Page:Edward Lytton Bulwer.pdf/12

446 pointing attention to great abuses—to awful suffering. The feelings, the weaknesses, the wretchedness of a great body of my countrymen have been utterly neglected; to their benefit I dedicate my talents—the spirit of 'Paul Clifford' is the cause of the people." As a matter of taste, we have owned to liking "Devereux" the best; but as matter of principle, we give the preference to "Paul Clifford." The use of the last is more actual and immediate.

Whether in lively satire, keen remark, or accurate reflection—whether in deducing the character from circumstance—whether in painting the nice distinction of natural good feeling which favourable position ripens into virtue, or natural strong passion, or weakness, which events harden into crime—the desire of benefit from an obvious lesson, or practical inference necessarily drawn by the reader, the same desire of conferring a moral benefit on the author's kind is paramount through all. Fiction is the eloquence of experience, and to be useful it must be actual. The character of William Brandon is as yet our author's most powerful conception. The lava-flood of passion, which bursts in one red flood, chills, hardens—never to melt again—the evil knowledge brought by too early experience (for experience may come too soon—the fruit must be mature that the east wind will not injure); the bitter consciousness of surpassing talent, unused and useless—the pride, which though inherent in the nature, has no outward cause of display, and takes refuge and fights under the shield of scorn—passion, talent, and knowledge—these best gifts of our kind, and yet those that may be turned to the worst purpose—never were these more finely developed than in William Brandon. One single touch of human kindliness in this proud and cold man is in his gentle and fatherly love for Lucy, his orphan niece. It may seem fanciful, but it has always reminded us of the tuft of blue violets Frazer records with such expression of pleasure, when he finds them growing, lonely and lovely, on the high and icy mountains of Himala. Lord Mauliverer is an inimitable satire on aristocratic indulgence; he is the far niente of indolent luxury embodied in all its selfishness. One single expression sets forth his whole system of action. Brandon, at a tête-à-tête dinner, refuses or neglects some dainty of the table, and Mauliverer exclaims, "Oh, hang your abstemiousness, it is d———d unfriendly to eat so little!" This slight speech is the essence of one who desires companionship for its pleasantness, and not for its sympathy. Lucy Brandon, the heroine, is an entire contrast to all Mr. Bulwer's former female portraits. Isabel and Isora were high-wrought, beautiful, and ideal—as if poetry had lent its aid to life, to show "how divine a thing a woman might be made;" but Lucy is a sweet, simple, gentle creature—entirely a girl—only a very lovely and loveable one, till circumstances discover that gold lies beneath the stream which had hitherto only "broke into dimples and laughed in the sun." It is the "unconquerable strength of love," giving its own force to a nature essentially timid and feminine. One of the great merits of this work is the many slight touches, which, like the finishings of a portrait, give such identity to a picture. The descriptions are singularly accurate, from that of the small and most wretched streets in London on a wet night, to the ancient manor-house with its one old chesnut tree "worth a forest." The affections delineated are such as are in constant play, brightening and sweetening from the