III.
MAETERLINCK ON HAMLET.
Maeterlinck, in his first essay, "The Treasure of the Humble," is,
undoubtedly, mystical. He does not argue, or define, or explain, he
asserts, but even in that book and far more so in his second, "Wisdom
and Destiny," it is real life which absorbs him as Alfred de Sutro his
translator points out. In this book "he endeavours in all simplicity
to tell what he sees." He is a Seer.
Maeterlinck's aim is to show that contrary to the usual idea, what we
call Fate, Destiny, is not something apart from ourselves, which
exercises power over us, but is the product of our own souls.
He takes many examples to prove this, of which Hamlet is one. Man,
said Maeterlinck, is his own Fate in an inner sense; he is superior to
all circumstances, when he refuses to be conquered by them. When his
soul is wise and has initiative power, it cannot be conquered by
external events, and happiness is inevitable to such a soul.
Maeterlinck asks: Where do we find the fatality in Hamlet? Would the
evil of Claudius and Queen Gertrude have spread its influence if a
wise man had been in the Palace? If a dominant, all powerful soul--a
Jesus--had been in Hamlet's palace at Elsinore, would the tragedy of
four deaths have happened? Can you conceive any wise man living in the
unnatural gloom that overhung Elsinore? Is not every action of Hamlet
induced by a fanatical impulse, which tells him that duty consists in
revenge alone? And revenge never can be a duty.
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