ew, which makes it possible for the reader
to see every important incident through the eyes of each of the
characters in turn. Furthermore, it is comparatively easy to
characterize in the first person when the thing that is written is so
intimate and personal as a letter. But the disadvantage of the device
lies in the fact that it tends toward incoherence in the structure
of the narrative. It is hard for the author to stick to the point at
every moment without violating the casual and discursive tone that the
epistolary style demands.

Of course a certain unity may be gained if the letters used are all
written by a single character. The chief advantage of this method over
a direct narrative written by one of the actors is the added motive
for the revelation of intimate matters which is furnished by the fact
that the narrator is writing, not for the public at large, but only
for the friend, or friends, to whom the letters are addressed. But a
series of letters written by one person only is very likely to become
monotonous; and more is usually gained than lost by assigning the
epistolary role successively to different characters.

We have seen that, although the employment of an internal point of
view gives a narrative vividness of action objectivity of observation,
immediacy of emotion, and plausibility of tone, it is attended by
several difficulties in the delineation of the characters and the
construction of the plot. It is therefore in many cases more advisable
for the author to look upon the narrative externally and to write it
in the third person. But there are several different ways of doing
this; for though a story viewed externally is told in every case by
a mind distinct from that of any of the characters, there are many
different stations in which that mind may set itself, and many
different moods in which it may recount the story.

First of all (to start with a phase that contrasts most widely
with the internal point of view) the external mind may set itself
equidistant from all the characters and may assume toward them an
attitude of absolute omniscience. The story, in such a case, is told
by a sort of god, who is cognizant of the past and future of the
action while he is looking at the present, and who sees into the minds
and hearts of all the characters at once and understands them better
than they do themselves.

The main practical advantage in assuming the god-like point of view
is that the narrator