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Beacon Lights of History, Volume 13 - Great Writers; Dr Lord's Uncompleted Plan, Supplemented with Essays by Emerson, Macaulay, Hedge, and Mercer Adam by John Lord
page 47 of 337 (13%)
out a hundred years ago. Even the novels of Sir Walter, although to be
found in every library, kindle but little enthusiasm compared with that
excited by the masterpieces of Thackeray, Dickens, George Eliot, and of
the favorites of the passing day. Why is this? Will these later lights
also cease to burn? Will they too pass away? Is this age so much
advanced that what pleased our grandfathers and grandmothers has no
charm for us, but is often "flat, stale, and unprofitable,"--at least,
decidedly uninteresting?

I am inclined to the opinion that only a very small part of any man's
writings is really immortal. Take out the "Elegy in a Country
Churchyard," and how much is left of Gray for other generations to
admire? And so of Goldsmith: besides the "Vicar of Wakefield" and the
"Deserted Village," there is little in his writings that is likely to
prove immortal. Johnson wrote but little poetry that is now generally
valued. Certainly his dictionary, his greatest work, is not immortal,
and is scarcely a standard. Indeed, we have outgrown nearly everything
which was prized so highly a century ago, not only in poetry and
fiction, but in philosophy, theology, and science. Perhaps that is least
permanent which once was regarded as most certain.

If, then, the poetry and novels of Sir Walter Scott are not so much
read or admired as they once were, we only say that he is no exception
to the rule. I have in mind but two authors in the whole range of
English literature that are read and prized as much to-day as they were
two hundred years ago. And if this is true, what shall we say of
rhetoricians like Macaulay, of critics like Carlyle, of theologians like
Jonathan Edwards, of historians like Hume and Guizot, and of many other
great men of whom it has been the fashion to say that their works are
lasting as the language in which they were written? Some few books will
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