Burlesques William Makepeace Thackeray

10
In the matter for which he suffered, George could never be brought to acknowledge that he
was at all in the wrong. "It may be an error of judgment," he said to the Venerable Chaplain
of the gaol, "but it is no crime. Were it Crime, I should feel Remorse. Where there is no
remorse, Crime cannot exist. I am not sorry: therefore, I am innocent. Is the proposition a
fair one?"
The excellent Doctor admitted that it was not to be contested.
"And wherefore, sir, should I have sorrow," the Boy resumed, "for ridding the world of a
sordid worm;* of a man whose very soul was dross, and who never had a feeling for the
Truthful and the Beautiful? When I stood before my uncle in the moonlight, in the gardens
of the ancestral halls of the De Barnwells, I felt that it was the Nemesis come to overthrow
him. 'Dog,' I said to the trembling slave, 'tell me where thy Gold is. THOU hast no use for
it. I can spend it in relieving the Poverty on which thou tramplest; in aiding Science, which
thou knowest not; in uplifting Art, to which thou art blind. Give Gold, and thou art free.'
But he spake not, and I slew him."
"I would not have this doctrine vulgarly promulgated," said the admirable chaplain, "for its
general practice might chance to do harm. Thou, my son, the Refined, the Gentle, the
Loving and Beloved, the Poet and Sage, urged by what I cannot but think a grievous error,
hast appeared as Avenger. Think what would be the world's condition, were men without
any Yearning after the Ideal to attempt to reorganize Society, to redistribute Property, to
avenge Wrong."
"A rabble of pigmies scaling Heaven," said the noble though misguided young Prisoner.
"Prometheus was a Giant, and he fell."
"Yes, indeed, my brave youth!" the benevolent Dr. Fuzwig exclaimed, clasping the
Prisoner's marble and manacled hand; "and the Tragedy of To-morrow will teach the World
that Homicide is not to be permitted even to the most amiable Genius, and that the lover of
the Ideal and the Beautiful, as thou art, my son, must respect the Real likewise."
"Look! here is supper!" cried Barnwell gayly. "This is the Real, Doctor; let us respect it and
fall to." He partook of the meal as joyously as if it had been one of his early festals; but the
worthy chaplain could scarcely eat it for tears.
* This is a gross plagiarism: the above sentiment is
expressed much more eloquently in the ingenious romance of
Eugene Aram:—"The burning desires I have known—the
resplendent visions I have nursed—the sublime aspirings
that have lifted me so often from sense and clay: these tell