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The obstacle to their mental and moral union is found in a third person, Densdeth, in whom manly strength and genius have been corrupted by selfishness and sensuality into the worst form of spiritual evil.
In "Cecil Dreeme" it is Churm's pair of trotters that convey the party of rescuers to the private Insane Asylum in which Densdeth had confined the heroine. In "Edwin Brothertoft," it is one of Edwin's renowned breed of white horses that carries him through almost insuperable obstacles to his goal.
He infuses a subtle skepticism of the reality of goodness by the mere magnetism of his evil presence. Persons who have been guarded against the usual contrivances by which the conventional Devil works his wonders find themselves impotent before the fascinations of Densdeth. They follow while they detest him, and are at once his victims and his accomplices.
This person is simply abhorred by Cecil, while Byng finds in him something which tempts appetite, piques curiosity, develops sensuous feeling, and provokes pride, as well as something which excites moral disgust and loathing. Byng's distrustful love for Emma Denman admirably represents this stage of his moral experience. Densdeth is undoubtedly the central character of the book.
It proves its creator to be a true spiritual as well as physical descendant of President Edwards; and not even his ancestor has shown more vividly the "exceeding sinfulness of sin." Densdeth is one of those evil natures in whom delight in evil pleasures has subsided into a delight in evil itself, and a desire to communicate it to others.
The dramatis personae are, indeed, little more than moral or immoral principles incarnate. There is no growth in them, no human variableness or complexity; it is "Every Man in his Humor" over again, with the humor left out. Densdeth is an impossible rascal; Churm, a scarcely more possible Rhadamanthine saint.
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