A Fiction

L’exercice des plus sublimes vertus eleve et nourrit le genie. 
          
                                           Rousseau.

London,
Printed for J. Johnson, St. Paul’s Church-Yard.

MDCCLXXXVIII

ADVERTISEMENT.

In delineating the Heroine of this Fiction, the Author attempts to develop a character different from those generally portrayed.  This woman is neither a Clarissa, a Lady G——­, nor a[A] Sophie.—­It would be vain to mention the various modifications of these models, as it would to remark, how widely artists wander from nature, when they copy the originals of great masters.  They catch the gross parts; but the subtile spirit evaporates; and not having the just ties, affectation disgusts, when grace was expected to charm.

Those compositions only have power to delight, and carry us willing captives, where the soul of the author is exhibited, and animates the hidden springs.  Lost in a pleasing enthusiasm, they live in the scenes they represent; and do not measure their steps in a beaten track, solicitous to gather expected flowers, and bind them in a wreath, according to the prescribed rules of art.

These chosen few, wish to speak for themselves, and not to be an echo—­even of the sweetest sounds—­or the reflector of the most sublime beams.  The[B] paradise they ramble in, must be of their own creating—­or the prospect soon grows insipid, and not varied by a vivifying principle, fades and dies.

In an artless tale, without episodes, the mind of a woman, who has thinking powers is displayed.  The female organs have been thought too weak for this arduous employment; and experience seems to justify the assertion.  Without arguing physically about possibilities—­in a fiction, such a being may be allowed to exist; whose grandeur is derived from the operations of its own faculties, not subjugated to opinion; but drawn by the individual from the original source.

FOOTNOTES: 

[Footnote A:  Rousseau.]

[Footnote B:  I here give the Reviewers an opportunity of being very witty about the Paradise of Fools, &c.]

MARY

CHAP.  I.

Mary, the heroine of this fiction, was the daughter of Edward, who married Eliza, a gentle, fashionable girl, with a kind of indolence in her temper, which might be termed negative good-nature:  her virtues, indeed, were all of that stamp.  She carefully attended to the shews of things, and her opinions, I should have said prejudices, were such as the generality approved of.  She was educated with the expectation of a large fortune, of course became a mere machine:  the homage of her attendants made a great part of