“My dear friend, my dear friend, this is trash!”
It is so hard to speak thus—but so necessary
for an editor! We all remember the thorn in his
pillow of which Thackeray complained. Occasionally
I know that I did give way on behalf of some literary
aspirant whose work did not represent itself to me
as being good; and as often as I did so, I broke my
trust to those who employed me. Now, I think
that such editors as Thackeray and myself,—if
I may, for the moment, be allowed to couple men so
unequal,—will always be liable to commit
such faults, but that the natures of publishers and
proprietors will be less soft.
Nor do I know why the pages of a magazine should be
considered to be open to any aspirant who thinks that
he can write an article, or why the manager of a magazine
should be doomed to read all that may be sent to him.
The object of the proprietor is to produce a periodical
that shall satisfy the public, which he may probably
best do by securing the services of writers of acknowledged
ability.
BEVERLEY
Very early in life, very soon after I had become a
clerk in St. Martin’s le Grand, when I was utterly
impecunious and beginning to fall grievously into
debt, I was asked by an uncle of mine, who was himself
a clerk in the War Office, what destination I should
like best for my future life. He probably meant
to inquire whether I wished to live married or single,
whether to remain in the Post Office or to leave it,
whether I should prefer the town or the country.
I replied that I should like to be a Member of Parliament.
My uncle, who was given to sarcasm, rejoined that,
as far a he knew, few clerks in the Post Office did
become Members of Parliament. I think it was
the remembrance of this jeer which stirred me up to
look for a seat as soon as I had made myself capable
of holding one by leaving the public service.
My uncle was dead, but if I could get a seat, the
knowledge that I had done so might travel to that
bourne from whence he was not likely to return, and
he might there feel that he had done me wrong.
Independently of this, I have always thought that
to sit in the British Parliament should be the highest
object of ambition to every educated Englishman.
I do not by this mean to suggest that every educated
Englishman should set before himself a seat in Parliament
as a probable or even a possible career; but that the
man in Parliament has reached a higher position than
the man out,—that to serve one’s
country without pay is the grandest work that a man
can do,—that of all studies the study of
politics is the one in which a man may make himself
most useful to his fellow-creatures,—and
that of all lives, public political lives are capable
of the highest efforts. So thinking,—though
I was aware that fifty-three was too late an age at
which to commence a new career,—I resolved
with much hesitation that I would make the attempt.
