New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1857-06-23


upon its young victims. II Yves the same win
Donbey in respect 10 mercantile pride, and IN
Bleak House with respect TO the interminable
frauds of Cbancery; and now, in Little Dorrt, in
respect TO the deays, and insoence, and mockenes
Of sristOcratc government. They all evince q
settled design on thepart Of the author not merely
to amuse and beguile the reader by originstes Of
character and complexities Of plot bat to illustrate
by example some great political or social principle
Just a. Hoear,b, in be Rakes Progress or Mar
risre la mode, did not mean merely to paint pic
ture or to tel q story 50 Dickens does not mean
10 conyuse by bis IN or TO melt by bic patbOs,
but to instruct ard benefit us by interesting 10
cause, to arouse antipathy and alarm at existing
miscries, ard TO improve society by eIposing'its
defects. Even in these works in which this moral
purpose is not so decisivey Obtruded a merciless
satire and ridicule Of social weaknesses takes its
place. Stupid professors and vulgar higher classes,
physicians lawyers, officials, and even the tabOoed
clergy, who are bypocrites or preteDders, or adrot
but concealed rascals-the ways of society, which
cover hardened sefshness with flimsy veneer Of
Countrywide miserably ragged fctiOns Of family
gentlty-the large series Of the pnchbeck virtues,
that look like gold, but not even half so good
brass-tte Iedtape charlatanry, and the venerable
flaws Of institutions in the dry-rot-the inhumani-
ties and lies Of rOutine-the gigantic wrongs and
tcrturiDg wickedness Of conyention-are handled
with a rare and treDchant sarcasm, which over
whelms them in torrent Of honest disgust and
contempt.
Now, a recent writer in Biaekrood depores this
turn of Dickens's mind, and after exposing severa
of bis characteristic faults Of manner, seriously
counseIs BIN to 20 back to what he considers the
unmxed comedy of Pickwck. We suspect that
his Tory idiosyncrasies are more concerned in the
advice than his tastes as a scholar. The novelist
has, doubtless, trodden upon some pet corn of his,
and be would prefer to see him in another line of
business. lie likes the jests of Dickens hugely;
he enjoys the oddities Of his personages, and
coptesses to fondness even of his caricatures But
be thinks that none of his later works is comparable
to the immortal epic which records the things said
and done by the heroic imbecilities of Dngley Dell.
This raises a question or two. We, like the Scotch
critic, would relish amazingly another Pickwick-
another entire volume, without plot, without moral,
without sentiment, with scarcely dignifed person
in it. with scarcely an incident which ia not of the
most commonplace kind aud sometimes verging
toward the coarse and which should yet be 30
stuffed with whim and absurdity, and rOlllcking
animal life and ludcrous situation, as to move the
rsibes of the starchest and stiest lieracGtus that
ever drew long breath. But would any one, for
the sake Of another such difficult and brilliant
achievement, consent to forego the possibility of
another Curiosity shop, or another Copperfeld
There are, it must be confessed, many signal
faults in the later books of Observation-Disclosures
mannerism in the styie-some false morality, or
rather low views of morality, in that he seems TO
suppose an unlimited distribution Of plum pudding
the noblcst human vrtue-a too great prediction
for little Nells and Pauls, and other amable little
folks and painfully weak peope-an INSULT clent
constructive power, which needlessly complexities
and prOtracts his plots-and Il mistaking often of
meodramatic effect for genuine tragic intensity;
but, making every abatement that may be needtul
in these regards, is it not also true that these later
works eyince decided progress, and refinement OF
artistic quality Is it not true that the genius OF
the author has broadened and deepened since the
days Of Pickwick, SO that nearly every doubtful
tendency of that work has been corrected, while
every element and evidence of mind touched to
higher issues has been marveOusly developed
We confess to that opinion. certain excess OF
sentiment, a certain delight in mere mlaudlln
amiabity certain inclination TO resort to sorrows
and death-beds Of children which looks like an ex
laustion Of resource, We admit in these later
works; but We discover in them also-what was H.
dicsted in Pickwick, though not from the artistic
requirements of his task then worked Out-a pro-
founder sympathy with life, greater versatility OF
power, and comic vein just as rich, exuberant aud
willful as ever before but also subtle delicate
and refined.
The error of the Scotch critic to whom we have
referred lies in supposing that because the comic
was the predominant element in Pickwick, 1t was
also the exclusive element; but it was not So:
nearly every quality that Dickens has since dis
PLAYED was latent in that work; only in fidelity to
the pecuaries Of his genius, and in thorough, un-
comfortable sympathy with that vast concrete En-
csh life which il has been his task to represent,
be has modulated into another key. He has drawn
more upon the pathetic minor chords of his instru-
ment. He has seen that life was not an immense
bit of drolery, that there were other sides to it
than the mirth-provokng side, and that to survey
it only in one aspect would be to fall into very
great fasehood. A single Pickwick he Justly
deemed allowable, but rain Of Pickwcks-would
not that be melancholy Nothing, proverbialy, is
more dull than jest book, though each one of its
jesss may be excellent. 1t 10 just as painful to
laugh too much as il is to be always in the dumps
Accordingly Dickens has varied his tone: the same
essenfia theme runs through his last phrase that