I believe they
desired more to admire and more to blame. I felt sufficiently at my
ease with all except Thackeray, and with him I was painfully stupid.
'Now, dear Nell, when can you come to Haworth? Settle, and let me
know as soon as you can. Give my best love to all.--Yours,
'C. B.'
TO W. S. WILLIAMS
'_January_ 10_th_, 1850.
'MY DEAR SIR,--Mrs. Ellis has made her "morning call." I rather
relished her chat about _Shirley_ and _Jane Eyre_. She praises
reluctantly and blames too often affectedly. But whenever a reviewer
betrays that he has been thoroughly influenced and stirred by the
work he criticises, it is easy to forgive the rest--hate and
personality excepted.
'I have received and perused the _Edinburgh Review_--it is very
brutal and savage. I am not angry with Lewes, but I wish in future
he would let me alone, and not write again what makes me feel so cold
and sick as I am feeling just now.
'Thackeray's Christmas Book at once grieved and pleased me, as most
of his writings do. I have come to the conclusion that whenever he
writes, Mephistopheles stands on his right hand and Raphael on his
left; the great doubter and sneerer usually guides the pen, the
Angel, noble and gentle, interlines letters of light here and there.
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