e most entrancing complexity.
But there are curious traces in Ibsen's correspondence of the
difficulty, very strange in his case, which he experienced in forming
a concrete idea of Julian in his own mind. He had been vaguely drawn to
the theme, and when it was too late to recede, he found himself baffled
by the paradoxes which he encountered, and by the contradictions of a
figure seen darkly through a mist of historical detraction.

He met these difficulties as well as he could, and as a prudent dramatic
poet should, by close and observant study of the document. He endeavored
to reconcile the evident superiority of Julian with the absurd
eccentricities of his private manners and with the futility of his
public acts. He noted all the Apostate's foibles by the side of his
virtues and his magnanimities. He traced without hesitation the course
of that strange insurrection which hurled a coarse fanatic from the
throne, only to place in his room a literary pedant with inked fingers
and populous beard. He accepted everything, from the parasites to the
purple slippers. The dangers of so humble an attendance upon history
were escaped with success in the first instalment of his "world drama."
In the strong and mounting scenes of _Caesar's Apostacy_, the
rapidity with which the incidents succeed one another, their inherent
significance, the innocent splendor of Julian's mind in its first
emancipation from the chains of false faith, combine to produce an
effect of high dramatic beauty. Georg Brandes, whose instinct in such
matters was almost infallible, when he read the First Part shortly
after its composition, entreated Ibsen to give this, as it stood, to the
public, and to let _The Emperor Julian's End_ follow independently.
Had Ibsen consented to do this, _Caesar's Fall_ would certainly take a
higher place among his works than it does at present, when its effect
is somewhat amputated and its meaning threatened with incoherence by the
author's apparent _volteface_ in the Second Part.

It was a lifelong disappointment to Ibsen that _Emperor and Galilean_,
on which he expended far more consideration and labor than on any other
of his works, was never a favorite either with the public or among the
critics. With the best will in the world, however, it is not easy to
find full enjoyment in this gigantic work, which by some caprice
of style defiant of analysis, lacks the vitality which is usually
characteristic of Ibsen's least produc