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We yesterday received the April number of the Democratic Review.Democratic Review was a well-regarded Democratic periodical published by John O’Sullivan (1813–1895), the man who coined the term "Manifest Destiny." For further reading, see: Sean Wilentz, The Rise of American Democracy: Jefferson to Lincoln (New York: Norton, 2005), 438, 490, 500.Sketches by Boz (1836).
The Review says, speaking of Dickens and his novels:
"There is one striking defect in them, which, in the present undiscriminating applause bestowed on both him and them, we will not omit to notice. We allude to the atrocious exaggeration of his bad characters. There are no such creatures in the world, or in nature. Take Quilp,
Daniel Quilp, a spiteful and bad-tempered dwarf, is a villain in Dickens’ 1840 novel that hideous and devilishThe Old Curiosity Shop.of the pure abstract of all that is malignant;—what right has Boz to disgust and wound all our moral sensibilities, by giving such a thing a prominent place?" inchrnation incarnation
Then again:
"True, we cannot close our doors against either him or them, if we would, * * * still, there are not such characters in human nature; and the moral effect of exhibiting such to the imagination is very bad; and a serious drawback on the useful influence of the rest of his writings. * * * The same tone of exaggeration runs indeed through most of his characters."
Lest we should be accused of not treating the critic fairly, we will add, that the general tone of the article in question is highly favorable to Mr. Dickens, and that it expresses the utmost satisfaction with the complimentary course pursued by the Americans toward their great library guest. We shall now use liberty to make a few remarks about the exceptions taken by the writer in the Review.
Boz appears to be no Utopian. Though such books as his could have been written only by a man whose heart had great store of kindly feelings, confidence in the capability of his fellow men for the attainment of high perfection, genial dispositions—and possessed, also, of a propensity to look on the bright side of life’s picture; yet Boz, like the rest of us, knows, no doubt, that there are many wicked men in the world—many beings whose hearts are fearful pest houses, and whose presence is as the taint of some deadly contagion. And it is necessary to exhibit these creatures in their unclothed deformity. Many well meaning, but weak minded people, have an unwholesome delicacy upon this subject. Hold up villainy to public scorn, say we; the wise physician cures no cankers except by cutting with a sharp blade, and a deep stroke.
Is the Review sure that "no such characters exist in the world or in nature," as Dickens’ villians? Would to heaven that it could reasonably be sure! Why, almost within the reach of our voice, there is a palpable counterpart to the worst embodiment of evil that the brain of Dickens ever transcribed upon paper! And the being to whom we allude is worse than the wickedest character in the Boz novels—in New York Herald, which was notorious for its scurrilous attacks on political enemies and titillating reportage, beginning with its coverage of the murder of the prostitute Helen Jewett in 1835.Oliver Twist. Sikes is one of Dickens’ most violent characters in the novel, a robber who eventually becomes a murderer.
The Democratic Review need not to go far, then, to find its own argument overthrown. In truth, the editor of the Review misses the consistency of his own doctrines. It is characteristic, indeed, of a noble mind to look around upon fellow creatures with broad glances of comprehensive love, and generous confidence in their essential capacity for virtue. Yet of him whose opportunity it may be, stern duty requires that he should sometimes paint lofty vice—that he should picture it forth in all its glaring reality—and that he should thus teach how terrible a thing is iniquity, and how wise it is to avoid the paths of evil.