OF DISRAELI
NIETZSCHE'S "GENEALOGY OF MORALS"
AUGUST STRINDBERG
THE WELTANSCHAUUNG OF MISS MARIE CORELLI
FRANK WEDEKIND
ARTHUR SCHNITZLER
...