Two volumes in " Bell's Miniature Series of Great Writers
" (G. Bell and Sons, is. and 2s. each) may be mentioned together. These are Dr. Johnson, by John Dennis, and Dickens, by W. Teignmouth Shore. Both are very readable and useful little books. Mr. Dennis sends away his readers with as just a con- ception of what Johnson was and what he was not as can be wished for. He appreciates fully Johnson's verse, though he quite rightly prefers "The Vanity of Human Wishes" to " London." On the other hand, he .says, we think, too mach when he writes that in criticism " Johnson expressed the mind of his time." It is impossible to deny that his views of Milton were strongly coloured by party feeling. Addison had shown him a more excellent way. In Mr. Teignmouth Shore's criticism on Dickens we should have liked to see a more distinct line drawn between the early and the late stories. With" Little Dorrit " the reign of mannerism set in, and the unlaboured humour of the earlier period was gone. Still, the criticism is just on the whole. As to the premature failure of health, why not speak out the truth that the great man was unduly anxious to make money? His relations with his publishers show it, and the anxiety killed him.
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