The Portland daily press., 1874-09-11
ElianiSIn.

ential on all that was to follow, so pregnant
and aromatic, so deep and refined, that they
warrant us in using the term Elianism, and
regarding it as an active principal in the world
OF letters. The father of serials, Charles
Dickens, stands foremost among its disciples.
His earlier years, like Lambs, were passed at
desk, and in the throbbing thoroughfares of
the great city. Before him. novelists in gen.
eral relied on the exhibition OF high life for
the readers amusement, but he, following the
footsteps of Lamb, delighted to dwell on the
experiences of the poor. He made boots as
interesting as a duke, and found angels of
purity and mercy. among strolling players.
His heroes were adventurers without birth or
fortune, penniess clerks or workhouse boys.
From crowds of ragamuffins and oddities he
drew not only inexhaustible fun, but genuine
pathos. He admired, he conned, he treas
ured up in his memory such sketches as those
of the gag-eater in Christ's Hospital, Elias
Relations, his Cousin Bridget, Sarah Battle,
the Chimney Sweepers, the Beggars, the Old
Actors, and tine Old China of Lambs Essays,
and in the Sketches by Boz" the s'Pickwick
Papers," the american Notes." and sPic-
lures of Italy," with all his tales and novels,
down to "Great Expectations and the EMU
tua Friend he e0Jgeed MthSS sSdefps seESs Ss @ @
ures, indeed, more grotesque than Lambs,
but ever jutting out in salient points, making
humor and tender feeling run side by side,
and often throwing in earnest protests against
social abuses and wrongs. With all possible
respect for that nobleman's good intentions,
we maintain that ''Boz'' and his prototype
have done more for the poor than Lord
Shaftesbury hundred fold. But Dickens re-
sembed Lamb also in his fertile conception
of varied characters. though he did not, like
him, reproduce pictures of himself, and call
up beings in different shapes to speak the sem
timents and display the feelings of one deep
and beautiful mind.
He left this to Thackeray. In his writings
we are continually reminded of Lamb. Eli
anism pervades them all, from ''Vanity Fair"
to the Roundabout Papers," We see in ev-
cry page the same affection for all animate,
and most inanimate things, which dwelt in
Lamb; the same love of old authors and imi-
tatiou of their style; the same shrewd obser-
walton, keen wit, and delicate irony playing
on the surface of philosophical meaning; and,
above all, the same unfolding of his own heart
and character in their peculiar gentleness and
indulgence to the weaknesses of others. He
is always photographed, and, like Ella in
his essays, Thackeray gives us in each sue
ceeding novel some fresh phase of his own
life, experience and thought. In the ''New
comes" we see him in his connection with ar
fists, and in "Pendennis" we trace several
stages of his literary career. His Partisan
experience comes to light in "Philip," and
his German in the "Newcomes" and s'Barry
Lyndon" ''Pendennis," again, supplies us
with pictures of his country and college life;
while in the education of Pen, Give and Phil
ip, we are brought back to his school days at
the Charter House. He cannot write paper
on the heroes and heroines of romance with
out describing the afternoon in July, on the
day George ~. was crowned, when he lay, a
little boy, IN his great-grandmOther's garden,
reading the "Scottsh Chiefs" amid the great
changing of bell. OF every picture he paints,
he must form the foreground or the back
ground, and no one complains of this dspos-
al as an intrusion, nor calls him an egotist on
that account. We love to hear him talk OF
himself for he can seldom find anything
better to talk about. We admire his confess
sions, which are ample as st. Augustine's,
and the transparency OF his soul, which
equals Lambs. He commends and CEN
sures himself with freedom, and mai
vete; and whether his eye is turned in
ward or on external objects, he seems al
ways intent on stripping off disguise and
piercing to the very heart and core. If he ex-
amined paintings, it was not so much to
trace artistic results as to discover the charac-
ter of him who drew them. In his Lectures
ON the Hnmoristst'' he dwells more on the
authors themselves thar O. "i,1fr VOTES; ana
in his hiSto. ,car papers he deals less with the
facts than with the men. He evokes the spr-
it of the times, and invests it with form and
color. He chases Psyche over every meadow,
and, without ruff1ng the down on her wings,
he captures her as she scars from the lips OF
dying men. He has kind word 10 say for
every one-except George Nv. With in-
tense aversions, he is brimful of charity; ah-
hors distinctions of caste, Identifies all un-
worthy actions and sordid emotions with
snobbery; and, like Swift and Lamb, prac-
tises with consummate art 'the grave and
logical conduct of an absurd proposition"
Give him character devoid of some one
good quality, and he will make every action
of that individual consonant with the defect,
and also render the virtue that is wanting
conspicuous by its very absence. This mega
tive painting is very characteristic of Lamb,
nor could any one study his popular Fala-
cies," or hear him describe the pleasures of
poverty and sickness, without perceiving how
exquisitely humorous writer may be when
saving persistentiy exactly what he does not
mean. Barry Lyndon" unites both these
kinds of negative teaching. Barry himself is
above the distinctions of vice and virtue, like
the captain Dangerous of George Angus
tus Sala, and the story is pervaded with
grave irony very artfully concealed. 1t thus
becomes pungent satire, without losing the
interest of a romance. Those who examine
ELLA" carefully will find the germs of such
conceptions neatly arranged as in the stores
OF scotsman. Parity OF sufferiHg between
Thackeray and Lamb only brought out parity
of lament. The insanity of Lambs sister
was the shadow Of his existence; the loss of
his wife was Thackeray's ''rooted sorrow"
The humor of each is tempered by incuable
grief, and the wisdom that comes of sorrow
tones down in both instances the wit that had
else been too reckless and the coloring that
had heen too high. The pupil ismay be add
ed, like his master, is weekday. and not
Sunday preacher. He does not meddle with
the highest themes; he leaves mysteries to the
pulpit and the church, and is content to en-
force social virtues.
As with Dickens and Thackeray, so it is
with other ingenious and popular humorists
of latter days. They have all taken tneir cue
from Lamb; and so far as their works contain
humor without effort, and manifest feelings
without disguise-so far as the moral lessons
in them are implied rather than expressed
so tar as the soul of things is extracted, the