Novelists From England

"Richardson is among English novelists the first analyst of the mind and the emotions: he is the inaugurator of the psychological novel. But his method differs widely from that of the psychological novelist of to-day, say George Meredith and Mr. Henry James. Richardson's method is purely objective, and in his analysis he does not set out upon a voyage of discovery. He stands firmly poised on his feet, satisfied with himself, and is unmoved in his dissection of the specimen which lies before him. His insight is objective, cold, hard, and unsympathetic. In a word, unlike the novelists of the latter decades of the nineteenth century, Richardson is not introspective. The mystery of individual character and personality interests us now, because we are impressed with the inexplicable mysteriousness of our own individuality. The novelist of to-day who probes into the secrets of the soul is the scholar who is perplexed with himself, and finds no master to instruct him. Richardson is imbued with the logical and scientific spirit of his age, and he approaches human life armed with his diploma as the qualified teacher. This is only to say that he belonged to his time, and knew nothing of that overstrained subjective temperament which is common with us."

"I have no horror of death: if I thought it inevitable I think I could quietly resign myself to the prospect ... But I wish it would please God to spare me not only for Papa's and Charlotte's sakes, but because I long to do some good in the world before I leave it. I have many schemes in my head for future practice – humble and limited indeed – but still I should not like them all to come to nothing, and myself to have lived to so little purpose. But God's will be done."

"But then to wake and find it flown, The dream of happiness destroyed, To find myself unloved, alone, What tongue can speak the dreary void? A heart whence warm affections flow, Creator, thou hast given to me, And am I only thus to know How sweet the joys of love would be?"

"You may rejoice to think yourselves secure, You may be grateful for the gift divine, That grace unsought which made your black hearts pure And fits your earthborn souls in Heaven to shine. But is it sweet to look around and view Thousands excluded from that happiness, Which they deserve at least as much as you, Their faults not greater nor their virtues less?"

"Except by Clarissa Harlowe I was never so moved by a work of genius as by Othello. I read seventeen hours a day at Clarissa, and held the book so long up leaning on my elbows in an arm-chair, that I stopped the circulation and could not move. When Lovelace writes, "Dear Belton, it is all over, and Clarissa lives," I got up in a fury and wept like an infant, and cursed and d——d Lovelace till exhausted. This is the triumph of genius over the imagination and heart of its readers."

"Sir, there is more knowledge of the heart in one letter of Richardson's, than in all Tom Jones."

"This is the creative spirit who, by means of instructive stories, commands us to feel the charm of virtue; who, by means of Grandison, extorts from the sinner himself a first wish to be pious also. The works which he created, no time can destroy; they are nature, taste, religion. Immortal is Homer, but among Christians the British Richardson is more immortal still."

"But in spite of his flatness and insensitiveness, his talent was great. His success came from the fact that he did know how people feel, and, above that, he could paint the intricacy of tragic feelings. Especially he knew how women feel, and how they would like to think they feel; and he was on their side. He describes himself as "with his eye always on the ladies"; he felt himself at home with them; he was always sizing up their air, their reactions, and their emotions. The milieu in which he set himself, his circle of women friends, did not, after all, serve only to swell his sense of prestige. Under that very explicit moral intention he preserved in addition a real artistic integrity."

"O! what a Godlike Power is that of doing Good! — I envy the Rich and the Great for nothing else!"

"While Richardson has been thus influential over the greatest authors of prose fiction on the Continent, he has been no less potent over the very feeblest of such writers as we in England read but do not boast of. Certainly few of our fashionable novelists have ever read Richardson, but nine-tenths of our fashionable novelists are exclusively erotic. Take the love-story away from their plots, and, insipid though the love-story be, nothing of a plot would remain. Now, those nine-tenths of our fashionable novelists would never have been erotic if Richardson, whom they have never read, had not written."

"Men eminent for piety, wisdom, and virtue, have recommended Richardson's Clarissa from the pulpit; a work which Dr. Johnson, (so generally unwilling to praise) has been often heard to pronounce, "not only the first novel, but perhaps the first work in our language, splendid in point of genius, and calculated to promote the dearest interests of religion and virtue.""

"Enjoy the blessings Heaven bestows, Assist his friends, forgive his foes; Trust God, and keep his statutes still, Upright and firm, through good and ill;Thankful for all that God has given, Fixing his firmest hopes on heaven; Knowing that earthly joys decay, But hoping through the darkest day."

"In love affairs, there is no mediator like a merry, simple-hearted child — ever ready to cement divided hearts, to span the unfriendly gulf of custom, to melt the ice of cold reserve, and overthrow the separating walls of dread formality and pride."

"Richardson was popular because he gave voice to sentiments that were already latent in society; it was because he anticipated the younger generation by giving expression to these feelings that he was so much idolized by it. Almost all the characteristics of the romantic school—its disregard of conventional literary form, its exaltation of emotion, its idealization of women, its preoccupation with the theme of education, its recognition of the moral value of the individual, are found in Richardson's novels. And, limiting our enquiry to his native land, it may be further remarked that a society, which notwithstanding its surface corruption was sound at heart, would not long remain content in the spiritual torpor that had overtaken it. The revulsion that is marked by the Wesleyan movement in religion, is marked in literature by the appearance of Richardson. Henceforth the moral tone of the nation becomes healthier... [N]ot his least claim to originality is that in an age of selfishness and brutality he appealed to higher sentiments, and awoke true and tender emotions in his readers."

"Bad news fly fast."

"There is such a thing as looking through a person's eyes into the heart, and learning more of the height, and breadth, and depth of another's soul in one hour than it might take you a lifetime to discover, if he or she were not disposed to reveal it, or if you had not the sense to understand it."

"A sinless God, for sinful men, Descends to suffer and to bleed; Hell must renounce its empire then; The price is paid, the world is freed, And Satan's self must now confess, That Christ has earned a Right to bless"

"The distant prospects were Anne's delight and when I look round she is in the blue tints, the pale mists, the waves and shadows of the horizon."

"I wish my sister felt the unfavourable [reviews on The Tenant of Wildfell Hall] less keenly. She does not say much, for she is of a remarkably taciturn, still, thoughtful nature, reserved even with her nearest of kin, but I cannot avoid seeing that her spirits are depressed sometimes..."

"We have all had severe colds and coughs in consequence of the severe weather. Poor Anne has suffered greatly from asthma, but is now, I am glad to say, rather better - she had two nights last week when her cough and difficulty of breathing were painful indeed to hear and witness and must have been most distressing to suffer - she bore it, as she does all affliction, without one complaint – only sighing now and then when nearly worn out – she has an extraordinary heroism of endurance. I admire, but certainly could not imitate her."

"On all her breezes borne Earth yields no scents like those; But he, that dares not grasp the thorn Should never crave the rose."

"I would fain hope that [Anne’s] health is a little stronger than it was – and her spirits a little better, but she leads much too sedentary a life, and is continually sitting stooping either over a book or over her desk – it is with difficulty one can prevail on her to take a walk or induce her to converse."

"It is deeds not words which must purchase my affection and esteem."

"God is Infinite Wisdom, and Power, and Goodness — and Love; but if this idea is too vast for your human faculties — if your mind loses itself in its overwhelming infinitude, fix it on Him who condescended to take our nature upon Him, who was raised to heaven even in His glorified human body, in whom the fullness of the Godhead shines."

"It is a troublesome thing this susceptibility to affronts where none are intended."

"If you loved as I do, she earnestly replied, you would not have so nearly lost me — these scruples of false delicacy and pride would never thus have troubled you — you would have seen that the greatest worldly distinctions and discrepancies of rank, birth, and fortune are as dust in the balance compared with the unity of accordant thoughts and feelings, and truly loving, sympathising hearts and souls."

"Poor child! she left us last Monday; no one went with her; it was her own wish that she might be allowed to go alone, as she thought she could manage better and summon more courage if thrown entirely upon her own resources."

"Don't you know that every time we meet the thoughts of the final parting will become more painful? Don't you feel that every interview makes us dearer to each other than the last?"

"Never mind our kind friends: if they can part our bodies, it is enough; in God's name, let them not sunder our souls!"

"He cannot endure Rachel, because he knows she has a proper appreciation of him."

"There is perfect love in heaven!"

"I shall expect my husband to have no pleasures but what he shares with me; and if his greatest pleasure of all is not the enjoyment of my company — why — it will be the worse for him — that's all." "If such are your expectations of matrimony, Esther, you must, indeed, be careful whom you marry — or rather, you must avoid it altogether."

"I'd rather be like myself, bad as I am."

"It is never too late to reform, as long as you have the sense to desire it, and the strength to execute your purpose."

"Increase of love brings increase of happiness, when it is mutual, and pure as that will be."

"God will judge us by our own thoughts and deeds, not by what others say about us."

"And you thought to rob me of my son too, and bring him up to be a dirty Yankee tradesman, or a low, beggarly painter?" "Yes, to obviate his becoming such a gentleman as his father."

"A hardness such as this is taught by rough experience and despair alone."

"You might as well sell yourself to slavery at once, as marry man you dislike."

"I will not allow myself to be worse than my fellows."

"Though I hate him from my heart, and should rejoice at any calamity that could befall him, I'll leave him to God; and though I abhor my own life, I'll leave that, too, to Him that gave it."

"To regret the exchange of earthly pleasures for the joys of heaven, is as if the grovelling caterpillar should lament that it must one day quit the nibbled leaf to soar aloft and flutter through the air, roving at will from flower to flower, sipping sweet honey from their cups, or basking in their sunny petals."

"Keep both heart and hand in your own possession, till you see good reason to part with them; and if such an occasion should never present itself, comfort your mind with this reflection, that though in single life your joys may not be very many, your sorrows, at least, will not be more than you can bear. Marriage may change your circumstances for the better, but, in my private opinion, it is far more likely to produce a contrary result."

"If you had no higher motive than the approval of your fellow mortal, it would do you little good."

"Chess-players are so unsociable, they are no company for any but themselves."

"I sometimes think she has no feeling at all; and then I go on till she cries — and that satisfies me."

"God have mercy on his miserable soul! and make him see and feel his guilt — I ask no other vengeance! If he could but fully know and truly feel my wrongs I should be well avenged, and I could freely pardon all."

"Adoration isn’t love. I adore Annabella, but I don’t love her; and I love thee, Milicent, but I don’t adore thee."

"A man must have something to grumble about; and if he can’t complain that his wife harries him to death with her perversity and ill-humour, he must complain that she wears him out with her kindness and gentleness."

"No generous mind delights to oppress the weak, but rather to cherish and protect."