Thus his criticism, consciously or unconsciously, is warped and twisted by two unnecessary controlments. On the one [Sidenote: _Drawbacks resulting._] hand, he looks too much at the actual occupants of his bookcase, without considering whether there may not be another bookcase filled with other things, as good but different. On the other, he is too prone, not merely to generalise from his facts as if they were the only possible facts, but to “overstep the genus” a little in his generalisation, and to merge Poetics in Ethics. That others went further than he did, that they said later that a hero must not only be good but white, and superadded to his Unity of Action a Unity of Time and a Unity of Place, which his documents do not admit, and which his doctrines by no means justify, are matters for which, no doubt, he is not to be blamed. But of the things for which he is legitimately responsible, some are not quite praiseworthy. In the first place, “Imitation” is an awkward word, though no doubt it is more awkward in the English than in the Greek, and “Representation” or “Fiction” will get us out of part of the difficulty. Not only does this term for the secondary creation proper to art belittle it too much, but it suggests awkward and mischievous limitations: it ties the poet’s hands and circumscribes his aims.[42] Indirectly it is perhaps responsible for Aristotle’s worst critical slip—his depreciation of Character in comparison with Action. This very depreciation is, however, a serious shortcoming; and so is the failure to recognise, despite some not indistinct examples of it in the matter before him from the _Odyssey_ downwards, what has been called “Romantic Unity,” that is to say, the Unity given by Character itself, though the action may be linear and progressive rather than by way of _desis_ and _lusis_. The attempt to extend (save in respect of scale only) the limitations of Tragedy to Epic is another fault; and so perhaps is the great complexity and the at least not inconsiderable obscurity of the definition of Tragedy itself. In such a treatise as this it is possible merely to allude to the famous clause, “through pity and terror effecting the _katharsis_ of such emotions.” Volumes have been written on these few words,[43] the chief crux being, of course, the word _katharsis_. It cannot be said that any of the numerous solutions is by itself and to demonstration correct, but it is clear that the addition is out of keeping with the rest of the definition. Hitherto Aristotle, whether we agree with him or not, has been purely literary, but he now shifts to ethics. You might almost as well define fire in terms strictly appropriate to physics, and then add, “effecting the cooking of sirloins in a manner suitable to such objects.” Footnote 42: