Vanity of Human Wishes, by dying suddenly of apoplexy while he is considering what he will do with Mr. Allworthy’s property (when it reverts to him); or that admirable scene, commended by Macaulay, of Partridge at the Playhouse, which is none the worse because it has just a slight look of kinship with that other famous visit which Sir Roger de Coverley paid to Philips’s Distrest Mother. Or take again, as utterly unlike either of these, that burlesque Homeric battle in the churchyard, where the “sweetly-winding Stour” stands for “reedy Simois,” and the bumpkins round for Greeks and Trojans! Or take yet once more, though it is woful work to offer bricks from this edifice which has already (in a sense) outlived the Escorial, [Footnote: The Escorial, it will be remembered, was partially burned in 1872.] the still more diverse passage which depicts the changing conflict in Black George’s mind as to whether he shall return to Jones the sixteen guineas that he has found:—
“Black George having received the Purse, set forward towards the Alehouse; but in the Way a Thought occurred whether he should not detain this Money likewise. His Conscience, however, immediately started at this Suggestion, and began to upbraid him with Ingratitude to his Benefactor. To this his Avarice answered, ‘That his conscience should have considered that Matter before, when he deprived poor Jones of his 500l. That having quietly acquiesced in what was of so much greater Importance, it was absurd, if not downright Hypocrisy, to affect any Qualms at this Trifle.’—In return to which, Conscience, like a good Lawyer, attempted to distinguish between an absolute Breach of Trust, as here where the Goods were delivered, and a bare Concealment of what was found, as in the former Case. Avarice presently treated this with Ridicule, called it a Distinction without a Difference, and absolutely insisted, that when once all Pretensions
