; but no one would accept him as a sun, for the
test of a sun is that it can make something grow. Practically speaking
the two qualities of a modern drama are, that it should play and that it
should pay. It had been proved over and over again in weighty dramatic
criticisms, in careful readers' reports, that the plays of Shaw could
never play or pay; that the public did not want wit and the wars of
intellect. And just about the time that this had been finally proved,
the plays of Bernard Shaw promised to play like _Charley's Aunt_ and to
pay like Colman's Mustard. It is a fact in which we can all rejoice, not
only because it redeems the reputation of Bernard Shaw, but because it
redeems the character of the English people. All that is bravest in
human nature, open challenge and unexpected wit and angry conviction,
are not so very unpopular as the publishers and managers in their
motor-cars have been in the habit of telling us. But exactly because we
have come to a turning point in the man's career I propose to interrupt
the mere catalogue of his plays and to treat his latest series rather as
the proclamations of an acknowledged prophet. For the last plays,
especially _Man and Superman_, are such that his whole position must be
re-stated before attacking them seriously.

For two reasons I have called this concluding series of plays not again
by the name of "The Dramatist," but by the general name of "The
Philosopher." The first reason is that given above, that we have come to
the time of his triumph and may therefore treat him as having gained
complete possession of a pulpit of his own. But there is a second
reason: that it was just about this time that he began to create not
only a pulpit of his own, but a church and creed of his own. It is a
very vast and universal religion; and it is not his fault that he is the
only member of it. The plainer way of putting it is this: that here, in
the hour of his earthly victory, there dies in him the old mere denier,
the mere dynamiter of criticism. In the warmth of popularity he begins
to wish to put his faith positively; to offer some solid key to all
creation. Perhaps the irony in the situation is this: that all the
crowds are acclaiming him as the blasting and hypercritical buffoon,
while he himself is seriously rallying his synthetic power, and with a
grave face telling himself that it is time he had a faith to preach. His
final success as a sort of charlatan coincides with his