Page:Chesterton - Twelve Types (Humphreys, 1902).djvu/101

Rh century to the spirit of heroic comedy. When an ex-General of Napoleon is asked his reason for having betrayed the Emperor, he replies, 'La fatigue,' and at that a veteran private of the Great Army rushes forward, and crying passionately, 'Et nous?' pours out a terrible description of the life lived by the common soldier. To-day when pessimism is almost as much a symbol of wealth and fashion as jewels or cigars, when the pampered heirs of the ages can sum up life in few other words but 'la fatigue,' there might surely come a cry from the vast mass of common humanity from the beginning 'et nous?' It is this potentiality for enthusiasm among the mass of men that makes the function of comedy at once common and sublime. Shakespeare's 'Much Ado