466 RKSSAY ON THE MORAL EFFECTS OP FICTION. 



were destined (I do riot s.iy, intended) to soften. It is therefore clear, 

 from the very nature of poetry, that the poet must inspire somewhat 

 better morals than those around him, though, to be effectual and useful, 

 his morals must not be totally unlike those of his contemporaries. With 

 respect to posterity, the case is somewhat different ; as they become 

 more and more civilized, they limit their admiration to the really 

 admirable qualities of energy, magnanimity, and sensibility ; they turn 

 aside their eyes from their attendant ferocity, or consider it only as a 

 proof of the power of the poet, as an exact painter of manners. If the 

 Iliad should, in a long course of ages, have inflamed the ambition and 

 ferocity of a few individuals, even that evil, great as it is, will be far from 

 balancing all the generous sentiments which, for three thousand years, 

 it has been pouring into the hearts of youth, and which it now continues 

 to infuse, aided by the dignity of antiquity, and by all the fire and 

 splendour of poetry. Every succeeding generation, as it refines, requires 

 the standard to be proportionably raised. 



Apply these remarks, with the necessary modifications, to those fic- 

 tions copied from common life, called novels, which are not above a cen- 

 tury old, and of which the multiplication and the importance, as well as 

 literary as moral, are characteristic features of England. There may be 

 persons now alive who may recollect the publication of ' Tom Jones/ at 

 least, if not of ' Clarissa.' In that time, probably twelve novels have 

 appeared, of the first rank a prodigious number, of such a kind, in any 

 department of literature ; and the whole class of novels must have had 

 more influence on the public, than all other sorts of books combined. 

 Nothing popular can be frivolous ; whatever influences multitudes, must 

 be of proportionable importance. Bacon and Turgot would have con- 

 templated with inquisitive admiration this literary revolution. 



If fiction exalts virtue by presenting ideal perfection, and strengthens 

 sympathy by multiplying the occasions for its exercise, this must be best 

 done when the fiction most resembles that real life which is the sphere 

 of the duties and feelings of the great majority of men. At first sight, 

 then, it seems that the moralist could not have imagined a revolution in 

 literature more favourable to him, than that which has exalted and mul- 

 tiplied novels. And now I hear a clamour around me ; ' Tom Jones is 

 the most admirable and popular of all English novels, and will Mr. Phi- 

 losopher pretend that Tom Jones is a moral book ?' With shame and 

 sorrow it must be answered, that it does not deserve the name, and a 

 good man, who finds such a prostitution of genius in a book so likely to 

 captivate the young, will be apt to throw it from him with indignation ; 

 but he will still, even in this extreme case, observe, that the same book 

 inspires the greatest abhorrence of the duplicity of Blifil, of the hypocrisy 

 of Thwackum and Square ; that Jones himself is interesting by his frank- 

 ness, spirit, kindness, and fidelity all virtues of the first class. The 

 objection is the same in its principle with that to the Iliad. The ancient 

 epic exclusivly presents war the modern novel, love ; the one what was 

 most interesting in public life, and the other, what is most brilliant in pri- 

 vate, and both with an unfortunate disregard of moral restraint 



* Fierce wars and faithful loves." 

 A more refined objection against novels has been made by Stewart, 



