Guerndale
An Old Story (Classic Reprint)

Excerpt from Guerndale: An Old Story<br><br>In these latter commercial days of ours, when a rise of one-eighth of one per centum in the rate of discount causes more stir than was anciently felt at the downfall of a religion, and even our passions are regulated by the laws of supply and demand; in these days, when the strength of popular emotion is accurately tested in the stock market and not often felt in any other way; in these days, when honor is replaced by adroitness, justice by good nature, and the occasional highwayman by then common swindler - in all these days it is natural that the character of our fiction should follow the nature of our thought. These are the piping times of peace: we lazily adapt ourselves to the laws of expediency, and are possessed of too much good taste to be either very good or very bad. So we all preserve a specious mediocrity; and society is somewhat insipid in consequence.<br><br>About the Publisher<br><br>Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com<br><br>This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.