The Arkansaw traveler., 1885-05-23
INFERIOR LITERATURE.
David Swing, in Cur1ent.l

needed, issued recently very expensive edition of" The Sentimental Journey" It may have been the result of willingness to catch dollars by means of vulgari:y, but the superbly made volume was more probably the result of the impression that nothing is indecent in literature unless 1t has just come from some low style of mortal still living. By some kind of spell all the old books, whose names have been rattled off for generations in essays. speeches, and in table-talk, pass as em- bodiments of merit, while the real truth is those books won their popularity in a vulgar age, and have now outlived their merit. Notoriety does not imply good character. This law holds true among books as among men. Thus many names of books have come down to our times having notoriety but not merit
 What was once famous will long re- main so. It will be just as difficult to erase from history the names of Aaron Burr and Guiteau as those of Whittier or Emerson. Fame does not imply value, it implies only fame. It is painfully in teresting to hear the girl and boy grad uates allude in their exhibition speeches and essays to authors whose books it is hoped they have never read-authors many fathoms lower in taste than the graduates who are bestowing the pane gyrics. Many pass through lite reading and talking without having found out the downright vulgarity of authors whose names nave always stood only in great light of fame. Some years ago culti- 1Sated and widely-reading woman rushed out to buy Christmas gift for her clergy. man, and knowing that the dear parson already possessed quite long row of standard worthies, she determined to send him "Rabelais." Telling her hus- band in the evening of her noble gift to their pastor, she was amazed with thS words "Goodness gracious My dear, you must recall the present; give him something else. You have given your pastor the vilest book in existence" So the carriage was ordered, and some val uable book was left at the parsonage, and the two volumes of morocco, gilt and dirt hauled away.
 It is the duty of the men and women now in the world to make an examlnation into this matter of name, or fame, and learn how this fame came to pass, for if 1t was created out of period less refined than our own, then we are not bound to perpetuate it any more than we are bound in our ordinary conversation to use the coarse terms common in the older periods and in other lands. As we would abom- mate the personal habits and taste and conversational language of the older French, German, English and Scotch, so must we despisc thai part Of this semi barbarism which spreads into their liter ature. How does the age of the story of Tristram Shandy" confer upon it any whiteness more than it had in the time of its productionp Sterne possessed so much wit, pathos and general merit that his works should be preserved, but the few coarse passages should be eliminated from his books, just as we cut dead limbs from trees or amputate hand or finger that shows signs of gan grene. Before eating an apple we have sense enough to cut out the rotten spots.
 Could Jean Paul Richter or Montague come back to earth, and mingle with the people of Boston or Chicago, and per ceive the purity of the high modern liter ature they would justly complain in this way: Why do you modern minds who pretend to love us permit us to pass along among you with great blotches of soot on our facesp We did not know there were such spots on our faces. Why did you not help us to escape laughter or con- tempt?' When we see Richter taking his long morning walks Tn his blessed Germany, his neck all bare to the healthy wind, and his long hair blowing in the spring or autumn breeze, when we re- member his love of the world animate and inaninate. his wit, his imagination, his romance and also his piety, do we not realize how gladly would he have risen to the modern delicacy of thought and ian- guage, had he so much as dreamed vf its obligation and atiractiveness ITO see ourselves as others see us" is difficult, truly, but to see ourselves as others will see us after hundred years have passed IS something more beyond reach. Others must do the looking in this futurity busi- ness, and must do as they would be done by. In Sterne's case he no doubt had no other intention but that of being a low form of thinker and writer, and in our day he would have shown a leaning to- ward sensuality but many of the earlier writers were simply the victims of their surroundings, and hence seem to ask oi our century a retouching. We do not thus impose upon them; we obey their most earnest wish.
 There are no obligations resting upon us to perpetuate all that happens to be found in old books. The werld has signed no contract with any of the older writers. Many thousands have been wholly forgotten. They have all had their part in life, and have gone from it. We are under no obligation to read all of Montague We can select and omit. If we prefer the snow-white Virgil to the less pure Horace we need not make any compensation to Horace for this prefer ence. So if we omit Sterne's |" Sentimental Journey" and "Tisham Shandy," and prefer Robinson Crusoe or "Old Mortal ity," it is noAe of Sterne's business. We are not living in the world by his permis- sion, nor as his obedient servants
 One of the grand spectacles of our times is this one of purer literature. It