A Memoir of Jane Austen

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Quarterly Reviews 107
great excellence is on serious subjects. There are some very
delightful conversations and reflections on religion: but on lighter
topics I think she falls into many absurdities; and, as to love, her
heroine has very comical feelings. There are a thousand improbabilities
in the story. Do you remember the two Miss Ormsdens
introduced just at last? Very flat and unnatural. Mad elle. Cossart is
rather my passion.’
Two notices of her works appeared in the ‘Quarterly Review.’°
One in October 1815, and another, more than three years after
her death, in January 1821. The latter article is known to have
been from the pen of Whately, afterwards Archbishop of Dublin. 1
They differ much from each other in the degree of praise which
they award, and I think also it may be said, in the ability with
which they are written. The first bestows some approval, but the
other expresses the warmest admiration. One can scarcely be
satisfied with the critical acumen of the former writer, who, in
treating of ‘Sense and Sensibility,’ takes no notice whatever of the
vigour with which many of the characters are drawn, but declares
that ‘the interest and merit of the piece depends altogether upon
the behaviour of the elder sister!’ Nor is he fair when, in ‘Pride
and Prejudice,’ he represents Elizabeth’s change of sentiments
towards Darcy as caused by the sight of his house and grounds.
But the chief discrepancy between the two reviewers is to be
found in their appreciation of the commonplace and silly characters
to be found in these novels. On this point the difference
almost amounts to a contradiction, such as one sometimes sees
drawn up in parallel columns, when it is desired to convict some
writer or some statesman of inconsistency. The Reviewer, in
1815, says: ‘The faults of these works arise from the minute detail
which the author’s plan comprehends. Characters of folly or sim-
1
Lockhart had supposed that this article had been written by Scott, because it
exactly accorded with the opinions which Scott had often been heard to express, but he
learned afterwards that it had been written by Whately; and Lockhart, who became the
Editor of the Quarterly, must have had the means of knowing the truth. (See Lockhart’s
Life of Sir Walter Scott, vol. v. p. 158.) I remember that, at the time when the review
came out, it was reported in Oxford that Whately had written the article at the request
of the lady whom he afterwards married. [JEAL does not appear to know that Scott
wrote the earlier of the two reviews.]