Auto-biography of men, who held no distinguished rank in the political
world, is often very pleasant reading; especially where the writer has a
strong tincture of vanity, and is obviously blind to his own character;
for, if he does not know it himself, he is sure to let his readers know
it; if he does not see the dark spots, he will not endeavour to conceal
them; and, if he thinks them bright ones, he will blazon them. But
novel-writing, when well done, is, after all, the best species of
writing; for, if what all the world says, is true; what all the world
reads, must be good. A novel writer, of any talents, will draw his
portraits from the life--will catch at every striking feature, and
generally paint man as he is; and there is this difference between
actual histories and works of imagination, that the former are for the
most part true in letter, but false in spirit; and the latter, false in
letter, and true in spirit; the one is correct in names, dates, and
places, but out of truth in everything else: the other is not correct in
names, dates, and places, but perfectly true in every other point.
The worst part of a novel is the hero or heroine: these are too
frequently fabrications from the author's fancy, instead of portraits
from nature; or, if taken from life, they are tortured into a perfection
that life never knew. This is too much the case with "Thaddeus of
Warsaw," and ten thousand others. Ladies are not good hands in painting
heroes, nor gentlemen always equal to the portraying of heroines. The
author of _Werter_ knew that, and therefore he did not disfigure his
wicked and interesting work with an artificial Charlotte: he leaves her
to the reader's own fancy, who has nothing to do but to fancy himself
Werter, and his own imagination will paint Charlotte.
When the hero is made the vehicle of one moral lesson, as Vivian, in
Miss Edgeworth's "Tales of Fashionable Life," then there is no need of
artificial ornament; and when there is no intention of presenting an
unmixed character of evil, nothing remains but to draw from life, and
the work is perfect. One of Miss Edgeworth's failings is of great
service to her, in this kind of painting: she wants what some persons
call feeling, that is to say, she does not believe in the omnipotence of
love, and therefore would never have written such a book as the "Sorrows
of Werter;" and if she had possessed the same materials, she would have
produced a very different work--not so full of genius, perhaps, but an
interesting and instructive tale.
Novels are productions more easily criticised than any others: every one
may judge for himself of the truth or probability of the events, and the
accuracy of the features of character. It is impossible almost to
deceive a reader--to palm upon him fiction for truth; for the truth is
felt, if it be there, and the falsehood is palpable and revolting. There
is also an extensive light of information in them. They do not merely
give one scene, or character, or class of characters; but their
principles are generally applicable to a very wide extent--they exercise
the mind to a habit of observation, and so far from giving false views
of life, they more frequently direct us to its true estimate. To be
sure, there is sometimes a degree of improbability in some of the
incidents, which is mostly forgiven, if the whole mass be, in the main,
true and accurate. There are certain standard incidents, which are
common property--such as the discovery of relationships--the change of
children--and liberal aunts, who make nothing of presenting a young
married couple with twenty or thirty thousand pounds on their wedding
day; but, if any young lady or gentleman is silly enough to marry,
without the means of support, because they have read such things in
novels, and have also read of rich uncles all of a sudden returning from
the East or West Indies, to shower gold and pearls on all their
relations, all that must be said for them is, that they have not
sufficient sense to read "Aesop's Fables," and they might as easily be
misled into the imagination that brutes could talk. It is a very weak
charge against novels, that they present false views of life; for, when
they do, none but silly people read them; and they are just as wise
after, as they were before.
If there be any evil in novels at all, it is when they take people from
their business--when they occupy a mother's time to the neglect of her
children--when they lead idle boys to neglect their lessons, and when
they lead idle gentlefolks to fancy themselves employed, when they are
only killing time. W.P.S.
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