Ruskin
was never really allied with any other human soul; he knew most of
the great men of the day; he baited Rossetti, he petted Carlyle; he
had correspondents like Norton, to whom he poured out his
overburdened heart; but he was always the spoiled and indulged
child of his boyhood, infinitely winning, provoking, wilful. He
could not be helped, because he could never get away from himself;
he could admire almost frenziedly, but he could not worship; he
could not keep himself from criticism even when he adored, and he
had a bitter superiority of spirit, a terrible perception of the
imperfections and faults of others, a real despair of humanity.
I do not know exactly what the terrors which Ruskin suffered were--
very few people will tell the tale of the valley of hobgoblins, or
probably cannot! In the Pilgrim's Progress itself, the unreality of
the spirits of fear, their secrecy and leniency, is very firmly and
wittily told. They scream in their dens, sitting together, I have
thought, like fowls in a roost. They come padding after the
pilgrim, they show themselves obscurely, swollen by the mist at the
corners of the road.
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