his thrusts. His sincerity and keen insight into Spanish character enable him to reveal human beings that we recognize readily under their unfamiliar national costumes.
Like Shaw, Benavente is no respecter of his audiences' feelings. He apparently enjoys shattering fond illusions, nor does he spare individuals, even the most powerful. In so closely knit a country as Spain it is remarkable that the work of a vigorous, active free-thinker who has taken his place in the world of affairs has not degenerated into mere personal lampoon. It is not that Benavente has lacked the courage, for in Catholic Spain it is just as dangerous to attack the cherished conventions of caste and religion as it is in Puritan England to show that democracy can be tyrannical or marriage unhappy, and Benavente has not hesitated to satirize with particular gusto outworn ideas of personal and family honor, conventional moral hypocrisy, and devout wickedness.
It is said of this Spanish playwright, as it has been said of Bernard Shaw, that he has no higher aim than to be the super-clever popular playwright of his day; that he is utterly frivolous; that he lacks that stability which belief in any carefully thought out and firmly held philosophy would give him. It is true that we read his satirical comedies in vain if we look for the kindly admonitions of a great moral teacher; neither do we find in them the clarion calls to action of the social revolutionist. There are none of the continental dramatists' bitter criticisms of contemporary life in his plays—nor, it must be added, any of the comforting encouragement of popular modern philosophers. He does not exhort; he does not preach; he does not advise. He is content to show us some particular phase of life as he himself sees it, and then he leaves us to draw our own conclusions. He does this deliberately, not as a refuge for mediocrity, but because he is convinced that the true function of the drama is to picture life on the stage, and he accomplishes his purpose so well that he wins at once extravagant blame and praise. He is blamed unjustly for lack of a serious purpose, and so lifelike are his portraits that he has been over-praised as a student of character.
These confused estimates of his work have been fostered by Benavente himself. A dramatist to the core, he appreciates keenly the theatric effect, and he uses his powers spectacularly to arrest the attention of his fellow countrymen. He is too sensible and too honest to don a cloak of sobriety which would be unbecoming and un-
