ge. Was the first
fine, the other sane and valuable--those are the twin tests.

A somewhat significant fact of their literary history may be
mentioned, before an attempt is made to appreciate Thackeray's
novels. For some years after Dickens' death, which, it will be
remembered, occurred six years after Thackeray's, the latter
gained in critical recognition while Dickens slowly lost. There
can be little question of this. Lionized and lauded as was the
man of Gadshill, promptly admitted to Westminster Abbey, it came
to pass in time that, in a course on modern English literature
offered at an old and famous New England college, his name was
not deemed worthy of even a reference. Some critics of repute
have scarce been able to take Dickens seriously: for those who
have steadily had the temerity to care for him, their patronage
has been vocal. This marks an astonishing shift of opinion from
that current in 1870. Thackeray, gaining in proportion, has been
hailed as an exquisite artist, one of the few truly great and
permanent English figures not only of fiction but of letters.
But in the most recent years, again a change has come: the
pendulum has swung back, as it always does when an excessive
movement carries it too far beyond the plumb line. Dickens has
found valiant, critical defenders; he has risen fast in
thoughtful so well as popular estimation (although with the
public he has scarcely fluctuated in favor) until he now enjoys
a sort of resurrection of popularity. What is the cause of this
to-and-fro of judgment? The main explanation is to be found in
the changing literary ideals from 1850 to 1900. When Dickens was
active, literature, broadly speaking, was estimated not
exclusively as art, but as human product, an influence in the
world. With the coming of the new canon, which it is convenient
to dub by the catch-phrase, Art for Art's Sake, a man's
production began to be tested more definitely by the technique
he possessed, the skilled way in which he performed his task.
Did he play the game well? That was the first question. Often it
was the first and last. If he did, his subject-matter, and his
particular vision of Life, were pretty much his own affair. And
this modern touchstone, applied to the writings of our two
authors, favored Thackeray. Simple, old-fashioned readers
inclined to give Dickens the preference over him because the
former's interpretation of humanity was, they averred, kindlier
and more wholesome.