--Caine's books are very edifying. I should like to read
all that Caine has written. Miss Corelli, too, is very edifying.--And
you may add Upton Sinclair.' `What I want to know,' says the disciple,
`is, what English novels may be selected as specially enthralling.'
The pundit answers: `We have no novels addressed to the passions that
are good for anything, if you mean that kind of enthralment.' And here
some poor wretch (whose name the disciple will not remember) inquires:
`Are not Mrs. Glyn's novels addressed to the passions?' and is in due
form annihilated. Can it be that a time will come when readers of this
passage in our pundit's Life will take more interest in the poor
nameless wretch than in all the bearers of those great names put
together, being no more able or anxious to discriminate between (say)
Mrs. Ward and Mr. Sinclair than we are to set Ogden above Sherlock, or
Sherlock above Ogden? It seems impossible. But we must remember that
things are not always what they seem.
Every man illustrious in his day, however much he may be gratified by
his fame, looks with an eager eye to posterity for a continuance of
past favours, and would even live the remainder of his life in
obscurity if by so doing he could insure that future generations would
preserve a correct attitude towards him forever.
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