Morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven [Conn.]) 1848-1894, 1884-03-25
Kent Club Course.

The Closing AttracttOn-A Brilliant Lee
ture by Hon. mr.. Applebee-Subject
stDickens, sentfmentaIist and Humor-
fst''-Rare Pleasure Afforded q Large
Audience.
Hon. James z. Applebee, of Boston, de-
livered the last lecture of the Kent club
course Last evening. His subject was ''Dick-
ems, Sentimentalist and Humorist" The
court room was crowded with an appreciative
audience, who pronounced this lecture the
best of the course. The lecturer began by
comparing and contrasting Dickens and
Thackeray. As the two men were rivals and
friends the desire to thus treat them is en-.
tirely natural. Dickens, like Lord Byron,
got up one fine morning and found himself
illustrious, but Thackeray only after long
years of toll earned the reward of literary
merit. The sweetness and grace and beauty
of both of these men of the Victorian era is
irresistible. Dickens presents us with exag
CREATIONS of humanity, Thackeray with men
and women never raised above the human
level, but always sharply, finely and artistic
ally delineated. Dickens presents rs with
carefully constructed and long drawn
out scenes of most exquisite pathos
during which he makes his hearers hearts
vibrate to every touch and causes them to
feel in all its fuIlness the luxury of woe.
Thackeray's scenes on the contrary are
marked with charming brevity and sweet
ness. But Thackersy's sympathy becomes
narrow at that very point where Dickens
broadens into universally. They both hold
the mirror up to human nature; Thackeray
only to the soft and polished, the life of
fashionable society; Dickens to the broad
universal life of hu mainly. The former
interpreted the springs of human motive;
the latter human action. And he
gave us bits of humanity warm and
palpitating. not glazed with the conventional
tiles of society. Thackeray never went out =
side of London or descended into the COM
mon ways of life, but Dickens gave us the
plain homespun. The former again speaks
of servile shopmen and conscious TO otmen.
The latter in his little back parlor suppers
shows us how to worship God in the doing
of daily duty. Here the lecturer told the
story of the infelicity of the Jones and Smith
marriage to show the cleverness and worldh
ness of Thackeray and the scene in David
Copperfeld, whore Daniel Peggoty
hears of the flight of Little
Nell, to show the genius of
Dickens, which reveals itself strongest in
delineating human nature in its commonest
FORM and makes rs appreciate what grand
heroism common people are capable of mani
Testing. There is always something in them
better than their seeming. We laugh at them,
but when the laugh is over We think of them
with no WEAKNESS and dismiss them with no
contempt. He made bad hateful, but not
entirely SO. He does not put them up for us
to laugh at only, but to exercise sublime
charity for man as man is. Dickens often
blends SO peculiarly and successfully his pa
thos and his humor, and how finely when
Mr.. Pinch buys the steak for the
wonderful beefsteak pudding. Thus he
could move at once the sources of laughter
and of tears. He could utter deeply pathetic
thoughts that send the tear drops to the eye,
but he could link to it peice of exquisite
humor that would send the tear drops down
the cheek in a burst of laughter. AS senti-
nentalist WIS cannot but noticehis extreme
fondness for delineaAing deathbed scenes. But
the tendency of these scenes is elevating. 1t
makes us turn from the end of human life to
its duty but just begun. Purely as humor-
list we notice that his humor is most entirely
the humor of character. Some of his most
comic creations are not merely persons, but
often embodiments of qualities, the incarnation
of vices and follies existing in English society
at his time. He has added to our language
three most indispensable adjectives, Bum
bleism, Pecksnifian and Podsnappery. AL
though these are embodiments of qualities,
they are nevertheless real persons. Dickens
possessed the strange power of breathing on
| drop of ink and making it teeming world
| of men and women, oftentimes
utterly comic, but yet not the less real. Here
| the lecturer selected some of Dickens comic
| characters, and personRted and render
| ed them to the great smusement
L nf IA ondinncn AMMO
these being Samivel Weller, Sairey Camp,
| Rev. Chad band and Sergeant Buzzfuz. 1t is
| difficult to see in what essential respects they
| all differ from the Lancelots, Dogberries
and Falstaffs of Shakespeare. Once conced-
ing the possibilities of such creatures as those
for which We are indebted to Dickens and
we must also concede that he makes them
speak and act just as they would be expected
to. And what wonderful power of creation
he had. too. How we love the thriftless,
graceIess scamp Mieawber. And how
humor crops out in the complete
stupidity of the fat boy. The Pc
culiar grace of Dickens as a writer is
that he stood in an attitude of graciouabom-
age towards humanity, seeing with far pro-
bling vision something of the divine beneath
every human oddly and eccentric1ty. A
critic in the Spectator said of Dickens that as
humorist he surpassed Shakespeare, but
though this is high ground to hold, yet no
than did Charles Dickens. Nor was he adj
mired solely for that; nation never
mourned more for man than England
did for him. Outside this world of reality in
which we live he built a beautiful world of
imagination. Such nature and such char
acter as his, with its self-sacrifcing deeds,
becomes teacher and guide to the saints
in life. To his genius we give the honest
tribute of a tear.
Mr.. Applebee is very interesting lectu-
rer, and showed his powers of thought and
elocution in marked degree. The London
press says of him as follows: 'James Kay
Applebee was the lecturer at Langham Hall
last evening and received a somewhat unusual
compliment. Having retired from the plat
form he was recalled and bowed his acknowl-
edgements of the enthusiastic applause. "
Times.
'Mr. Applebee's lectures abound with the
most valuable and interesting information,
and his language, always elegant and beauti-
full, is frequently eloquent and sublime. p
South London journal.
Mr.. Applebee during his stay in the city
was guest of Col. D. r. Wright. The
Kent club is to be congratulated ON the sue.
cess of its lecture course, which has been
particularly interesting one and to which the
concluding lecture has added most fsvora-
BILE and lasting impression.