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Ben-Hur: a Tale of the Christ: Thackeray

He did, indeed, take a quite childlike delight in dining with the socially eminent. He frankly liked to be pointed out as "the great Mr. Thackeray," and as frankly he resented the gross familiarity of Tom, Dick, or Harry who chanced to have known him in Bohemia. But it was rather that he pitilessly discerned and detested the today and the mean-spirited flunky than that he was a snob.

Thackeray lived at the period when wealth without manners or intellect generated wide-spread desire for social success. At the same time "The Back Kitchen" and "The Cave of Harmony," immortalized by Colonel Newcome, were the most eagerly frequented haunts of the day. Thackeray knew every aspect of this rather vulgar society. He was as much at ease with the Prime Minister of England as with the proprietor of the "Back Kitchen." With his keen satiric sense and sharp wit, the chronicler of snobs flayed it; with his tender heart and kindly humor the great novelist understood it. In his own way he strove to regenerate it.

These qualities of heart and mind, which live in his books, created the puzzle of his personality.

He was a Cynic! By his life all wrought Of generous acts, mild words, and gentle ways; His heart wide open to all kindly thought, His hand so quick to give, his tongue to praise!