Page:In defense of Harriet Shelley, and other essays.djvu/423

 A BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH

&quot;American humorists&quot; rise, expand into sudden popularity, and disappear, leaving hardly a memory behind. If he has not written himself out like them, if his place in literature has become every year more assured, it is because his &quot;humor&quot; has been some thing radically different from theirs. It has been irresistibly laughter-provoking, but its sole end has never been to make people laugh. Its more im portant purpose has been to make them think and feel. And with the progress of the years Mark Twain s own thoughts have become finer, his own feelings deeper and more responsive. Sympathy with the suffering, hatred of injustice and oppression, and enthusiasm for all that tends to make the world a more tolerable place for mankind to live in, have grown with his accumulating knowledge of life as it is. That is why Mark Twain has become a classic, not only at home, but in all lands whose people read and think about the common joys and sorrows of humanity.

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