Hardy's best novels are among the few in English fiction that can be read again and again, and that reveal at every reading some fresh beauties of thought or style. The man is so big, so genuine and so unlike all other writers that his work must be set apart in a class by itself. Were he not so richly endowed his pessimism would be fatal, for the world does not favor the novelist who demands that his fiction should be governed by the same hard rules that govern real life. In the work of most novelists we know that whatever harsh fate may befall the leading characters the skies will be sunny before the story closes, and the worthy souls who have battled against malign destiny will receive their reward. Not so with Hardy. We know when we begin one of his tales that tragedy is in store for his people. The dark cloud of destiny soon obscures the heavens, and through the lowering storm the victims move on to the final scene in which the wreck of their fortunes is completed. [Illustration: THOMAS HARDY--A PORTRAIT WHICH BRINGS OUT STRIKINGLY THE MAN OF CREATIVE POWER, THE ARTIST, THE PHILOSOPHER AND THE POET] Literary genius can work no greater miracle than this--to make the reader accept as a transcript of life stories in which generous, unselfish people are dealt heavy blows by fate, while the mean-souled, sordid men and women often escape their just deserts. Hardy is not unreligious; he is simply and frankly pagan. Yet he differs from the classical writers in the fact that he is keenly alive to all the strong influences of nature on a sympathetic mind, and he is also a believer in the power of romantic love. No one has ever equaled Hardy in making the reader feel the living power of trees and other objects of nature. You can not escape the influence of his scenic effects. These are never theatrical--in fact they seem to form a vital part of every story. The scenes of all his novels are laid in his native Dorsetshire, which he has thinly disguised under the old Saxon name of Wessex. In _Far From the Madding Crowd_ Hardy first demonstrated the tremendous possibilities of rural scenes as a vital background for a story, but in _The Return of the Native_ he actually makes Egdon heath the most absorbing feature of the book. All the characters seem to take life and coloring from this heath, which has in it the potency of transforming characters and of wrecking lives. And in _Tess_ the peaceful, rural scenes appear to accentuate the tragedy of the heroine's unavailing struggles against a fate that was worse than death.