And now the full agitation and misery of the disclosure came rushing
upon Tom indeed. The star of his whole life from boyhood had become, in
a moment, putrid vapour. It was not that Pecksniff, Tom's Pecksniff, had
ceased to exist, but that he never had existed. In his death Tom would
have had the comfort of remembering what he used to be, but in this
discovery, he had the anguish of recollecting what he never was. For,
as Tom's blindness in this matter had been total and not partial, so was
his restored sight. HIS Pecksniff could never have worked the wickedness
of which he had just now heard, but any other Pecksniff could; and the
Pecksniff who could do that could do anything, and no doubt had been
doing anything and everything except the right thing, all through his
career. From the lofty height on which poor Tom had placed his idol it
was tumbled down headlong, and
Not all the king's horses, nor all the king's men,
Could have set Mr Pecksniff up again.
Legions of Titans couldn't have got him out of the mud; and serve him
right! But it was not he who suffered; it was Tom.
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