to the great novelist's memory. "Our immortal Fielding," Gibbon writes, "was of the younger branch of the Earls of Denbigh, who drew their origin from the Counts of Hapsburgh. The successors of Charles V. may disdain their brethren of England: but the romance of 'Tom Jones,' that exquisite picture of human manners, will outlive the palace of the Escurial and the Imperial Eagle of Austria."
There can be no gainsaying the sentence of this great judge. To have your name mentioned by Gibbon, is like having it written on the dome of St. Peter's. Pilgrims from all the world admire and behold it.
As a picture of manners the novel of "Tom Jones" is indeed exquisite: as a work of construction quite a wonder: the by-play of wisdom; the power of observation; the multiplied felicitous turns and thoughts; the varied character of the great Comic Epic; keep the reader in a perpetual admiration and curiosity.[1] But
- ↑ "Manners change from generation to generation, and with manners morals appear to change,—actually change with some, but appear to change with all but the abandoned. A young man of the present day who should act as Tom Jones is supposed to act at Upton, with Lady Bellaston, &c., would not be a Tom Jones; and a Tom Jones of the present day, without perhaps being in the ground a better man, would have perished rather than submit to be kept by a harridan of fortune. Therefore, this novel is, and indeed, pretends to be, no example of conduct. But, notwithstanding all this, I do loathe the cant which can recommend "Pamela" and "Clarissa Harlowe" as strictly moral, although they poison the imagination of the young with continued doses of tinct. lyttæ, while Tom Jones is prohibited as loose. I do not speak of young
