and represents; and he has therefore taken observation simply as the
basis of his plot and his characterization. As we read "Vanity Fair" and
"The Newcomes," we are impressed with the actuality of the persons and
incidents. There is an absence both of directing ideas and disturbing
idealizations. Everything drifts to its end, as in real life. In "Great
Expectations" there is shown a power of external observation finer and
deeper even than Thackeray's; and yet, owing to the presence of other
qualities, the general impression is not one of objective reality. The
author palpably uses his observations as materials for his creative
faculties to work upon; he does not record, but invents; and he produces
something which is natural only under conditions prescribed by his own
mind. He shapes, disposes, penetrates, colors, and contrives everything,
and the whole action, is a series of events which could have occurred
only in his own brain, and which it is difficult to conceive of as
actually "happening." And yet in none of his other works does he
evince a shrewder insight into real life, and a clearer perception
and knowledge of what is called "the world." The book is, indeed, an
artistic creation, and not a mere succession of humorous and pathetic
scenes, and demonstrates that Dickens is now in the prime, and not in
the decline of his great powers.

The characters of the novel also show how deeply it has been meditated;
for, though none of them may excite the personal interest which clings
to Sam Weller or little Dombey, they are better fitted to each other and
to the story in which they appear than is usual with Dickens. They all
combine to produce that unity of impression which the work leaves on
the mind. Individually they will rank among the most original of the
author's creations. Magwitch and Joe Gargery, Jaggers and Wemmick,
Pip and Herbert, Wopsle, Pumblechook, and "the Aged," Miss Havisham,
Estella, and Biddy, are personages which the most assiduous readers of