Dickens proposed the health of
the President of the Institution, Lord John Russell. He said he
should do nothing so superfluous and so unnecessary as to descant
upon his lordship's many faithful, long, and great public services,
upon the honour and integrity with which he had pursued his
straightforward public course through every difficulty, or upon the
manly, gallant, and courageous character, which rendered him
certain, in the eyes alike of friends and opponents, to rise with
every rising occasion, and which, like the seal of Solomon, in the
old Arabian story, enclosed in a not very large casket the soul of
a giant. In answer to loud cheers, he said he had felt perfectly
certain, that that would be the response for in no English assembly
that he had ever seen was it necessary to do more than mention the
name of Lord John Russell to ensure a manifestation of personal
respect and grateful remembrance.
SPEECH: LONDON, MAY 8, 1858.
[The forty-eighth Anniversary of the establishment of the Artists'
Benevolent Fund took place on the above date at the Freemasons'
Tavern. The chair was taken by Mr. Charles Dickens, who, after
having disposed of the preliminary toasts with his usual felicity,
proceeded to advocate the claims of the Institution in whose
interest the company had assembled, in the following terms:-]
Ladies and gentlemen,--There is an absurd theatrical story which
was once told to me by a dear and valued friend, who has now passed
from this sublunary stage, and which is not without its moral as
applied to myself, in my present presidential position.
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