NOVEL

NOVEL, a fictitious narrative in prose, which professes to exhibit the natural workings of the human heart, the happiness and misery of private life, and, above all, the nature of the affection called Love, and the consequence of indulging it in certain circumstances.

The novel sprung out of the old romance, and has been censured for insipidity, as its parent was for extravagance. (See ROMANCE.) That the greater part of those absurd things, which, under this title, are daily issuing from the press, deserve all the contempt with which they can be treated, is a position which we feel not ourselves inclined to controvert; but we cannot admit that any species of writing is in itself insipid, merely because numbers have attempted it without success. The heroic poems of Blackmore are universally

Novel. versally known to be contemptible performances; and if we had before us all the heroic poetry that has ever been written, how many thousands of volumes should we have as mean as either Prince Arthur, King Arthur, Elise, or Alfred? Yet no critic has hitherto dared to maintain, that heroic poetry is an insipid species of writing.

But to the novel objections have been urged of more importance than its insipidity. It has been often affirmed, with learned solemnity, that the perusal of novels tends to corrupt the youth of both sexes; to produce effeminacy in men and extravagant notions of the happiness of love in women; that it diverts the minds of the former from more serious and useful studies, and exposes the latter to the arts of seduction. That there are too many novels to which this objection is applicable in its full force, is a fact which we are afraid cannot be denied: but when it is admitted, let not these performances be again accused of insipidity: for were they insipid, they could have no such consequences. It is by laying fast hold of the heart that they lead it astray. That a novel might be written so as to interest the heart in behalf of virtue, as much as any one has ever warped it to the side of vice, is a truth which no man will ever venture to call in question who has any knowledge of human nature; and therefore we are decidedly of opinion, that there may be novels worthy at once of the perusal of inexperienced youth and hoary wisdom. A critic*, by no means too indulgent to works of fancy, and among whose failings laxity of morals has never been numbered, thus expresses himself on the subject of novel-writing:—
"These familiar histories may perhaps be made of greater use than the solemnities of professed morality, and convey the knowledge of vice and virtue with more efficacy than axioms and definitions. But if the power of example is so great, as to take possession of the memory by a kind of violence, and produce effects almost without the intervention of the will, care ought to be taken, that, when the choice is unrestrained, the best examples only should be exhibited; and that what is likely to operate so strongly, should not be mischievous or uncertain in its effects."

We have said, that the novel professes above all things to exhibit the nature of love and its consequences. Whether this be essential to such performances may perhaps be reasonably questioned: but it has been made an important part of the drama in most novels, and, we think, with great propriety. It is the object of the novelist to give a true picture of life, diversified only by accidents that daily happen in the world, and influenced by passions and qualities which are really to be found in conversing with mankind. To accomplish this object, he conceives a hero or heroine, whom he places in a certain rank of life, endues with certain qualities of body and mind, and conducts, through many vicissitudes of fortune, either to the summit of happiness or to the abyss of misery, according to the passion which he wishes to excite in his readers. In the modern novel, this hero or heroine is never placed on a throne, or buried in a cottage; because to the monarch and the cottager no difficulties occur which can deeply interest the majority of readers. But among the virtuous part of the intermediate orders of society, that affection which we call

love seldom fails, at some period of life, to take possession of the hearts of both sexes; and wherever it has place, it must be productive of happiness or of misery. In the proper management of this passion consists much of the difficulty of the novel-writer. He must exhibit his hero as feeling all the pangs and pleasures of love, as sometimes animated with hope, and sometimes ready to sink into despair, but always exerting himself to obtain the gratification of his wishes. In doing this, care should be taken, either that he never transgresses the laws of virtue, or at least that he never transgresses them with impunity.

"It is justly considered as the greatest excellency of art to imitate nature; but it is necessary to distinguish those parts of nature which are most proper for imitation: greater care is still required in representing life, which is so often discoloured by passion or deformed by wickedness. If the world be promiscuously described, I cannot perceive (says the great critic already quoted) of what use it can be to read the account; or why it may not be as safe to turn the eye immediately upon mankind, as upon a mirror which shows all that presents itself without discrimination. It is therefore not a sufficient vindication of a character, that it is drawn as it appears; for many characters ought never to be drawn: nor of a narrative, that the train of events is agreeable to observation; for that observation which is called knowledge of the world will be found much more frequently to make men cunning than good. The purpose of these writings is surely not only to show mankind, but to provide that they may be seen hereafter with less hazard; to teach the means of avoiding the snares which are laid by TREACHERY for INNOCENCE, without ensuring any wish for that superiority with which the betrayer flatters his vanity; to give the power of counteracting fraud, without the temptation to practice it; to initiate youth by mock encounters in the art of necessary defence; and to increase prudence without impairing virtue.

"Many writers, for the sake of following nature, mingle good and bad qualities in their principal characters, that they are both equally conspicuous; and as we accompany them through their adventures with delight, and are led by degrees to interest ourselves in their favour, we lose the abhorrence of their faults, because they do not hinder our pleasures, or perhaps regard them with some kindness for being united with so much merit.—There have been men indeed splendidly wicked, whose endowments threw a brightness on their crimes, and whom scarce any villany made perfectly detestable, because they never could be wholly divested of their excellencies: but such have been in all ages the great corrupters of the world; and their resemblance ought no more to be preserved than the art of murdering without pain.

"In narratives, where historical veracity has no place, there should be exhibited the most perfect idea of virtue; of virtue not angelical, nor above probability (for what we cannot credit we shall never imitate), but the highest and purest that humanity can reach, which, exercised in such trials as the various revolutions of things shall bring upon it, may, by conquering some calamities and enduring others, teach us what we may hope, and what we can perform. Vice (for vice is necessary

cessary to be shown) should always disgust; nor should the graces of gaiety, or the dignity of courage, be united with it, as to reconcile it to the mind. Wherever it appears, it should raise hatred by the malignity of its practices, and contempt by the meanness of its stratagems; for while it is supported by either parts or spirit, it will seldom be heartily abhorred."

If these observations be just, and to us they appear unanswerable, Richardson's Lovelace is a character which ought never to have been drawn. In the graces of gaiety and the dignity of courage, in liberality without profusion, in perseverance and address, he everywhere appears as the first of men; and that honour with which he protects the virtue of his Rosebud, if any instruction is to be drawn from it, can only lead the admirers of Richardson to believe that another Clarissa might be in perfect safety were she to throw herself upon the honour of another Lovelace. Yet in the composition of this splendid character there is not one principle upon which confidence can securely rest; and Lovelace, whilst he is admired by the youth of both sexes, and escapes the contempt of all mankind, must excite in the breast of the cool moralist sentiments of abhorrence and detestation.

A French critic †, speaking of this character, says, "By turns I could embrace and fight with Lovelace. His pride, his gaiety, his drollery, charm and amuse me: his genius confounds me and makes me smile; his wickedness astonishes and enrages me; but at the same time I admire as much as I detest him." Surely this is not the character which ought to be presented to the inexperienced and ardent mind.

The most perfect characters which we at present recollect in any novel are Richardson's Grandison and Fielding's Allworthy. The virtues of the former are perhaps tinged with moral pedantry, if we may use the expression: and the latter suffered himself to be long imposed upon by the arts of the hypocrite and the philosophical coxcomb; but without some defects they would not be human virtues, and therefore no objects of human imitation. Clarissa is an excellent character: she has as much perfection as can be expected in woman, whilst she exhibits, at the same time, some obvious defects.

As it is the object of the novelist to interest the heart, and to communicate instruction through the medium of pleasure, his work, like a tragedy or comedy, should be one, exhibiting a hero or heroine, whose success every incident should contribute to forward or to retard. In this respect no work of fancy has ever surpassed the Tom Jones of Fielding. It is constructed upon principles of the soundest criticism, and contains not a single event which does not in some way contribute towards the winding up of the piece. A living author, deeply read in Grecian literature, and far from being prejudiced in behalf of any modern, has been heard to say, that had Aristotle seen Tom Jones, he would have pronounced it a poem perfect in its kind.

Against this sentence another critic of name has entered his protest, and strenuously maintained that nothing can be a poem which is not written in verse. We shall judge of the truth of this conclusion by comparing it with the principles from which it is deduced. Having laid down as a maxim incontrovertible, that "the end of poetry is pleasure, to which use itself must be subservient," he very justly infers from this IDEA, that

"poetry should neglect no advantage that fairly offers itself, of appearing in such a dress or mode of language as is most taking and agreeable to us. It follows (he says), from the same idea of the end which poetry would accomplish, that not only rhythm, but NUMBERS properly so called, is essential to it, and that it cannot obtain its own purpose unless it be clothed in VERSE." He then proceeds to ask, "What, from this conclusion, are we to think of those novels or romances, as they are called, which have been so current of late through all Europe? As they propose pleasure for their end, and prosecute it, besides, in the way of fiction, though without metrical numbers, and generally indeed in harsh and rugged prose, one easily sees what their pretensions are, and under what idea they are ambitious to be received. Yet as they are wholly destitute of measured sounds (to say nothing of their other numberless defects), they can at most be considered but as hasty, imperfect, and abortive poems: whether spawned from the dramatic or narrative species, it may be hard to say.

Unfinish'd things one knows not what to call,
Their generation's so equivocal.

However, such as they are, those novelities have been generally well received: Some for the real merit of their execution; others, for their amusing subjects; all of them for the gratification they afford, or at least promise, to a vitiated, pallid, and sickly imagination, that last disease of learned minds, and sure prognostic of expiring letters. But whatever may be the temporary success of these things (for they vanish as fast as they are produced), good sense will acknowledge no work of art but such as is composed according to the law of its kind."

Of this severe criticism the author himself has given us, what amounts to a complete confutation. He tells us, that the ancients looked for so much force and spirit of expression in whatever they dignified with the name of poem, as sometimes to make a question "whether comedy were rightly referred to this class, because it differed only in measure from mere prose? Their doubt (he justly adds) might have been spared or at least resolved, if they had considered that comedy adopts as much of this force and spirit of words as is consistent with the nature and dignity of that pleasure which it pretends to give: For the name of poem will belong to every composition whose primary end is to please, provided it be so constructed as to afford all the pleasure which its kind or sort will permit."

If this decision be just, and we readily admit it, a well composed novel is entitled to the appellation of a poem, though it be written in prose and in a style not remarkable for elevation. The business of the novelist is to interest the heart by a display of the incidents of common life. In doing this, he must exhibit scenes that are probable, and record speeches that are natural. He is not at liberty to invent, but only to select, objects, and to cull from the mass of mankind those individuals upon which the attention ought most to be employed. The more closely he adheres to this rule, the more deeply does he interest us in his narrative; because every reader feels at once that it is possible he may at some time or other be in circumstances nearly resembling those of the hero of the tale. But the business of life

life is not transacted in pompous language, nor the speeches of real lovers made in verse either rhymed or blank. Were Tom Jones or Clarissa Harlowe to be translated into verse, we shall venture to assert that they would quickly lose their hold of the public mind: because the hero and heroine would then appear in a light which every heart must feel to be unnatural.

It is well observed by Johnson, that the task of the novel writer "requires, together with that learning which is to be gained from books, that experience which can never be attained by solitary diligence, but must arise from general converse and accurate observation of the living world. Their performances have, as Horace expresses it, plus oneris quantum varie minus, little indulgence, and therefore more difficulty. They are engaged in portraits of which every one knows the original, and can detect any deviation from exactness of resemblance. Other writings are safe, except from the malice of learning, but these are in danger from every common reader; as the slipper ill executed was censured by a shoemaker who happened to stop in his way at the Venus of Apelles." It is in thus faithfully copying nature that the excellence of Fielding consists. No man was ever better acquainted with the shades which diversify characters, and none ever made his personages act and speak more like real men and women in the particular circumstances which he describes.

"But the fear of not being approved as a just copier of human manners, is not the most important concern that an author of this class ought to have before him. Novels are written chiefly to the young, the ignorant, and the idle, to whom they serve as lectures of conduct and introduction into life. In every such work, it should therefore be carefully inculcated, that virtue is the highest proof of understanding, and the only solid basis of greatness; and that vice is the natural consequence of narrow thoughts; that it begins in mistake and ends in ignominy: and since love must be introduced, it should be represented as leading to wretchedness, whenever it is separated from duty or from prudence."