mark on the ecclesiastical organization of the time.

If any one, judging by the length of this preface, should conclude that
I hold my little book in undue esteem, let him know that I owe it more
than one grudge. It is said that Thomas Campbell, twenty years after the
appearance of his best-known poem, was one day introduced as "the author
of 'The Pleasures of Hope.'" "Confound 'The Pleasures of Hope,'" he
protested; "can't I write anything else?" So, however much I may prefer
my later work, more carefully wrought in respect of thought, structure,
and style, this initial novel, the favorite of the larger public, has
become inseparably associated with my name. Often I have mentally
applied Campbell's imprecation on "The Pleasures of Hope" to this
story. I could not write in this vein now if I would, and twenty-one
years have made so many changes in me that I dare not make any but minor
changes in this novel. The author of "The Hoosier School-Master" is
distinctly not I; I am but his heir and executor; and since he is a more
popular writer than I, why should I meddle with his work? I have,
however, ventured to make some necessary revision of the diction, and
have added notes, mostly with reference to the dialect.

A second grudge against this story is that somehow its readers persist
in believing it to be a bit of my own life. Americans are credulous
believers in that miracle of the imagination whom no one has ever seen
in the flesh--the self-made man. Some readers of "The Hoosier
School-Master" have settled it for a certainty that the author sprang
from the rustic class he has described. One lady even wrote to inquire
whether my childhood were not represented in Shocky, the little lad out
of the poor-house. A biographical sketch of me in Italian goes so far as
to state that among the hard resorts by which I made a living in my
early life was the teaching of a Sunday-school in Chicago.