Such are the views of a close observer of human nature, whose works have had an exceedingly wide and an always excellent influence. While Mr. Trollope has probably exaggerated the educational power of the novel, it cannot be denied that this form of literature takes a considerable part in moulding the opinions and standards of the young. The impressions of life derived from novels are almost as strong as those we receive from what is passing in the world about us. If a work of fiction form a truthful reflection of nature, it must hold up to the reader's view examples of evil as well as examples of good; it must deal with depravity as well as with virtue. And, therefore, all that can be expected from the novelist is that he should endeavor to represent life as it is, with its due apportionment of beauty and of ugliness. And so much is demanded not only by the moralist, but by the critic. Many writers who have described the life of criminals, who have endeavored to make infamous careers attractive, and have pandered to the lower tastes of the reading public, would urge in their own defence: that they have nothing to do with morality; that their object is to produce a work of art; that no question of the good or evil effect of their writing should be allowed to trammel their imagination. But the critic would rightly reply, that truth at least must be respected in a work of art; that the imagination must not be allowed the liberty of misrepresentation; and that the novelist in whose pages vice predominates, or is given an alluring aspect, is no more artistic than the writer of Sunday-school books. In judging the influence exerted by the great body of writers of fiction whose names have been mentioned in this chapter, I shall therefore proceed on the understanding that that novelist who writes almost exclusively of good people is not necessarily the one whose influence has been the best, nor that he who has drawn many weak or evil-doing characters has necessarily taught the worst lessons. The standard by which we must judge an author, as well from an artistic as from a moral point of view, must be founded on the recognition that both good and evil prevail in the world, and that whoever undertakes to give a picture of life must paint both the evil and the good in their true colors.