ally am

Faithfully your Friend,

CHARLES DICKENS.

Mr. Theodore Ledyard Cuyler.

I hold that Dickens was the most original genius in our fictitious
literature since the days of Walter Scott. As a social reformer his fame
is quite as great as it is as a master of romance. His pen was mighty to
the pulling down of many a social abuse, and from the loving kindness of
his writings has been got many an inspiration to deeds of charity. But
how could a man who went so far as he did go no further? How could the
reformer who struck at so many social wrongs spare that hideous
fountain-head of misery in London, the dram-shop? And how could he
descend to scurrilously satirize all societies formed for the promotion
of temperance? A still greater marvel is that so kind-hearted a man as
Mr. Dickens, who sought honestly the amelioration of the condition of
his fellow-men, could utterly ignore the transforming power of
Christianity. He did not cast contempt on the Bible, and never soiled
his pages with infidelity, neither did he ever enlighten, and warm and
vivify them with evangelical uplifting truth. Only a few feet of earth
separate the grave of Charles Dickens from the grave of William
Wilberforce. Both loved their fellow-men; but the great difference
between them was that one of them invoked the spiritual power of the
Gospel of Christ, which the other lamentably ignored.

CHAPTER III

GREAT BRITAIN SIXTY YEARS AGO (_Continued_)

_Carlyle--Mrs. Baillie--The Young Queen--Napoleon_

One of the lions of whom I was in pursuit was Thomas Carlyle. Very few
Americans at that time had ever seen him, for he lived a very secluded
and laborious life in a little brick house at Chelsea, in the southwest
of London; and he rarely kept open doors. His life was the opposite to
that of Dickens and Macaulay, and he was never lionized, except when he
went to Edinburgh to deliver his address before the University, years
afterwards. I sent him a note in which I informed him of the
enthusiastic admiration which we college students felt for him, and that
I desired to call and pay him my respects. To my note he responded
promptly: "You will be welcome to-morrow at three o'clock, the hour when
I become accessible in my garret here." I found his "garret" to be a
comfortable front room on the second floor of his modest home. It was
well lined with books, and a portrait of Oliver Cromwell hung behind his
study chair. He was seated at