… That I was, unparadoxically, also trying to put in the reader’s head, that Dickens has contributed to the demoralization of our world, was on the surface of my essay. In this respect, I was acknowledging this author’s great power. The reduction of hard moral fact, to mushy simper and what we now call “empathy,” was partly his doing. I detect it even in the unpleasant vibrations of BLM rioters, and other agents of our Left.
They “protest” things that, indirectly, they learnt to protest from the kind-hearted Dickens; subjective hysterias about the world being unfair. Of course it is unfair, as it has always been, and to everyone who has been living in it. But unfairness is a whim, compared to sound moral judgements, and the reticence that should accompany them. We cannot make the world “more fair” by rioting. Dickens, incidentally, agrees with me on that.
He was among the writers (and artists generally) who contributed subtly to our post-Christian worldview, based on emotion, not remorseless thought. Who made, say, Christmas about giving presents to little children, rather than centrally about the birth of Christ. That doesn’t mean his works should be suppressed. On the contrary, they should be read and enjoyed, with this thought in mind. He moralizes, but in a way that may actually subvert morality, by substituting “feelings” for the hard truths, which are to die for.
David Warren, “Retractiones”, Essays in Idleness, 2020-07-29.
December 27, 2020
QotD: Charles Dickens
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