GEORGE CRUIKSHANK


By William Makepeace Thackeray



* Reprinted from the Westminster Review for June, 1840. (No 66.)


Accusations of ingratitude, and just accusations no doubt, are made
against every inhabitant of this wicked world, and the fact is, that a
man who is ceaselessly engaged in its trouble and turmoil, borne hither
and thither upon the fierce waves of the crowd, bustling, shifting,
struggling to keep himself somewhat above water--fighting for
reputation, or more likely for bread, and ceaselessly occupied to-day
with plans for appeasing the eternal appetite of inevitable hunger
to-morrow--a man in such straits has hardly time to think of anything
but himself, and, as in a sinking ship, must make his own rush for the
boats, and fight, struggle, and trample for safety. In the midst of such
a combat as this, the "ingenious arts, which prevent the ferocity of
the manners, and act upon them as an emollient" (as the philosophic bard
remarks in the Latin Grammar) are likely to be jostled to death, and
then forgotten. The world will allow no such compromises between it and
that which does not belong to it--no two gods must we serve; but (as one
has seen in some old portraits) the horrible glazed eyes of Necessity
are always fixed upon you; fly away as you will, black Care sits behind
you, and with his ceaseless gloomy croaking drowns the voice of all more
cheerful companions. Happy he whose fortune has placed him where there
is calm and plenty, and who has the wisdom not to give up his quiet in