[For the truly characteristic letter here published, and for the
sketch which accompanies it, we are indebted to the obliging
attention of Mr. John Tomlin of Tennessee.—With our own warm
admiration of the writings and character of Dickens we can well
understand and easily pardon the enthusiasm of our friend.]
In setting about that most difficult of all tasks, the sketching of the
character of a living author, I feel that I cannot entirely keep clear
of that weakness of the human mind, which praises the foibles of a
friend and condemns the virtues of an enemy. There is no task more
difficult of performance than the one I have imposed upon myself—no
task but what can be more easily performed correctly, than the
presentation to the world, in their nice distinctive shades, of living
characters. To admire one is to praise him—and to cover all of his
faults in the blindness of charity, is the weakness of our nature. It is
scarcely possible then, Mr. Poe, for one like me, whose love is as
strong as the faith of the martyr, when at the stake he expires, and
whose hate is as deep as the depths of the sea, to shun the errors that
almost every one has fallen into, who undertakes the task of sketching
characters, _life-like_, of eminent living individuals.—To succeed
partially is in my power, and in the power of almost every one, but to
succeed wholly in introducing to the mind’s eye the character as it
really is, of any individual, is scarcely possible. I will not say that
I am peculiarly fitted to shine in this province, nor will I say that I
am equal to the task that I have voluntarily imposed upon myself—but I
will say that everything I say will be said from a conviction of belief.
Nay, do not start and turn pale, gentle reader, when I tell you that
“Boz,” the inimitable “Boz,” is the subject of the present sketch. It is
indeed true that Charles Dickens, the great English author—he who lives
in London amid the exciting scenes and struggles of this world’s great
Metropolis, is now about to be “talked off,” by a backwoodsman—but he
will do it with an _admiring_ reverence, and a _most partial_
discretion. I will not speak of his published works, for they have been
numbered among our household gods,—nor of the genius of the mind that
has made them such. So long as there is mind to appreciate the high
conceptions of mind, and a taste to admire the purity of thought, so
long will Charles Dickens live “the noblest work of God.”
Charles Dickens as an author is too well known for me to say aught for
or against him. It is only in his private capacity will I speak—only as
Charles Dickens, the private man. Those social qualities of the nature
so requisite in the making up of a good man, belong to him essentially
and justly. He could not be Charles Dickens and have not those qualities
of the soul which but few possess. Had all of us the true nobility of
nature, all of us would be like him in spirit. There is in him a
gentleness that commands our love as much as his genius has our
admiration. The kindness of his nature is as great as his talent is
pre-eminent. He could never be otherwise than “Boz” nor less than
Charles Dickens—the being of all kindly feeling.
Dwelling in a little hamlet that is scarcely known beyond the sound of
its church bell—and in a place that a few years ago, resounded only to
the winds of the magic woods, or the moccasin tread of the Indian on the
dry leaves,—I, a creature less known by far than my village, addressed
a letter to “Boz,” and, in answer from him, received the following
letter:
“1 Devonshire Terrace, York Gate.
Regent’s Park, London.
Tuesday, Twenty-third February, 1841.
Dear Sir:—You are quite right in feeling assured that I should
answer the letter you have addressed to me. If you had
entertained a presentiment that it would afford me sincere
pleasure and delight to hear from a warm-hearted and admiring
reader of my books in the back-woods of America, you would not
have been far wrong.
I thank you cordially and heartily, both for your letter, and
its kind and courteous terms. To think that I have awakened a
fellow-feeling and sympathy with the creatures of many
thoughtful hours among the vast solitudes in which you dwell, is
a source of the purest delight and pride to me; and believe me
that your expressions of affectionate remembrance and approval,
sounding from the great forests on the banks of the Mississippi,
sink deeper into my heart and gratify it more than all the
honorary distinctions that all the courts in Europe could
confer.
It is such things as these that make one hope one does not live
in vain, and that are the highest reward of an author’s life. To
be numbered among the household gods of one’s distant countrymen
and associated with their homes and quiet pleasures—to be told
that in each nook and corner of the world’s great mass there
lives one well-wisher who holds communion with one in the
spirit—is a worthy fame indeed, and one which I would not
barter for a mine of wealth.
That I may be happy enough to cheer some of your leisure hours
for a very long time to come, and to hold a place in your
pleasant thoughts is the earnest wish of Boz.—And with all good
wishes for yourself, and with a sincere reciprocation of all
your kindly feeling, I am, Dear Sir,
Faithfully Yours,
Charles Dickens.
Mr. John Tomlin.”
Can anything be more _unique_—or more sweetly beautiful than this
letter? In it there is the poetry of feeling warmed into life by his
sympathies with the “creatures of many thoughtful hours.” The brain has
never yet loosened from her alembic fountain, and dropped upon an
author’s page, thoughts more gem-like than those that we see sparkling
like diamonds in his letter. Time in her ravages on the thoughts of the
departed never harvested more sparkling things than what appears here
from the granary of “Boz’s” original mind. Throughout there is a
tenderness breathing its seer-like influence on every thought, until it
seems to become hallowed like the spirit-dream of a lover’s hope.
The great difference between mankind is, that there is a feeling of
kindness in the heart of some that is not possessed by others. To live
in this world without conferring on others, benefits, is to live without
a purpose. Of what value to our fellow creatures is mind, no matter how
splendidly adorned, if it bestows no favors on them? The rich gems that
lie buried in the caves of the oceans, are not in their secret caves
intrinsically less valuable, but their value is really not known until
they yield a profit.—Napoleon in his granite mind impressed no stamp of
heaven on his countrymen. Hard as the winter of his Russian Service
lived his life on the memory of man! Frozen tears as thickly as
hail-drops from a thunder-shower fell from the eyes of his army to
blight and wither the affections of civilized Europe. In his life he
toiled for a name which he won at the sacrifice of the lives of
millions, and perished a prisoner on a bleak and rocky isle of the
ocean!—The splendid intellect of Byron, more dazzling than the sunbeam
from a summer sky, by one untoward circumstance came to prey upon every
good feeling of his heart—and what was he?—a misanthrope!—That
ill-fated and persecuted star, P. B. Shelley, what could he not have
been, had the genius of his high-toned feelings been directed aright?
With all of the genius of these three beings Charles Dickens has a good
heart, with all of the philanthropy and patriotism of a Washington. How
few indeed are the great men that have lived in any age or in any
country whose social qualities of the heart have not been materially
injured, and in many instances totally destroyed, by eccentric
peculiarities. Sometimes these peculiarities are real, but mostly have
they been assumed. To be as nature made us is hardly possible now with
any being who has the least prospect of a brilliant career in the world
of letters. When nature bestows her high endowments on the mind, the
favored one immediately aspires to oddity, and often to insanity,—and
makes a non-descript of his genius. To have the world’s affability, and
those social qualities of the heart that give so much of happiness and
pleasure to our fellow creatures, is not considered by a man of genius
as a thing at all worthy of possession, or as gifts adding one lustre to
the character. Instead of being as they are, forming epochs in time and
being bright exemplars in the annals of chroniclers, which nature
intended them to do, they by the most odd monstrosities endeavor to mar
the genial warmth of the feeling by misanthropic actions, and destroy
from their very foundation the most kindly emotions.
To see one of our fellow creatures on whom nature has with an unsparing
hand bestowed her best gifts, doing deeds unworthy the high standing of
his parentage, and disgracing the purity of his privileges, is to the
noble in spirit the source of its most feverish excitement. With the
best of minds, organized artistically, Byron fell into habits so
monstrously bad, that among the virtuous his name became a term used in
denoting disgrace. No excuse can be offered for the man who has
disgraced his name—no charity is so blind as not to see the stain.
In the world’s history, as far back as the memory reaches into the past,
we have seen the most brilliant minds, associated in connection with
some of the worst qualities of the heart. There is occasionally some
solitary instance, standing as some beautiful _relief_ on the epoch of
time, of beings whose splendid endowments of mind have not been more
remarkable in their era of history for talent, than the generous
breathings of the holy purity of heart have been for kindness. Such
cases as these are few, and happen but seldom. In “Boz” these two
qualities have met.
* * * * *