Biography written of him; but to return silently, with his small,
sorely foiled bit of work, to the Supreme Silences, who alone can
judge of it or him; and not to trouble the reviewers, and greater or
lesser public, with attempting to judge it! The idea of "fame," as
they call it, posthumous or other, does not inspire one with much
ecstasy in these points of view.--Secondly, That Sterling's
performance and real or seeming importance in this world was actually
not of a kind to demand an express Biography, even according to the
world's usages. His character was not supremely original; neither was
his fate in the world wonderful. What he did was inconsiderable
enough; and as to what it lay in him to have done, this was but a
problem, now beyond possibility of settlement. Why had a Biography
been inflicted on this man; why had not No-biography, and the
privilege of all the weary, been his lot?--Thirdly, That such lot,
however, could now no longer be my good Sterling's; a tumult having
risen around his name, enough to impress some pretended likeness of
him (about as like as the Guy-Fauxes are, on Gunpowder-Day) upon the
minds of many men: so that he could not be forgotten, and could only
be misremembered, as matters now stood.

Whereupon, as practical conclusion to the whole, arose by degrees this
final thought, That, at some calmer season, when the theological dust
had well fallen, and both the matter itself, and my feelings on it,
were in a suitabler condition, I ought to give my testimony about this
friend whom I had known so well, and record clearly what my knowledge
of him was. This has ever since seemed a kind of duty I had to do in
the world before leaving it.


And so, having on my hands some leisure at this time, and being bound