They were all astonishingly
effective; but there was one of them which was so effective that my
friend and I fought about it outside, and had almost to be separated by
the police. It was intended to indicate how men really behaved in a
wreck or naval disaster, how they break down, how they scream, how they
fight each other without object and in a mere hatred of everything. And
then there was added, with all that horrible irony which Voltaire began,
a scene in which a great statesman made a speech over their bodies,
saying that they were all heroes and had died in a fraternal embrace. My
friend and I came out of this theatre, and as he had lived long in
Paris, he said, like a Frenchman: "What admirable artistic arrangement!
Is it not exquisite?" "No," I replied, assuming as far as possible the
traditional attitude of John Bull in the pictures in _Punch_--"No, it is
not exquisite. Perhaps it is unmeaning; if it is unmeaning I do not
mind. But if it has a meaning I know what the meaning is; it is that
under all their pageant of chivalry men are not only beasts, but even
hunted beasts. I do not know much of humanity, especially when humanity
talks in French. But I know when a thing is meant to uplift the human
soul, and when it is meant to depress it.
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