Some how or other, we found ourselves next talking about Sidney Smith;
and it was very pleasant to me, recalling the evenings when your
father has read and we have laughed over him, to hear him spoken of as
a living existence, by one who had known him. Still, I have always had
a quarrel with Sidney, for the wicked use to which he put his wit, in
abusing good old Dr. Carey, and the missionaries in India; nay, in
some places he even stooped to be spiteful and vulgar. I could not
help, therefore, saying, when Macaulay observed that he had the most
agreeable wit of any literary man of his acquaintance, "Well, it was
very agreeable, but it could not have been very agreeable to the
people who came under the edge of it," and instanced his treatment of
Dr. Carey. Some others who were present seemed to feel warmly on this
subject, too, and Macaulay said,--
"Ah, well, Sidney repented of that, afterwards." He seemed to cling to
his memory, and to turn from every fault to his joviality, as a thing
he could not enough delight to remember.
Truly, wit, like charity, covers a multitude of sins. A man who has
the faculty of raising a laugh in this sad, earnest world is
remembered with indulgence and complacency, always.
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