The slightest novels are a blessing to those in distress, not
chloroform itself a greater. Our fine old sea-captain's life
was justified when Carlyle soothed his mind with THE KING'S
OWN or NEWTON FORSTER. To please is to serve; and so far
from its being difficult to instruct while you amuse, it is
difficult to do the one thoroughly without the other. Some
part of the writer or his life will crop out in even a vapid
book; and to read a novel that was conceived with any force
is to multiply experience and to exercise the sympathies.
Every article, every piece of verse, every essay, every
ENTRE-FILET, is destined to pass, however swiftly, through
the minds of some portion of the public, and to colour,
however transiently, their thoughts. When any subject falls
to be discussed, some scribbler on a paper has the invaluable
opportunity of beginning its discussion in a dignified and
human spirit; and if there were enough who did so in our
public press, neither the public nor the Parliament would
find it in their minds to drop to meaner thoughts. The
writer has the chance to stumble, by the way, on something
pleasing, something interesting, something encouraging, were
it only to a single reader. He will be unfortunate, indeed,
if he suit no one. He has the chance, besides, to stumble on
something that a dull person shall be able to comprehend; and
for a dull person to have read anything and, for that once,
comprehended it, makes a marking epoch in his education.
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