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[-415-]
EPILOGUE TO VOLUME I.
THUS
far have we pursued our adventurous theme; and though we have already told so
much, how much more does there remain yet to tell!
Said we not, at the outset, that we would introduce our
readers to a city of strange contrasts? and who shall say that we have not
fulfilled our promise?
But as yet we have only drawn the veil partially aside
from the mighty panorama of grandeur and misery which it is our task to
display: — the reader has still to be initiated more deeply into the
MYSTERIES OF LONDON.
We have a grand moral to work out — a great [-416-]
lesson to teach every class of society; — a moral and a lesson whose
themes are:
WEALTH | POVERTY
For we have constituted ourselves the scourge of the oppressor, and the champion
of the oppressed: we have taken virtue by the hand to raise it, and we have
seized upon vice to expose it; we have no fear of those who sit in high places;
but we dwell as emphatically upon the failings of the educated and rich, as on
the immorality of the ignorant and poor.
We invite all those who have been deceived to come around us,
and we will unmask the deceiver; — we seek the company of them that drag the
chains of tyranny along the rough thoroughfares of the world, that we may put
the tyrant to shame; — we gather around us all those who suffer from vicious
institutions, that we may expose the rottenness of the social heart.
Crime, oppression, and injustice prosper for a time; but,
with nations as with individuals, the day of retribution must come. Such is the
lesson which we have yet to teach.
And let those who have perused what we have already written,
pause ere they deduce therefrom a general moral; — for as yet they cannot
anticipate our design, nor read our end.
No:— for we have yet more to write, and they have more to
learn, of the MYSTERIES OF LONDON.
Strange as many of the incidents already recorded may be
deemed,— wild and fanciful as much of our narrative up to this point may
appear,— we have yet events more strange, and episodes more seemingly wild and
fanciful, to narrate in the ensuing volume.
For the word "LONDON" constitutes a theme whose
details, whether of good or evil, are inexhaustible: nor knew we, when we took
up our pen to enter upon the subject, how vast — how mighty — how
comprehensive it might be!
Ye, then, who have borne with us thus far, condescend to
follow us on to the end :— we can promise that the spirit which has animated
us up to this point will not flag as we prosecute our undertaking;— and, at
the close, we feel convinced that more than one will be enabled to retrospect
over some good and useful sentiment which will have been awakened in the soul by
the perusal of "THE MYSTERIES OF LONDON."
END OF THE FIRST VOLUME
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