SAMUEL RICHARDSON

[Samuel Richardson was born in 1689, and died in 1761. He was a printer by trade, and was the author of three works: Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded (1740); Clarissa, or the History of a Young Lady (1749); and The History of Sir Charles Grandison (1753).]

THE conscious and ostentatiously avowed end of Richardson's writings was moral edification; and doubtless much of what he wrote can serve no other. In Pamela he designed to recommend virtue to young women through a series of familiar letters; and the result is a monument of vulgarity, and an outrage upon morals. Sir Charles Grandison carries no less heavy a burden of moral purpose; but the picture of the ideal man, whose sole fault is a trifling hastiness of temper, and whom fortune has endowed with vast wealth, an agreeable person, engaging manners, and everything that can make virtue easy and vice detestable—if frequently ridiculous and not seldom fatiguing, is never offensive.

But Richardson is to be reckoned in the not inconsiderable number of those artists whose practice has triumphed over their principles. In Clarissa he attempted to compose a tract to prove (apparently) that a sincere belief in religion may consist with the most unbridled profligacy; and he contrived to produce one of the masterpieces of English literature. The characters are discriminated with nicety, and sustained with consistency; of the innumerable details scarce one is irrelevant; of the countless subtle strokes, scarce one superfluous; for Richardson was no niggler. The conduct of the plot is a model of ingenuity and artifice; every incident contributes to the one supreme effect; nor is any other modern tragedy so informed with the sense of the imminent inevitable. The character of Clarissa is noble and affecting. She meets her peril with courage, her ruin with dignity, and her end with cheerfulness. But it is in the portrayal of

Lovelace that Richardson's genius reaches its culmination. His plottings may seem, at first sight, too elaborate, his villanies overcharged, his confidences childish. But regarded in their true proportions, they combine to produce one harmonious and triumphant whole, which at once satisfies and captivates the imagination. Among the villains of fiction Lovelace still stands lonely, inimitable, and unapproached.

Richardson has undoubtedly a stronger claim than any other writer to be considered the father of the English novel; and in many of the essentials of his art he has never been surpassed. His convention of a correspondence between the characters is probably as good as a better, though he does nothing to help it out by inventing excuses for such an excess of letter writing. His style, at its worst, is diffuse, clumsy, and involved; and, at its best, is no more than blunt, direct, and unaffected. When his characters are discussing the "social problems" of their day the diction is no better than the average contemporary pamphleteer's. His vocabulary is commonplace, shows no trace of selection, and is disfigured by that abuse of the current poetical phraseology into which even a Thomson was sometimes betrayed, and by force of which tears are transformed into "pearly fugitives." We are not, indeed, to look to Richardson for that nameless quality of style which is the property of a scholar and a gentleman, such as Fielding was; for Richardson belonged to neither category. On the other hand, it would be grossly unfair to be blind to the great knack of extremely racy and idiomatic colloquial English which he displays in his dialogue; or to grudge him the merits of straightforwardness and spirit; or to refuse to admit that at times he shows complete command over an instrument of moderate powers and compass. The effects, indeed, which he more than once achieves seem out of all proportion to the poverty of his means. Simple as these are, who that has been thrilled with righteous anger at Lovelace's triumph, or melted with compassion at Clarissa's death, will venture to deny that, twice or thrice at all events, he has turned them to the best possible account?

J. H. MILLAR,

MISS CLARISSA HARLOWE TO MISS HOWE

Friday, three o'clock.

My sister is but this moment gone from me. She came up all in a flame; which obliged me abruptly to lay down my pen; she ran to me—

O Spirit! said she, tapping my neck a little too hard. And is it come to this at last!

Do you beat me, Bella?

Do you call this beating you? only tapping your shoulder thus, said she, tapping again more gently-this is what we expected it would come to you want to be independent-my father has lived too long for you!

I was going to speak with vehemence; but she put her handkerchief before my mouth, very rudely-You have done enough with your pen, mean listener, as you are! But know that neither your independent scheme, nor any of your visiting ones, will be granted you. Take your course, perverse one! Call in your rake to help you to an independence upon your parents, and a dependence upon him!-Do so!-Prepare this moment—resolve what you will take with you—to-morrow you go-depend upon it to-morrow you go!—No longer shall you stay here, watching and creeping about to hearken to what people say. 'Tis determined, child!—You go to-morrow-my brother would have come up to tell you so; but I persuaded him to the contrary-for I know not what had become of you if he had. Such a letter! such an insolent, such a conceited challenger! Oh thou vain creature! But prepare yourself, I say-to-morrow you go-my brother will accept of your bold challenge; but it must be personal: and at my uncle Antony's— or perhaps at Mr. Solmes's

Thus she ran on, almost foaming with passion; till, quite out of patience, I said, No more of your violence, Bella.--Had I

known in what way you designed to come up, you should not have found my chamber-door open-talk to your servant in this manner. Unlike you, as I bless God I am, I am nevertheless your sister and let me tell you that I won't go to-morrow, nor the next day, nor next day to that except I am dragged away by violence.

What! not if your father or your mother command it-Girl! said she, intending another word, by her pause and manner before it came out.

Let it come to that, Bella; then I shall know what to say. But it shall be from their own mouths, if I do-not from yours, nor your Betty's.—And say another word to me, in this manner, and be the consequence what it may, I will force myself into their presence; and demand what I have done to be used thus !

Come along child! Come along, Meekness-taking my hand, and leading me towards the door-Demand it of them now-you'll find both your despised parents together!-What! does your heart fail you?-for I resisted being thus insolently offered to be led, and pulled my hand from her.

I want not to be led, said I; and since I can plead your invitation, I will go and was posting to the stairs accordingly in my passion-but she got between me and the door, and shut it

Let me first, bold one, said she, apprise them of your visitfor your own sake let me-for my brother is with them. But yet opening it again, seeing me shrink back-Go, if you will!— Why don't you go?—Why don't you go, Miss?—following me to my closet, whither I retired, with my heart full, and pulled the sash-door after me; and could no longer hold in my tears.

Nor would I answer one word to her repeated aggravations, nor to her demands upon me to open the door (for the key was on the inside); nor so much as turn my head towards her, as she looked through the glass at me. And at last, which vexed her to the heart, I drew the silk curtain that she should not see me, and down she went muttering all the way.

Is not this usage enough to provoke a rashness never before thought of?

As it is but too probable that I may be hurried away to uncle's without being able to give you previous notice of it; I beg you that as soon as you shall hear of such a violence, you

would send to the usual place, to take back such of your letters as may not have reached my hands, or to fetch any of mine that may be there.-May you, my dear, be always happy, prays your

CLARISSA HARLOWE.

(From Clarissa.)

MR. LOVELACE TO JOHN BELFORD, ESQ.

At Mrs. Sinclair's, Monday afternoon.

DREADING what might happen as to her intellects, and being very apprehensive that she might go through a great deal before morning (though more violent she could not well be with the worst she dreaded), I humoured her, and ordered Will to endeavour to get a coach directly, to carry us to Hampstead; I cared not at what price.

Robbers, with whom I would have terrified her, she feared not—I was all her fear, I found; and this house her terror: for I saw plainly that she now believed that Lady Betty and Miss Montague were both impostors.

But her mistrust is a little of the latest to do her service!

And, O Jack, the rage of love, the rage of revenge is upon me! by turns they tear me ! The progress already made—the women's instigations—the power I shall have to try her to the utmost, and still to marry her, if she be not to be brought to cohabitation—let me perish, Belford, if she escape me now!

Will is this moment returned. No coach to be got either for love or money.

Once more she urges-to Mrs. Leeson's, let me go, Lovelace! Good Lovelace, let me go to Mrs. Leeson's. What is Miss Montague's illness to my terror? For the Almighty's sake, Mr. Lovelace !-her hands clasped !

Oh, my angel! What a wildness is this! Do you know, do you see, my dearest life, what appearances your causeless apprehensions have given you? Do you know it is past eleven o'clock ?

Twelve, one, two, three, four-any hour, I care not-if you mean me honourably, let me go out of this hated house!