And it is no exaggeration to say that the reasons why men think life worth living, can be all found in the reasons why they think a great drama great.
Let us turn, then, to some of the greatest works of Sophocles, of Shakespeare, and of Goethe, and consider briefly how these present life to us.

Let us take _Macbeth_, _Hamlet_, _Measure for Measure_, and _Faust_.

We have here five presentations of life, under what confessedly are its most striking aspects, and with such interests as men have been able to find in it, raised to their greatest intensity.

Such, at least, is the way in which these works are regarded, and it is only in virtue of this estimate that they are called great.

Now, in producing this estimate, what is the chief faculty in us that they appeal to?
It will need but little thought to show us that they appeal primarily to the supernatural moral judgment; that this judgment is perpetually being expressed explicitly in the works themselves; and, which is far more important, that it is always pre-supposed in us.