THE CRIME OF PROMETHEUS 27

ively informational, and to whom the problem of objective
truth will offer only archaeological interest. Thus, in s lust
for enlightenment in ways and means to comprehend and
organize the world, the mass-man abdicates the throne of
reason and condemns himself to a scene of spriritual
twilight.

This well-ordered yet singularly lost and aimless mass
forms the audience of our modern theatre. It demands, im-
patiently, its banquet of the eye, 1ts feast of spectacles. In
its fear of isolation and in its need for felt companionable
warmth it flocks together in disciplined mildness. Nevertheless
it ravens after its sights like a pack that has found a common
prey. Its curiosity, readily stimulated, easily diverted, being
mob-appetite, 1s astonishingly versatile. The mass would know
everything, particularly about the predicament of its fel-
lows. It wills to know, without owning individual responsi-
bility for its knowledge. This quality of disinterest is, too,
identical on every level of mass society on its “knowing.”
The aggressive curiosity of the man on the street and that
of the man of science are equally pure of personal expectation.
Both men share the deeply rooted conviction that they must
collect diverse, descriptive information as an act of good will
toward the common body comprising the concensus of broth-
ers, which alone will be able to comprehend its vast fact-
ual manifold. Both thus avow faith in the *“scientific method’
which has prepared their way of life so smoothly and with
such irrevocable enlightenment.

This common faith sets the mood and atmosphere and
summons forth the drama of our theatre. The audience is com-
passionate and inquisitional. It appoints itself an eager and
impartial confessional for the protagonists of the scene, upon
which it casts its spotlight with merciless clarity. The mass
wills only to “know,” and neither wishes nor hopes for any
personal advantage from the action. Its pleasure is rather just
to ruminate over it and, with the warm glow of its sympathy,
to administer a tender lash to those victims of disorientation