Note 64 — Chapter III · (continued 8)

I have made the best I can of a very badly expressed sentence, and, as I should add, a very meagre description of the aim of modern comic drama. I am, however, not quite satisfied that it is an adequate translation, or that I have grasped what Hegel means by the words nicht gestehen zu wollen. It would apply very aptly to such a character as Sir Willoughby Patterne, but the pertinency of such an epithet as lang empfunden I fail to see. I doubt myself if we have here anything more than a chance note of Hegel tacked in by editors. The whole of the present paragraph is a very jejune description of the treatment of the love passion or affairs of honour by modern drama. A pity we cannot supplement it with the substance of Meredith's "Essay on Comedy." The passage, however, must be read as qualified by the further note lower down on the exuberance of one aspect of modern comedy. But the reference to "Comedy" in the modern sense is a mere fragment.