endured.  For a century and a half after Dryden’s time, hard-hearted parents were apt to withdraw their opposition to their children’s “felicity” for no better reason than that the fifth act was drawing to a close.  But this formula is practically obsolete.  Changes of will, on the modern stage, are not always adequately motived; but that is because of individual inexpertness, not because of any failure to recognize theoretically the necessity for adequate motivation.

Changes of sentiment are much more important and more difficult to handle.  A change of will can always manifest itself in action but it is very difficult to externalize convincingly a mere change of heart.  When the conclusion of a play hinges (as it frequently does) on a conversion of this nature, it becomes a matter of the first moment that it should not merely be asserted, but proved.  Many a promising play has gone wrong because of the author’s neglect, or inability, to comply with this condition.

It has often been observed that of all Ibsen’s thoroughly mature works, from A Doll’s House to John Gabriel Borkman, The Lady from the Sea is the loosest in texture, the least masterly in construction.  The fact that it leaves this impression on the mind is largely due, I think, to a single fault.  The conclusion of the play—­Ellida’s clinging to Wangel and rejection of the Stranger—­depends entirely on a change in Wangel’s mental attitude, of which we have no proof whatever beyond his bare assertion.  Ellida, in her overwrought mood, is evidently inclining to yield to the uncanny allurement of the Stranger’s claim upon her, when Wangel, realizing that her sanity is threatened, says: 

WANGEL:  It shall not come to that.  There is no other way of deliverance for you—­at least I see none.  And therefore—­therefore I—­cancel our bargain on the spot.  Now you can choose your own path, in full—­full freedom.

  ELLIDA (Gazes at him awhile, as if speechless):  Is this
  true—­true—­what you say?  Do you mean it—­from your inmost heart?

WANGEL:  Yes—­from the inmost depths of my tortured heart, I mean it....  Now your own true life can return to its—­its right groove again.  For now you can choose in freedom; and on your own responsibility, Ellida.

  ELLIDA:  In freedom—­and on my own responsibility?  Responsibility? 
  This—­this transforms everything.

—­and she promptly gives the Stranger his dismissal.  Now this is inevitably felt to be a weak conclusion, because it turns entirely on a condition of Wangel’s mind of which he gives no positive and convincing evidence.  Nothing material is changed by his change of heart.  He could not in any case have restrained Ellida by force; or, if the law gave him the abstract right to do so, he certainly never had the slightest intention of exercising it.  Psychologically, indeed, the incident is acceptable enough.  The saner part of Ellida’s