, Fox, Nelson, were
hardly Puritans. And third, that the real rise of a new, cold, and
illiberal morality in these matters seems to me to have occurred in the
time of Queen Victoria, and not of Queen Elizabeth. All things
considered, it is likely that future historians will say that the
Puritans first really triumphed in the twentieth century, and that
Dickens was the last cry of Merry England.

And about these additional, miscellaneous, and even inferior works of
Dickens there is, moreover, another use and fascination which all
Dickensians will understand; which, after a manner, is not for the
profane. All who love Dickens have a strange sense that he is really
inexhaustible. It is this fantastic infinity that divides him even from
the strongest and healthiest romantic artists of a later day--from
Stevenson, for example. I have read _Treasure Island_ twenty times;
nevertheless I know it. But I do not really feel as if I knew all
_Pickwick_; I have not so much read it twenty times as read in it a
million times; and it almost seemed as if I always read something new.
We of the true faith look at each other and understand; yes, our master
was a magician. I believe the books are alive; I believe that leaves
still grow in them, as leaves grow on the trees. I believe that this
fairy library flourishes and increases like a fairy forest: but the
world is listening to us, and we will put our hand upon our mouth.

OUR MUTUAL FRIEND

One thing at least seems certain. Dickens may or may not have been
socialist in his tendencies; one might quote on the affirmative side his
satire against Mr. Podsnap, who thought Centralisation "un-English"; one
might quote in reply the fact that he satirised quite as unmercifully
state and municipal officials of the most modern type. But there is one
condition of affairs which Dickens would certainly have detested and
denounced, and that is the condition in which we actually stand to-day.
At this moment it is vain to discuss whether socialism will be a selling
of men's liberty for bread. The men have already sold the liberty; only
they have not yet got the bread. A most incessant and exacting
interference with the poor is already in operation; they are already
ruled like slaves, only they are not fed like slaves. The children are
forcibly provided with a school; only they are not provided with a
house. Officials give the most detailed domestic directions about the
fireguard; only they do not g