"But," returned Calixte laughing, "I am in no wise the partial result of a shipwreck. I ride the sea quite well, the mast is firmly planted, the hull is sound ... come, embark and don't treat me like a wreck. Now, listen, I am going to return and get rid of this cumbersome portfolio; I will get some verses I want to show you, then we will go to your home and you will also read me some slightly symbolic pages, eh?"
They discussed the value of the words with which the modern schools of writers distinguish themselves. The symbolists, according to Entragues, usurped their name; one never makes a symbol purposely, unless one is dedicated to this career as the fabulists to the fable. For him the symbol was the summit of art, conquered only by those who had placed upon it a statue which was superhuman and which yet had a human appearance, containing an idea in its form.
"Now," he continued, "in Milton's Satan you have a symbol, in de Vigny's Moïse you have a symbol, in Villiers' Hadaly you have a symbol. The symbol is a soul made visible: the type is only the resume or the epitome of a character."
"Your definition is not clear. It seems to me that what you take for the symbol is rather to be called synthesis."
"No, synthesis is found, indeed, in the symbol—it is the final process; if synthesis has not been preceded by an analysis—it matters not whether it be brief or long provided it be exact—there is no symbol, because there is no life."
"Say rather that every psychological masterpiece contains a symbol."
"Perhaps," conceded Entragues. "Would a symbolist then signify a fabricator of masterpieces?"
"At least that is quite an interesting ideal and I believe you will not disclaim it. You don't worry about the public any more than I do; you would rather please ten select persons than please everybody, to the exclusion of the ten."
"Evidently. We are not actors and the applause do not make us beam with joy. But if we write neither to win universal approbation nor to earn money, we become truly incomprehensible."
"Write for your mistress," said Calixte.