Page:Satire in the Victorian novel (IA satireinvictoria00russrich).pdf/42

 and artistic if not rampantly ethical. As an instrument of self criticism, whereby a man may be saved from making a solemn pompous fool of himself, as an antitoxin to vanity, a solvent of sentimentality, a betrayer of hypocrisy, satire may find all the mission it needs to be respectable; and if it can also acquire a degree of grace and comeliness, it may be listed among the muses.

Now this spirit of humorous criticism, sprung from innate prejudice, nurtured by penetrating observation, enlisted at least nominally under the banner of righteousness, and out for conquest, obviously must have something to conquer;—whether he is a soldier fighting an enemy alien, or a roving knight, bound to offer combat on chivalric grounds, though aware in his candid heart that the surpassing loveliness of his lady is a claim gallantly to be maintained rather than an incontrovertible fact. In either case, whether he uses archery or artillery, he must have a target; and a student of his tactics must understand what it is, even better perhaps than he does himself.

Taken individually, the objects of satiric attack are legion, being no fewer than all such victims of human displeasure as may suitably come in for jesting rebuke. Our only chance for any sort of synthesis is to see first if these individuals may be grouped into classes, and next, if these classes may be generalized under some principle, discovered to be under some supreme command.

The grouping is indeed easily discernible. Political parties stand out, social strata, various professions and institutions and movements. But to look upon these as ridiculed for themselves is to be satisfied with a superficial view. The fault is not in themselves but in their stars that they are underlings. What are these evil stars that seem in their courses to fight against them?