As a young man, Edgeworth's father spent much time in England and had seen dissipated upper-class society at firsthand. He was also familiar with leading figures in the provincial and Nonconformist enlightenments centered in the English Midlands. These men--leaders in the commercial and manufacturing revolutions and in campaigns for moral, social, and political reform--included the scientist Erasmus Darwin, the china manufacturer Josiah Wedgwood, the chemist James Keir, the industrialist Matthew Boulton, the educationist and social critic Thomas Day, and the inventor James Watt. Edgeworth's father published a book on the construction of roads and carriages (1813), devised a system of telegraphic communication, and invented various gadgets to increase domestic comfort and lessen domestic labor.
He married four times, and his wives bore him twenty-two children, of which four died very young. Thus his older daughters, especially Maria, were almost mothers to the younger children, the last of whom was born in 1812; his last wife, Frances Anne Beaufort, was slightly younger than Maria. This large and diverse family was dominated by his sheer physical energy, varied scientific, literary, and political interests, commitment to economic and social progress, and dedication to liberal educational ideas of the time. He decided to educate his oldest son according to the principles of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, but neglected Maria Edgeworth, who often expressed herself in tantrums and "naughtiness." Her mother died in March 1773, and her father married Honora Sneyd (1751-1780), whom he had loved for several years, only four months later.
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