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The Augustan Reprint Society
_Critical Remarks on Sir Charles
Grandison, Clarissa, and Pamela_
(1754)
With an Introduction by
Alan Dugald McKillop
Publication Number 21
(Series IV, No. 3)
Los Angeles
William Andrews Clark Memorial Library
University of California
1950
_GENERAL EDITORS_
H. RICHARD ARCHER, _Clark Memorial Library_
RICHARD C. BOYS, _University of Michigan_
EDWARD NILES HOOKER, _University of California, Los Angeles_
H. T. SWEDENBERG, JR., _University of California, Los Angeles_
_ASSISTANT EDITORS_
W. EARL BRITTON, _University of Michigan_
JOHN LOFTIS, _University of California, Los Angeles_
_ADVISORY EDITORS_
EMMETT L. AVERY, _State College of Washington_
BENJAMIN BOYCE, _University of Nebraska_
LOUIS I. BREDVOLD, _University of Michigan_
CLEANTH BROOKS, _Yale University_
JAMES L. CLIFFORD, _Columbia University_
ARTHUR FRIEDMAN, _University of Chicago_
SAMUEL H. MONK, _University of Minnesota_
ERNEST MOSSNER, _University of Texas_
JAMES SUTHERLAND, _Queen Mary College, London_
INTRODUCTION
The present pamphlet was published in February 1754, after six volumes
of _Sir Charles Grandison_ had appeared and about a month before the
appearance of the seventh and last volume. Though _Grandison_ was
technically anonymous, its authorship was generally known, and the
pamphlet refers to Richardson by name. Sale's bibliography gives further
details (_Samuel Richardson: A Bibliographical Record_, New Haven, 1936,
pp. 131-32), including the suggestion of the _Monthly Review_
(X, 159-60) that the author was Alexander Campbell, who also wrote
_A Free and Candid Examination of Lord Bolingbroke's Letters on History_
(1753). The pro-Bolingbroke and deistic sentiments of the _Critical
Remarks_ lend color to this attribution. Nichols' _Literary Anecdotes_
(II, 277) says under the year 1755 that William Bowyer printed a few
copies of two pamphlets on _Grandison_, one by Francis Plumer and one by
Dr. John Free. To Plumer is attributed _A Candid Examination of the
History of Sir Charles Grandison_ (April 1754; 3rd ed., 1755), and the
inference might then be that Free was the author of the _Critical
Remarks_, even though the date 1755 given by Nichols is not right, since
these two are the only known early _Grandison_ pamphlets. But Free's
orthodox religious views seem to eliminate him as a possibility. Whoever
the author was, his references to Henry and Sarah Fielding are decidedly
friendly, and he speaks well of Mason, Gray, Dodsley, and Pope.
The _Remarks_ represents a type of pamphlet occasionally called forth by
works which engaged the general attention of the town, such as the great
novels of the period; thus before the _Grandison_ pamphlets we have
_Pamela Censured_, _Lettre sur Pamela_, _An Examen of the History of Tom
Jones_, _An Essay on the New Species of Writing Founded by Mr.
Fielding_, and _Remarks on Clarissa_. Usually these fugitive essays are
hostile to the work they discuss, and represent the attempt of some
obscure writer to turn a shilling by exposing for sale a title page
which might catch the eye with a well known name. The J. Dowse who sold
the _Critical Remarks_ was an obscure pamphlet-shop proprietor, not a
prominent bookseller. Richardson and his correspondents were of course
irritated at both the _Grandison_ pieces: Mrs. Sarah Chapone was
indignant at the _Critical Remarks_, venturing the absurd suggestion
that Fielding might be the author (Victoria and Albert Museum, Forster
Collection, Richardson MSS., XIII, 1, ff. 102-03, letter of 6 April
1754); and Lady Bradshaigh and Richardson considered the more favorable
_Candid Examination_ an unfriendly work (Forster Collection, Richardson
MSS., XI, ff. 98, 100-02). Yet these obscure publications give an
interesting view of some current approaches and reactions before opinion
has taken a set form, and help us to get access to the contemporary
reading public.
The present author airs some cynical and skeptical views in religion and
ethics which are not of great critical interest. His ideas about
"sentimental unbelievers" and "political chastity," his simulated
disapproval of contemptuous references to the clergy, the attack on John
Hill's _Inspector_ to which he devotes his Postscript--these points
are little to our purpose. As to literary opinions, he falls into the
usual way of judging fiction by its supposed overt intellectual and
moral effects. His admiration for _Clarissa_ is based on his acceptance
of the complete idealization of the heroine, and of Richardson's
declared intention to show "the distresses that may attend the
misconduct both of parents and children in relation to marriage." In
formal literary criticism he is pompous and scholastic. He approves the
plot of _Clarissa_ in terms of the _Iliad_, but judges subtle and
complex characters by an over-simplified standard of decorum and
censures Lovelace as an intricate combination of Achilles and Ulysses!
His unnecessary labors to show that Richardson is not really Homeric
illustrate the sterile application of epic canons to the novel that
vitiates much early criticism of fiction.
In general, he represents the reader with pretensions to culture which
make him feel superior to Richardson's novels. He thinks they have been
attracting too much attention, yet finds himself forced to attend to
what he professes to despise. The stories are far too long, he
complains, and Richardson pads them to increase the profits of
authorship. (The _Candid Examination_ concurs on this point, and both
writers agree that _Clarissa_ should have been in five volumes instead
of eight.) The _Remarks_ echoes the common complaint that Richardson is
responsible for the flood of new fiction, and prophesies that his novels
will be merely the first in a succession of ephemeral best sellers. All
in all, we have here a fairly common pattern of opinion: _Pamela_ is low
and has no sound moral; _Grandison_ is tedious and excessively mannered;
_Clarissa_ at its best must be admitted to be supreme, despite
moralistic objections to the Mother Sinclair scenes and to the character
of Lovelace. The pamphleteer's silences are sometimes significant:
Pamela is not condemned as a scheming little minx, and he does not seem
to be much interested in her; despite his approval of Fielding and his
preference of Allworthy to Grandison, he shows little interest in the
Fielding-Richardson opposition, even omitting the Tom Jones-Grandison
antithesis which seemed obvious to many; he passes over the admired
Italian story, the madness of Clementina, and the issues raised by Sir
Charles' proposed marriage with a Catholic; nor does he offer the
familiar comment, soon to become a _cliché_, on the excessive
idealization of Sir Charles.
His best points do not follow from his jejune critical principles,
but from close reading that forces him at times to admit that he is
interested even while he carps and cavils. His predictions about the
last volume of _Grandison_ show that the story has at least carried him
along. His admiration for the character of Clarissa, though based on his
approval of idealization, is really a tribute to Richardson's art,
and his qualification that Clarissa is "rather too good, at least too
methodically so," is fair enough, as is the comment about Grandison's
"showy and ostentatious" benevolence and his excessive variety of
accomplishments. The judgment about Richardson's incessant emphasis on
sex anticipates much later criticism, and is made at first hand, though
connected with the stock comment that modern tragedies dwell too
exclusively on the passion of love. There is truth in the observation
that Mr. B-- and Lovelace think nothing can be done with women except by
bribery, corruption, and terror, that Richardson is unable to describe a
plausible seducer. The author of the _Candid Examination_ seems to take
up this cue when he says of the same pair, "I am of Opinion, that
neither of the two Gentlemen conducted themselves so, as to overcome an
ordinary Share of Virtue" (p. 24). Nevertheless the discussion in the
_Critical Remarks_ is thrown out of balance by exaggerated talk about
the portrayal of licentious scenes.
One important observation is that _Grandison_ duplicates some of the
principal characters in _Clarissa_: Charlotte Grandison is Anna Howe;
her much-enduring husband Lord G-- is Mr. Hickman (the writer expands
G-- to "Goosecap" on the model of Fielding's Mr. Booby); Pollexfen is
Lovelace. This is self-evident, but may have been suggested by the
conversation in which Harriet Byron calls Charlotte "a very Miss Howe,"
while Charlotte refers to Lord G-- as "a very Mr. Hickman" (_Grandison_,
1754, II, 7-8). The _Candid Examination_, in a postscript commenting on
the last volume of _Grandison_, repeats the charge of duplication in a
rather odd way: "The Conduct and Behaviour of Sir _Charles_ and his
Lady, after the Marriage, is an Imitation of that of Mr. B-- and
_Pamela_; but does not equal the Original" (p. 42).
The pamphleteer has more to say about Charlotte than about Harriet, Sir
Charles, or Clementina, the characters with whom later criticism has
been chiefly concerned. Charlotte's "whimsical" or "arch" way evidently
got on his nerves. He catches up a phrase which Harriet applies to her,
"dear flighty creature," and derisively repeats it several times.
Contemporary readers paid her considerable attention. The _Candid
Examination_ names among the fine things in the book "a Profusion of Wit
and Fancy in Lady G--'s Conversation and Letters," and thinks that
Harriet at times treats her levity too severely (pp. 6, 14-16). The
author of _Louisa: Or, Virtue in Distress_ (1760) remarks that Lady G--
is one of the most imitated of Richardson's characters--"I have
observed that most of our modern novels abound with a lady G--" (p. x).
There were objections even among Richardson's admirers, however, as by
Mrs. Delany: "Miss Grandison is sometimes diverting, has wit and humour,
but considering her heart is meant to be a good one, she too often
behaves as if it were stark naught" (_Autobiography and Correspondence_,
London, 1861, 1 Ser., III, 251). The evidence seems to show that early
readers of _Grandison_ did not isolate the principal characters, except
perhaps Clementina, but considered them with due reference to the
secondary characters and to the whole social context in which they
appear.
Finally, this critic is irritated by the conversational and epistolary
style which Richardson evolves in the process of "writing to the
moment"; he is particularly vexed at the coined or adapted words which
are sometimes italicized and dwelt on as characteristic of an
individual. He cites only a few, such as Uncle Selby's _scrupulosities_,
but he has others in mind, both from _Grandison_ and from Lovelace's
letters in _Clarissa_, and wonders whether such words as these will get
into the dictionary. (It happened that Johnson was entering words from
_Clarissa_ in his _Dictionary_ during these years.) He burlesques an
epistle from Charlotte, slipping in a few of Lovelace's locutions as
well (pp. 47-48; cf. _Grandison_, 1754, VI, 288). The author of the
_Candid Examination_ distinguishes between what he considers the low
mawkish talk of some of Richardson's characters, which he condemns
(pp. 11-12), and Richardson's freedom in coining words, which he
approves (p. 36). These slight instances may serve to remind us that
many of Richardson's early readers must have been keenly aware of his
innovations in style, and that these developments form an important link
in the 1750's between Richardson and the further innovations of Sterne.
The present reproduction is made by permission from a copy in the
University of Michigan Library.
_Alan Dugald McKillop_
_The Rice Institute_
CRITICAL
REMARKS
ON
_Sir CHARLES GRANDISON,
CLARISSA and PAMELA._
ENQUIRING,
Whether they have a Tendency to corrupt
or improve the Public Taste and Morals.
IN A
LETTER to the AUTHOR.
By a LOVER of VIRTUE.
_LONDON:_
Printed for J. DOWSE, opposite _Fountain Court_
in the _Strand_. MDCCLIV.
[Price One Shilling.]
[Decoration]
Critical Remarks, _&c._
SIR,
I hope you will take nothing amiss that may be said in the
following remarks on your compositions; I firmly believe
that your motive in writing them was a laudable intention to
promote and revive the declining causes of religion and
virtue. And when I have said so much, I have surely a right
from you to the same favourable interpretation of my design,
in publishing these Considerations on them, and endeavouring
to shew how far you have fallen short of your commendable
purpose.
That your writings have in a great measure corrupted our
language and taste, is a truth that cannot be denied. The
consequences abundantly shew it. By the extraordinary
success you have met with, if you are not to be reckoned a
classical author, there is certainly a very bad taste
prevailing at present. Our language, though capable of great
improvements, has, I imagine, been for some time on the
decline, and your works have a manifest tendency to hasten
that on, and corrupt it still farther. Generally speaking,
an odd affected expression is observable through the whole,
particularly in the epistles of Bob Lovelace. His many
new-coin'd words and phrases, Grandison's _meditatingly_,
Uncle Selby's _scrupulosities_; and a vast variety of
others, all of the same Stamp, may possibly become Current
in common Conversation, be imitated by other writers, or by
the laborious industry of some future compiler, transferred
into a Dictionary, and sanctioned by your great Authority.
Your success has farther corrupted our taste, by giving
birth to an infinite series of other compositions all of the
same kind, and equally, if not more, trifling than your's. A
catalogue of them would look like a Bible genealogy, and
were I to undertake the task of giving it, I should be
obliged to invoke the muse, as Homer does before he begins
the catalogue of the ships in his second Iliad. How long the
currency of such compositions may continue, how many may be
annually poured forth from the press, is more than any man
can say, without being endued with the spirit of prophesy.
But, without making any such pretensions, I can foretel,
that if ever a good taste universally prevails, your
romances, as well as all others, will be as universally
neglected, and that in any event their fate will not be much
better; for what recommends them to the notice of the
present age is, their novelty, and their gratifying an idle
and insatiable curiosity. In a few years that novelty will
wear off, and that Curiosity will be equally gratified by
other Compositions, it may be, as trifling, but who will
then have the additional charm of novelty, to recommend
them. Such, Sir, must be the fate of all works which owe
their success to a present capricious humor, and have not
real intrinsic worth to support them.
Short-lived then as they are, and must be, in their own
nature, it might be thought cruel to hasten them to the
grave, could that be effected by any thing I have in my
power to say, if they did not prevent the success, and
stifle in the birth, works which have a just title to life,
fame and immortality. Human genius is pretty much the same
in all ages and nations, but its exertion, and its
displaying itself to advantage, depend on times, accidents,
and circumstances. There are, no doubt, writers in the
present age, who, did they meet with proper encouragement,
might be capable of producing what would last to posterity,
and be read and admired by them. We have some good poets,
such as the authors of Elfrida, the Church-yard Elegy, and
the Poem on Agriculture; a performance which would have been
highly valued in an Augustan age, and is the best, perhaps
the only Georgic in our language. By the great manner in
which the author has executed the first part of his noble
plan, he has shewn himself sufficiently able for the rest;
but by his not prosecuting it, I imagine he has not met with
the deserved success. This may possibly be imputed to its
coming abroad at an improper time. I remember it was first
advertised just when the Memoirs of Sir Charles Grandison
were appearing by piece-meal. This was a very injudicious
step, for who could be supposed to attend to any thing else,
when the lovely Harriet Byron continued in suspence, when
the fate of Lady Clementina was undetermined, when it was
not yet settled, whether she was to marry Grandison, retire
to a Nunnery, or continue crack-brain'd all her lifetime.
After all, I am well-pleased to see Grandison and Harriet
fairly buckled. And I hope soon to hear, that the ceremony
is performed between the Count de Belvedere and Lady
Clementina. I am afraid there could have been no compleat
happiness in the matrimonial union of the English Gentleman
and the Italian Lady. The marriage state may be aptly enough
compared to two fiddles playing in concert: if the one can
sound no higher than Tweedle-dum, and the other no lower
than Tweedle-dee, there never can be any thing but a
perpetual jarring discord and dissonance betwixt them. In
the same manner the difference in religious sentiments would
have been a great allay in the felicity of that illustrious
couple.
I now proceed, Sir, to the principal business of this
address, which is, to enquire how far your writings have
contributed to promote the causes of religion and virtue,
for which, as you say, and I believe, they were chiefly
intended.
It is, no doubt, the indispensable duty of every writer to
promote, as far as lies in his power, in the society, of
which he is a member, the advancement of virtue, especially
the moral and social duties of mutual good-will and
universal benevolence. And as far as the established
religious system of a country has the same tendency, so far
is every man, who writes a popular treatise, let his private
sentiments, with respect to the pretensions it makes to
truth and a divine original, be what they will, obliged to
recommend it to the belief of the people. It is equally his
duty, if not more so, to inculcate on their minds a
reverence and regard for the established religious
corporation, and to avoid saying or doing any thing which
may subject them to ridicule and contempt. It must be owned,
that your conduct in these articles, especially the last,
cannot be sufficiently commended. Your works are designed
for the perusal of people in all ranks, they have had an
universal run, and in them you have not only shewn yourself
a pious Christian, and a good _Bible-scholar_, but you have
made all your heroines the same, and have besides introduced
the Characters of several pious and worthy clergymen, and
represented them acting in very advantageous lights. For
these things, as I observed just now, you cannot be more
than enough applauded; and no doubt your writings have in so
far produced a good effect; but I am afraid you have not
acted consistently throughout, for you have not only brought
in your hero Lovelace, but Mr. Moden, the only virtuous male
character in your Clarissa, expressing contempt for the
clergy. Now, in my opinion, a virtuous man, and we have had
several instances of that kind among the ancients, may very
consistently despise the public religion, but he will never
allow himself to bring the order belonging to it under
contempt. In fact, it is the clergy alone who render a
public religion useful and valuable, let its divine original
be a truth never so evident, it could have no influence upon
the people, unless they should be catechized and instructed
in it by the clergy; and though we should suppose it
downright nonsense, yet that order of men must always be
reckoned a venerable and necessary institution, in as far as
they are teachers of moral duties to the people, and
recommend to them the practice of virtue, either by precept
or example.
Another thing in which I humbly conceive you have been in
the wrong, is this: you constantly express a great virulence
against those whom you call sentimental unbelievers, and
take all opportunities to render them the objects of public
odium and detestation. You cannot but be sensible, that such
a conduct is contrary to the first and great duties of
social virtue. Ought you to quarrel with any man because he
is taller or shorter, fairer or blacker than yourself? And
yet we can no more help our differing in speculative
opinions than in stature or complexion. If you happen to
feel the knowledge and perception of divine things
supernaturally implanted on your mind, rejoice and be happy,
but let not your Wrath arise against those who are not blest
with the same sensations. Would you be angry with any man
because his eye-sight cannot distinguish objects at such a
great distance as yours? Why then quarrel with another for a
deficiency of the same kind in spiritual optics? No doubt
you will assert, that the truth of the present religious
system may be proved by a long connected chain of
demonstrative arguments. But if I might be allowed, without
offence, to give my opinion in this matter, as far as you
are concerned, I should say, that such an assertion is in
you unbecoming, as well as the conduct you observe in
consequence unjust and imprudent. The assertion is in you
unbecoming, because, whatever you may think, the question,
whether there was ever a divine revelation given, or a
miracle wrought, or whether, supposing such things done,
they can be proved to the conviction of a rational
unprejudiced man, by moral evidence, and human testimony,
requires more learning and judgment than you are possessed
of, to determine with any precision. It requires, indeed,
the greatest and most universal skill and knowledge in
nature and her philosophy, which has not come to your share,
as appears from your writings, where, as may easily be
perceived, you retail all that little you have pickt up. The
more knowledge a man has, he will always be the less
assuming; and a positive stiffness, especially in
commonly-received opinions, is a certain sign and constant
attendant of ignorance. Socrates, the wisest man among the
wisest people, after all his researches declared, that all
that he knew was, that he knew nothing. Cicero, the greatest
master of reason that ever lived, was a professed academic
or sceptist. And a learned and virtuous modern, whom I
forbear to name, in a letter to an intimate friend,
confessed, that the more he thought, he found the more
reason to doubt, and had always been more successful in
discovering what was false, than what was true. Those
illustrious three, learned, virtuous, and lovers of their
country, to whom it would be difficult, perhaps impossible,
to add a fourth, were all sentimental unbelievers, and all
at the same time inculcated a reverence and regard to the
established religions of their respective countries. Nay,
all sentimental unbelievers, had they not been provoked by
the ill-judged bigotry of their adversaries, would have
adhered unanimously to the same maxims. If their unbelief
proceeds from a consciousness of the weakness and limited
state of the human understanding, the constant result of
true learning and philosophy, they will be the more firmly
convinced of the great utility and absolute necessity of a
public form of worship, and a religious corporation, and
uniformly square their conduct accordingly. It was therefore
unjust, as well as imprudent, in you, Sir, who are a popular
writer, and whose works are read by every body, to endeavour
to render sceptical free-thinkers, from their own principles
the fastest and sincerest friends to religion in general,
the objects of odium and detestation to the believers in
that particular religion, which happens to be at present
established by law. This, Sir, and I shall say no more,
I hope may be said, from general principles, without offence
to any party, without determining or declaring my own
sentiments, which are in the right, and which in the wrong,
with respect to the truth of their opinions.
I now proceed to the last thing proposed in these remarks,
to examine how far your compositions have a natural tendency
to advance virtue. They are all strictly dramatical, and
therefore, whether they have a good or a bad tendency, they
must exert themselves with a stronger influence on the minds
of those who are affected by them. In all works of this
kind, in order to make them truly valuable and useful, all,
at least one of these three things ought to be done. First,
by the constitution of the plot or the fable, some great and
useful moral ought to be enforced and recommended. In the
second place, the characters which are introduced ought to
be so contrived, that the readers should be induced to
imitate their virtues, or avoid their vices. Or, lastly,
some one great moral virtue ought to be inculcated, by
making it the characteristic of the Hero, or the chief
person in the dramatic work. In these, as in every other
species of poetry and composition, the divine Homer has
excelled all other writers, he reigns unrivalled in them
all, and will for ever be without a competitor; insomuch,
that one certain way of judging the merit or demerit of all
other authors, is, to enquire how near they have approached,
or how far they have fallen short of this standard of
perfection in writing. I shall now examine how far you, in
your several performances, have succeeded, with respect to
these articles, in the same order wherein they are set down.
I have perused your late work, Grandison, carefully, and I
hope impartially, with this view, and for my Heart I cannot
so much as perceive the least shadow of either plot, fable,
or action. If there are any, they certainly lie far out of
the reach of my gross observation. Obvious they are not,
which they ought to be to the most common reader. It may,
indeed, be said, that no certain judgment can be formed of
it, in that respect, till the whole is compleated. But it is
no difficult matter to make probable conjectures about the
contents of the volume still in embrio. We shall probably be
entertained with a description of the nuptials between Lady
Clementina and the Count de Belvedere; that happy couple,
with Signor Jeronymo, and the rest of the Porretta family,
will certainly pay a visit to Grandison and his admired
Harriet; Beauchamp will be married to _that rogue_ Emily, in
whom he already _meditates his future wife_; _the good
doctor_ Bartlet may possibly pick up the dowager Lady
Beauchamp; but if the dowager Lady should chuse a younger
bedfellow, a match may be made up between him and _old aunt_
Nell; or if _old aunt_ Nell should continue obstinately
determined against matrimony, the _good doctor_ and
_grandmama_ Shirley may go to church together. And now, Sir,
though all these desirable events should be happily
accomplished, I should still be of the same opinion; nor can
I see any moral that could be drawn from them, unless it be
this, that men and women, old and young, after a certain
ceremony is performed, may go to bed together, without shame
or scandal, or any fear of being called to account for so
doing by the churchwardens. The plot and fable of your
Pamela may indeed be easily enough discovered. They consist
in Mr. B.'s attempts to debauch his beautiful waiting-maid;
in her resistance, and their happy nuptials. If we look for
a moral, we shall find the only one that can be extracted
out of it to be very ridiculous, useless, and impertinent;
it appears to be this, that when a young gentleman of
fortune cannot obtain his ends of a handsome servant girl,
he ought to marry her; and that the said girl ought to
resist him, in expectation of that event. Thus it is
manifest, that these two compositions are equally below
criticism, in this article, and, to do you justice, it must
be confessed, that your Clarissa is as much above it. When
considered in this light, it seems to be entirely Homerical.
That divine poet, in his Iliad, has inculcated by one fable,
and in the continuation of one action, two great and noble
morals. The first is, that discord among chiefs or allies
engaged in a confederacy, ruins their common designs, and
renders them unsuccessful; and the second, that concord and
agreement secure them prosperity in all their undertakings.
In the same manner, in the first part of Clarissa, we find
the bad consequences of the cruel treatment of parents
towards their children, and forcing their inclinations in
marriage; and in the second part, we see a fine example of
the pernicious effects of a young lady's reposing confidence
or engaging in correspondence with a man of profligate and
debauched principles. I do not at present recollect any
composition which, view'd in this light, can be compared
with the Iliad and Clarissa. The morals of the first are of
the utmost importance in public life, and those of the last
in private life. If the little states and republicks of
Greece, for whom Homer's poems were originally calculated,
had adhered uniformly to their maxims, they would have been
invincible, and must have subsisted to this day in all their
glory and splendor. In the same manner, if the morals
contained, and so admirably enforced by example, in your
Clarissa, had their due weight, a vast variety of mischiefs
and miseries in private life would be prevented. There is
nothing in which parents are apter to stretch their
authority too far, than in the article of marriage; there is
nothing in which they pay less regard to the happiness of
their children; nothing in which they allow less to the
influence of passion and inclination in them; and nothing in
which they are more sway'd by the dirty grovling passions of
vanity, pride, and avarice, themselves. On the other hand,
there is nothing in which young ladies, even of the greatest
modesty and discretion, more readily fall into errors. It is
pretty certain, that where they are allowed freely to follow
their own biass, they generally prefer either real or
reputed rakes, to men of a regular life and more sober
deportment. I have often been puzzled in endeavouring to
account for this conduct in the female world, so entirely
contrary to what all of them think their real and most
valuable interests. I have sometimes been tempted to impute
it to the truth of this satyrical maxim in the poet,
That _every woman is at heart a rake_,
and that, custom and education having deterred them from the
practice, they cannot help loving the theory in themselves,
and preferring the practice in others. But I rather incline
to attribute it to a cruel and unjust policy in the other
sex, who have deceived and bubbled them in this, as well as
several other articles, and have persuaded them of the truth
of this notable maxim, that rakes make the best husbands,
than which, as experience abundantly testifies, nothing can
be more false. A rake, indeed, may be a good husband while
the honey-moon lasts, for so long, perhaps, may novelty have
a charm; but when that is ended, the lust of variety, the
distinguishing characteristic of a rake, haunts him
incessantly, like a ghost, and soon extinguishes all his
principles of love, justice, and generosity. It is true,
indeed, the proverb goes, that a reformed rake makes the
best husband. It may be so, but then it is a truth of equal
importance with this, that a pick-pocket going to the
gallows is an honest man. His hands are tied behind him, and
he has it not in his power to be otherwise; in the same
manner a reformed rake is honest, because he has lost the
ability to be otherwise, and he naturally fondles and doats
upon his wife, that she may overlook deficiencies in more
essential articles. He acts entirely from the same
principles with those profuse and liberal old keepers, who
are said to pay for what they cannot do.
Should we now examine how you have succeeded in contriving
your characters, so as to be fit objects of imitation, if
virtuous, and if vicious, so as to be proper examples for
deterring others from the like practices, we shall find the
principal ones extremely faulty, generally quite destitute
of poetical probability, and in a word, far short of the
Homeric standard. Homer's characters are for the most part
drawn beyond the life; but the art with which he has reduced
them to truth, and probability, is surprising. He has
prodigiously exaggerated the bodily strength of Ajax, but
then he has rendered all probable, by representing him of
dull and heavy intellects. For it is a fact, that, with
bulky unwieldy force, we generally connect the idea of a
slow understanding. How consistently prudent is Ulysses,
thro' the whole of his character; we never see him err thro'
rashness, but rather commit faults, thro' an over caution.
How wonderfully are we reconciled to the great garrulity of
the venerable Nestor, which would be inexcusable, did we not
reflect, at the same time, on his extreme old age, of which
the poet never fails to remind us? How readily do we excuse
the ferocity of Achilles, when we reflect that the generous
youth prefers a short life, with fame and reputation, to a
length of days, with peace and happiness? How artfully are
we prevented from being shocked at his cruelty, in
slaughtering without distinction, or remorse, all who come
in his way? When we are told that he himself is acting under
the certainty of meeting his death before the Trojan Wall?
In short, Homer is possessed of this peculiar secret, to
contrive and add such circumstances that render all his
characters probable, and to blend vices and virtues of a
similar quality so together, as to render them all uniformly
consistent. And now tho' I confess, with pleasure, that
you are far from being destitute of merit, in some of
the characters you draw, yet you seem to be intirely
unacquainted with this secret. In order to illustrate my
assertion, I shall run thro' your principal characters in a
cursory and desultory manner.
In Grandison, you have endeavoured to give an example of
universal goodness and benevolence. But I am afraid you have
strained and stretched that character too far; you have
furnished him with too great a variety of accomplishments,
some of them destructive, at least not so consistent with
the principal and most shining virtue. _The man is every
thing_, as Lucy or Harriet says; which no man ever was, or
will be. Homer in the Odyssey, and in the character of
Euemæus, has given an example of universal benevolence; but
then he represents him an entire rustic, living constantly
in the country, shunning all public concourse of men, the
court especially, and never going thither, but when obliged
to supply the riotous luxury and extravagance of the
suitors. Mr. Fielding has imitated these circumstances, as
far as was consistent with our manners, in the character of
Allworthy, and has with admirable judgment denied him an
university education, made him a great lover of retirement,
seldom absent from his country seat, never at the metropolis
but when called by business, and constantly leaving it, when
that was over. The ingenious authoress of David Simple,
perhaps the best moral romance that we have, in which there
is not one loose expression, one impure, one unchaste idea;
from the perusal of which, no man can rise unimproved, has
represented, her hero, a character likewise of universal
benevolence, agreeably to the part he was to act; of tender
years, quite unimproved by education, unexperienced, and
ignorant of the ways of the world. Should we now consider
the matter a little deeply, we shall find a reason in nature
for the practice of these just painters of men and manners.
A human creature, in a simple unimproved state, is naturally
generous and benevolent; but when he comes abroad into the
world, and observes the universal depravity of morals, and
the narrow selfishness that every where prevail, according
to his particular temper or circumstances, he is either
contaminated by the example, or contracts a misanthropical
disposition, and hates or despises the greatest part of his
species. There may be, and no doubt there are, men who have
seen the world, who have been conversant, even in courts,
during their whole lives, who yet have retained and
exercised humane and benevolent dispositions; but such
characters are very rare, and, for the reasons above
specified, never can be poetically probable. Such, Sir, is
your Grandison; he seems never to have enjoyed retirement,
to have been abroad almost all his life-time, to have seen
all the courts in Europe, and been conversant, with the
great, rich, and powerful, in all nations. You represent him
likewise to be a man universally learned, and tell us, at
the same time, in capital letters, that SIR CH. GRAN. is a
CHRISTIAN; and that too, in the strictest and most bigotted
sense of the word; for he refuses the woman he loves, for a
difference in religious principles. This, in my humble
opinion, is likewise an inconsistency, for universal
learning naturally leads to scepticism, and the most useful,
as well as solid branch of human knowledge, consists in
knowing how little can be known. There are several other
inconsistencies in his character, particularly in some of
his duelling stories; besides, at any rate, his benevolence
has something showy and ostentatious in it; nothing in short
of that graceful and beautiful nature which appears in
Fielding's Allworthy.
The character of Lovelace is yet more inconsistent, still
more deficient in poetical probability, and indeed intirely
contradictory to Homer and nature. In all Homer's works,
there are not two characters between whom there is a greater
contrast and opposition, than between those of Achilles and
Ulysses. They enjoy no quality in common, but that of
valour; and the valour of the one is as different from that
of the other, as can well be imagin'd; for they all along
partake of their general characters, and are consistent with
them. But you, Sir, who, in the mouth of Harriet Byron and
that _dear flighty creature_ Lady G. sometimes take upon you
to criticize that great master of nature, shew that you have
either never studied him, or profited very little by him;
for in this one character of Lovelace, you have united these
two dissimilar and discordant characters of Achilles and
Ulysses; you have given him all the fierceness, cruelty, and
contempt of laws, impetuosity, rashness, in short, all the
furious ungovernable passions of the one, and have at the
same time provided him with all the cunning, craft,
dissimulation, and command over his passions, which so much
distinguish the other. How to reconcile to probability, or
even to possibility, the existence of such opposite and
contradictory qualities in one human bosom, is a task which
I leave to you.
The fine, or rather the _naughty gentleman_, in your Pamela,
to whom Mr. Fielding very properly gives the sirname of
Booby, is indeed one of the greatest bubbles, and blunderers
that one can meet withal. You have informed us, that he had
been a great rake, and had debauched several women; 'tis
well you have done so, but he certainly had made little
proficiency in that laudable science, for, from his whole
behaviour towards his Pamela, one should be apt to think him
the meerest novice in the world. He opens trenches before
her properly enough, by giving her silk stockings and fine
cloaths to feed her pride and vanity; but when he comes to
make a more direct attack in the summer-house, how
sheepishly does he act, and what blunders does he not
commit? He attempts to kiss her, the girl, as is natural,
struggles, and grows angry; he lets her go, and bribes her,
with five guineas, to keep the secret. This was knocking his
project in the head at once; and had he been guilty of no
other blunders, as he was of innumerable, was sufficient to
ruin his cause with her for ever. He was not to expect, that
a girl, piously educated, would surrender at the very first,
especially to a summons given in so blunt and indelicate a
manner; on the contrary, he ought to have laid his account
with meeting a good deal of anger and resistance; to have
born all, with patience, and laughed off his attempt for an
innocent frolic; and if she threatened to inform Mrs.
Jervis, to have bidden her do so, and told her, that he
would kiss Mrs. Jervis and her both. In which case she never
would have opened her lips about the matter; in every
succeeding attempt, he would have met with less and less
resistance, till at last he might have accomplished his
desires, before Miss Pamela had certainly known what he
would be at. But by his offering to bribe her to silence, he
betrayed all his designs, and informed her she had a secret
to keep, which unless she had been constitutionally vicious,
it was imposible for her not to disclose. Mr. Booby shews
likewise the utmost ignorance of human nature, in thinking
to gain his ends with a young and innocent girl by the force
of money. All young girls are taught to put a value on their
virginity, and unless debauched by their own sex, they never
will part with it, but to those they like. None but
well-disciplin'd ladies of the town are to be gained upon by
meer money; and Mr. Booby, by the whole of his conduct,
appears to be nothing but a downright Covent-garden rake. He
was resolved to have Pamela, and marriage was indeed the
only way left for him. This your first performance concludes
with that happy event, and having sold well, I imagine you
was induced to continue the story. But had I undertaken that
task, without violating the probability or the consistency
of the characters, I should have introduced Parson Williams
very fairly making a cuckold of Booby, and providing him
with an heir to his estate, which is the way all such
Boobies ought to be treated, and a proper catastrophe for
all such preposterous matches.
Your three Heroines are, Pamela, Harriet, and Clarissa,
ladies all renowned for chastity and _Bible-scholarship_.
The chastity of the first was from beginning to end never
well attackt, and the defence she made is so far from being
extraordinary, that had she surrendered at discretion, it
ought to have been reckoned miraculous. There is nothing
very characteristic about Harriet, yet is she a good sort of
a girl enough, especially as times go. _The men are sunk,
and the women barely swim_, saith the lively Charlotte
Grandison. But the character of Clarissa is, indeed,
admirable throughout the whole. Nature and propriety are not
only strictly observed, but we see the greatest nobleness of
soul, generosity of sentiments, filial affection, delicacy,
modesty, and every female virtue, finely maintained and
consistently conspicuous all along. The circumstances which
induced her noble and generous spirit to contract a liking
for Lovelace, are finely imagin'd; her delicacy and reserve,
her disgust at his teazing ways, after she was in his power,
are naturally to be expected from a woman of her superior
accomplishments. There is something excessively pathetic, and
accomplishments. There is something excessively pathetic, and
even sublime, in her first address to him, after she was
betrayed; her constant refusal of his proffer'd hand, her
resignation to her fate, and her behaviour to her
hard-hearted relations, are all equally noble, and all
natural in a Clarissa. Her character, in short, is such,
that unless one should be hunting for faults, scarce any can
be found; and perhaps it is owing to such a disposition in
me, that I cannot help observing she is rather too good, at
least too methodically so: The division of her time, and her
diary had been better omitted; all such things detract from
the nature and simplicity of a character. The characters of
her family are finely marked and distinguished, and well
adapted for bringing on the catastrophe. There is something
likewise extremely noble and generous in the friendship
between Clarissa and Miss Howe. But I must here observe,
that in this, your capital performance, you seem in a good
measure to have exhausted your invention with respect to
characters. For instance, that _dear flighty creature_ Lady
G. is nothing else but a second edition of _Madam Howe's
lively daughter_. They are both wits, and have both high
notions of female prerogative, and the pre-eminence of their
own sex over the other; they had both like to have run away
with too worthless fellows, and both afterwards treated two
honest well-meaning men, during the time of their courtship,
like dogs; and both, I imagine, for all these reasons, will
be great favourites with the female part of your readers.
Pollexfen and his crew very much resemble Lovelace and his
Beelzebubs; and Grandmamma Shirley is nothing else but a
_second mamma_ Horton; as Lord Goosecap is another Hickman.
It would take up too much time to animadvert upon all the
rest of your male and female characters. I shall only
observe in general, that you seem to have succeeded better
in your subordinate ones, than in the principal; the divine
Clarissa, as you justly call her, always excepted. Though
some are faulty, yet many appear to be well marked and
distinguished.
The third and last thing that is to be done in an epic or
dramatic composition is, to inculcate some one great moral
virtue, by making it the characteristic of the hero or the
chief person. Thus Homer, in his Odyssey, proposes Ulysses
as an example of prudence he professes to sing,
+Ton andra polutropon.+
_The man for wisdom's various arts renown'd._
And Virgil, in the person of Æneas, gives an example of
piety to the Gods, he sings the pious Æneas. In the same
manner, in the memoirs of Sir Cha. Grandison you propose an
example of benevolence, and in Pamela of chastity; you
celebrate the benevolent Grandison and the chaste Pamela.
I have already, in the two foregoing articles, given my
opinion sufficiently of the first, and shall here say
somewhat more of the latter, and enquire a little into the
nature of chastity.
The influence of custom, habit, and education, over human
minds is prodigious and inconceivable. It is so great and
extensive, that perhaps it is utterly impossible to
determine what principles or conceptions we receive from
nature, and what from the other sources. All women of honour
and condition among civilized nations imagine, that what are
called virgin delicacy and reserve, female chastity and
modesty, are not only fit and proper, but natural and
inherent in their sex. Fit and proper they certainly are, as
the universal consent of all ages and nations shews; and
besides, that fitness and propriety is founded on the nature
of things, but natural and inherent they are not, as is
equally manifest from experience. In ancient Greece, where
the women were remarkable both for continence before
marriage, and fidelity after it, customs prevailed
diametrically opposite to all our most established notions
of modesty and delicacy. It was customary among them, for
the women to perform the offices of rubbers, sweaters, and
cuppers to the men, when bathing; nor was this the
employment of the servants, or female slaves, but of young
ladies of the highest rank and quality. Thus, in the third
Odyssey, when Telemachus is entertained at Nestor's palace,
his youngest daughter,
_Sweet Polycaste, takes the pleasing toil,_
_To bathe the prince, and pour the fragrant oil._