pilgrim, or Egyptian
sage, represents
Tannhauser
in his true
Self, —the
"Only
Being
in
an
Abyss
of
Light!"
The
Tannhauser
who talks
is
the
" Only
Being
in an Abyss
of
Darkness,"
the natural man
ignorant of his identity with
the
Supreme
Being.
The various
other
characters
are all little
parts of Tannhauser's
own consciousness
and not real persons
at all
: whether good or bad,
all alike
hinder and
help (and
there
is not one whose function is not thus double) the realisa-
tion of his true
unity with all life.
This
circumstance
serves
to explain, though perhaps not to excuse,
the lack of dramatic
action
in
the
story.
Love
being
throughout
the
symbol of
his method,
as Beauty of its object,
it is through Love, refined
into
Pity,
that
he
at
last
attains
the
Supreme
Knowledge,
or at
least
sufficient of it to put the
last
straw
on
the back
of his corporeal camel,
and bring the story to a fitting end.
To pass to more
mundane affairs.
I may mention for the
benefit of those
who
may
not be
read
in certain
classes
of
literature, and
so think
me original
when
I
am hardly
even
paraphrasing, that Tannhauser's
songs
in Act IV.
are partly
adapted
from
the
so-called
" Oracles
of Zoroaster,"
partly
from
the
mysterious
utterances
of
the
great
angel
Av6,
perhaps
equally spurious.
Of course Bertram's song is merely
a
rather
free
adaptation
of
the
two principal
fragments
of
Sappho, which
so many people have failed to
translate
that
one
can
feel
no
shame
in
making
yet
another
attempt.
There may
be one
or two conscious plagiarisms
besides,
for
which I do not apologise.
For any unconscious
ones which