THE

METHODIST QUARTERLY REVIEW.

19.

APRIL, 186 0.

ART. I.-THE MODERN NOVEL.

British Novelists and their Styles: Being a Critical Sketch of the History of British Prose Fiction. By DAVID MASSON, M. A., Author of the "Life and Times of John Milton." Boston: Gould & Lincoln. 1859.

LITERATURE, like everything in the dominions of fashion, is perpetually changing and renewing its forms. Its present tendencies are obviously toward the lighter of the forms in which, in past times, it has appeared, and accordingly a largely increased prominence has within a few years been given to the prose fiction. This is seen not only in an enlarged demand for works of fiction, but, as a cause of that demand, in the accession to the class of novel-readers of a large number of persons not formerly found among them; and further, as both cause and effect of this, in the production and publication of a superior class of novels. Formerly, and for good and sufficient reasons, that whole class of books was proscribed as of evil tendency, and parents and teachers careful of the morals of their charges, sedulously excluded from their reading all "novels " as deadly moral poisons; and earnest men and women, who believed that life has higher purposes than the pleasures of the hour, thought they had more important matters on hand than "novel-reading." We speak of this not to their reproach but praise; for such was the prevailing character of that class of literature from the restoration of the Stuarts to the present century, that the only safe course to be taken with it was to abstain entirely from it. In the hands of Scott fictions assumed a new character, and from his time they have enjoyed a better reputation, which has steadily advanced, and been confirmed by the many modern contributions to its stores, till at FOURTH SERIES, VOL. XII.-12

length the novel occupies a prominent and highly important position in the literature of the age.

The appearance, just at this time, of such a volume as that of Mr. Masson is highly opportune, for literature is among its own chief subjects, whether in the department of history or of criticism. We may also congratulate the public that this needed work has been undertaken by one so entirely competent to do it justice, though our gratulations are somewhat limited by the fact that the writer's designs stopped very far short of a complete survey of his subject. Those who are acquainted with his "Life and Times of Milton" (of which only the first of two volumes has been published) need no further assurance of his fitness for such discussions as an exhaustive treatment of his theme would require, and this specimen of his ability in that speciality would be gladly accepted by the public as a pledge of something more perfect in reserve. The volume is a small duodecimo of a little more than three hundred pages, made up of four lectures, originally delivered as such, and afterward enlarged by fuller statements and more copious illustrations, and published in the form of a book. The style is pure and perspicuous, the range of subjects comprehensive, and the disquisitions and criticisms at once exact and appreciative. In taste and moral tone the book is all that the most fastidious or scrupulous can desire, and altogether it is a valuable contribution to the current literature. So much we here wish to say of the book which we make the nominal subject of this essay; we propose, however, to write of its subject rather than of itself, and so politely hand it to a convenient place upon the table, to be used only as it may aid in our further discussions.

The awkward formality of defining the subject in hand seems in this case to be a necessity, that it may be understood what we include under the general title of "the novel." Here too we are sorry, for once, to differ with our author as to the proper significance of that term. He distributes all literature into three departments, "History, Philosophy, and Poetry," giving as a synonom of poetry "the Literature of Imagination," and so embracing the Prose Fiction in the last category. To this we object not as philosophically incorrect, but as an infelicitous arrangement, and not sufficiently obvious. Poetry in such a classification must be recognized by its form, and so not distinguished from verse. Fictions have, indeed, often worn that dress, and some of the noblest productions of poetical genius have been fictions. But as there is much poetry that does not embody fiction, and much fictitious writing that cannot be called poetry, it seems not wise to include the

two in a common class. With verse, whether dealing with fiction or otherwise, we have no concern just now ;"our subject is Prose Fiction, and to that we would confine our attention. Here, too, we find further need to discriminate so as to exclude certain forms of fiction from our class. Esop's Fables are fictions, and so, many believe, are the parables of the New Testament; still they are not novels, even in miniature. So of the stories of classical mythology, and even the "plots" of dramatic productions; and so we may add of the long-drawn allegories, in which the true purpose of the discourse is readily seen through a thin vail of fictitious imagery.

A novel is a fictitious story, designed primarily to please, either as a present amusement or by the interest it awakens in the reader. in behalf of the persons and actions of the tale. Other purposes may be aimed at incidentally and without apparent design; but to please should seem to be the governing object, to which everything should be made subservient. It is accordingly first of all necessary that the reader should become acquainted with and concerned for the chief actors in the plot, and to secure this these should be characters in whom one may become interested. It is therefore one of the requisites of a novel that its chief characters shall be both great and virtuous. And since one seldom becomes much concerned for those whose affairs glide along quietly, it is usually required that the hero or heroine should be led through a maze of perplexities, the changing phases of which, and his struggles and conflicts, hopes and despondencies in them, make up the tale; and that it may please as a whole, the issue should be fortunate. Still further, since some degree of passionate emotion is a condition of pleasing excitement, the story must be conducted in such a way as to move and excite the desired passions in the reader. Different kinds of emotions are no doubt best suited to different classes of readers, and the writer must make his selection of the class to which he will address himself, and adapt himself to them, even at the risk of failing to please all others; but since nearly all minds are pleased by contemplating most forms of mental excitement, the range of the novelist's movements is not necessarily a circumscribed one.

Historically, fiction is among the oldest forms of the literature of every nation and people. In nearly all cases it has entered largely into the matter of the heroic songs and stories that universally distinguish the nascent literature of nations. In the unformed states of society the common mind is highly imaginative, and impatient of the rigid restraints of historic reality, and therefore it demands the more gorgeous creations of fiction. The proper prose fiction, however, finds a place only among the productions of a matured civiliza

tion, and then it honestly confesses the unreality of its statements. And as in the infancy of society its literature is always legendary, so in its more advanced stages fictions have been found in the literature of all nationalities, though, on account of its more perishable character, less of that kind of writing than of most others is transmitted to later times. The literature of the Hebrews, though they were a remarkably unimaginative people, is not wholly destitute of it. The book of Job, even if based on facts as to its narrative portions, is evidently imaginary as to its dramatic dialogues. The Canticles are at best an allegorical prophecy; and some would call the book a pure poetical fiction. In the non-canonical Scriptures we have the book of Judith, believed by the best critics and commentators to be a pure fiction, and one, too, wholly reckless of the proprieties of times and places. In the literature of both Greece and Rome fictions first appeared in the form of verse, of which the poems of Homer are the most notable, though the fables of early Roman history are scarcely less characteristic. From the early legendary epics the fiction of the classical languages passed over to the ode, and thence to the drama, from which the passage to the prose fiction was both natural and easy.

The genesis of the prose fiction among the ancients was regular and well defined. In the earlier stages of their national growth, their fictions usually wore the livery of verse. First came their heroic songs and epics, and after these more artificial dramas, indicating an advanced stage of culture, and not until the national character had passed the culminating point did the prose fiction appear. In the literature of the Jews it belonged to the latter days of the local national existence of that people. Among the Greeks it did not appear till as late as the third Christian century; while with the Romans, whose culture never equaled that of the Greeks, it showed itself a century before. Of these later Greek and Latin novels Mr. Masson aptly remarks:

"When we look into the works themselves we can see that, by their nature, they belong to an age when the polytheistic system of society was in its decrepitude. They are, most of them, stories of the adventures of lovers, carried away by pirates, or otherwise separated by fate, thrown from city to city of the Mediterranean coast, in each of which they see strange sights of sorcery and witchcraft; are present at religious processions, private festivals, crucifixions, and the like; become entangled in crimes and intrigues, and have hairbreadth escapes from horrible dens of infamy; sometimes were changed by magic into beasts; but at last reunited, and made happy by some sudden and extraordinary series of coincidences. There is a force of genius in some of them, and they are interesting historically as illustrating the state of society toward the close of the Roman empire; but the general impression which they leave is stifling, and even appalling, as of a world shattered into fragments, the air over each inhabited fragment stagnant and pestilential,

and healthy motion nowhere, save in some inland spots of grassy solitude, and in the breezes that blow over the separating bits of sea. One of the most curious features of them, as compared with the earlier classic poetry, is the more important social influence they assign to the passion of love, and consequently the more minute attention they bestow on the psychology of that passion, and the increased liberty of speech and action they give to women. Another particular in which they differ from the earlier Greek and Latin works of fiction is the more minute, and as we might say, more modern style in which they describe physical objects, and especially scenery. This is most observable in the Greek romances. It is as if the sense of the picturesque in scenery then began to appear more strongly than before in literature. In the Daphnis and Chloe of Longus, which is a sweet pastoral romance of the single Island of Lesbos, there are descriptions of the varying aspects and the rural labors of the seasons, such as we find in the modern pastoral poems."-Pp. 45, 6.

With the moderns, after the revival of learning, the course of things was similar to that just noticed, but distinguished by characteristic differences. The ancients proceeded without the aid of either models or precedents, inventing their own modes and processes; but the restorers of learning in Europe enjoyed the advantages afforded them by the still extant works of their predecessors. Before the twelfth century there was very little literature in any of the modern European tongues, while in the Byzantine Empire there still lingered the remains of the effete Greek culture, in the form of a feeble prose fiction, chiefly occupied with religious legends; and further East, in the empire of the Caliphs, there was a more robust form of fiction, of which the famous "Thousand and One Nights" remains a living specimen and enduring monument. A kind of fiction is, indeed, found in the ecclesiastical Latin of the middle ages, "The Lives of the Saints;" but these are rather forgeries than proper fictions, for while mere fabrications they purport to be veritable histories; and whether considered as histories or as literary compositions, they are alike deserving of no respect. At its first revival modern European literature took the form of verse, but passed rapidly into prose writings. In Italy, after the popular mind had been thoroughly aroused by the poetry of Dante and Petrarch, Boccaccio (1313-1375) brought in the prose fiction, arrayed in all the charms of the style of his great predecessors, originating at once a type of the novel which flourished for nearly two hundred years, till superseded by the Italian pastoral romance. Spain was at that time, and later, pre-eminently the land of romance and of a nascent romantic literature. The wars of the Goths and the Moors supplied abundant subjects for heroic and legendary stories which, first rehearsed in verse, at length took the form of prose. Knight-errantry was their all-pervading theme, of which the national mind seemed incapable of wearying, till the whole subject culminated and exploded in Cervantes' Don Quixote.