Governed by this apolaustic prejudice, he has since continued his transparent course of seeing only what he has desired to see, or rather of admitting the reality of only what has suited him, while setting down all else as either hypocrisy or delusion. And while it is true that no one escapes the necessity of bringing only a selective attention to bear upon the outer world, it by no means follows that we are all alike cut off from “reality.” On the contrary, it does mean that the basis of our selective attention, the interests and purposes served by it, are of fundamental importance. And the disastrous effect of Mr. Dreiser’s apolaustic prejudice is that it encouraged him in slavery to mere temperament, in helpless surrender to the chaotic flow of “natural” impulses, while it brought to his attention from the outer world only what fed itself, the antics of complicated beasts with strange illusions. The trouble with what he thus saw is not that it was non-existent, some gross trick of the fevered imagination;--it was there to be seen--it is there, in grievous plenty. No, the trouble is that none of it has positive significance. The naturalism which it fathers lights up the animal in man, but tells man nothing of that which positively distinguishes him from the beast--more, it vindictively denies that anything save hypocrisy and delusion does so distinguish him. And while it seeks to dissolve our humanity, it ends, as it ends in Mr. Dreiser, in a bottomless morass of misrepresentation and despair. This is the American tragedy of our confused age which constitutes the real import of Mr. Dreiser’s masterpiece. Note--For permission to quote from the writings of Mr. Dreiser, I am indebted both to him and to his publisher, Mr. Horace Liveright. FOOTNOTES [42] In that which follows I draw chiefly upon _A Book About Myself_ (1922), but also make use of _A Hoosier Holiday_ (1916), _Twelve Men_ (1919), and _Hey Rub-A-Dub-Dub_ (1920). _A Traveler at Forty_ (1913) is also a revealing book. [43] I refer particularly to _Jennie Gerhardt_ and _The “Genius.”_ Limitations of space unfortunately prevent me from considering here any save Mr. Dreiser’s latest novel, _An American Tragedy_. [44] From the _Bookman_, September, 1928 (Vol. 68, p. 25). _Pandora’s Box in American Fiction_ HARRY HAYDEN CLARK America, Carlyle wrote Emerson, “is verily the Door of Hope to distracted Europe; which otherwise I should see crumbling down into blackness of darkness.”