There is the class who
are still read in a certain measure, though in a much smaller measure
than is pretended, by the great body of ordinarily well-educated men.
Of this class, the two authors whose names I have already cited, Swift
and Fielding, are typical examples; and it may be taken to include
Goldsmith also. Then comes the class of those whom the ordinarily
well-educated public, whatever they may pretend, read really very
little or not at all; and in this class we may couple Sterne with
Addison, with Smollett, and, except, of course, as to _Robinson
Crusoe_--unless, indeed, our _blase_ boys have outgrown him among
other pleasures of boyhood--with Defoe. But below this there is yet a
third class of writers, who are not only read by none but the critic,
the connoisseur, or the historian of literature, but are scarcely read
even by them, except from curiosity, or "in the way of business." The
type of this class is Richardson; and one cannot, I say, help asking
whether he will hereafter have Sterne as a companion of his dusty
solitude. Are _Tristram Shandy_ and the _Sentimental Journey_ destined
to descend from the second class into the third--from the region of
partial into that of total neglect, and to have their portion with
_Clarissa Harlowe_ and _Sir Charles Grandison?_ The unbounded vogue
which they enjoyed in their time will not save them; for sane and
sober critics compared Richardson in his day to Shakspeare, and
Diderot broke forth into prophetic rhapsodies upon the immortality of
his works which to us in these days have become absolutely pathetic
in their felicity of falsified prediction.
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