Hannah More
During the time that Dr. Johnson dominated the literary conscience of England, a group of ladies who had wearied of whist and quadrille, the common amusements of fashion, used to meet at the homes of one another to discuss literary and political subjects. They were called in ridicule the "Blue Stocking Club," because Mr. Benjamin Stillingfleet, who was always present at these gatherings, wore hose of that colour. Among the members distinguished by their wit and talents were Mrs. Elizabeth Montagu, the author of an Essay on the Genius of Shakespeare; Mrs. Elizabeth Carter, a poetess and excellent Greek scholar; Mrs. Chapone, whose Letters to Young Ladies formed the standard of conduct for young women of two generations; Miss Reynolds, the sister of Sir Joshua; and Mrs. Vesey, noted as a charming hostess. Dr. Johnson, David Garrick, Reynolds, and Burke were frequenters of this club. One may well imagine that the conversation and wit of the Blue Stockings were far too rare to be understood by the grosser minds of the mere devotees of fashion, who in consequence threw a ridicule upon them which has always adhered to the name.
Hannah More, who had already become known as a playwright, visited London in 1773, and at once was welcomed by this group. In a poem called The Bas Bleu, dedicated to Mrs. Vesey, she thus describes the pleasure of these meetings:
Enlighten'd spirits! You, who know
What charms from polish'd converse flow,
Speak, for you can, the pure delight
When kindling sympathies unite;
When correspondent tastes impart
Communion sweet from heart to heart;
You ne'er the cold gradations need
Which vulgar souls to union lead;
No dry discussion to unfold
The meaning caught ere well 't is told:
In taste, in learning, wit, or science,
Still kindled souls demand alliance:
Each in the other joys to find
The image answering to his mind.
The Blue Stocking Club was composed largely of Tories, so that when all Europe became restless under the influence of the French Revolution, they strongly combated the levelling doctrines of democracy. Hannah More in particular, who had been conducting schools for the very poor near Bristol, saw how the teachings of the revolutionists affected men already prone to idleness and drink. To offset these influences, she published a little book with the following title-page: "Village Politics. Addressed to all the Mechanics, Journeymen, and Labourers, in Great Britain. By Will Chip, a country Carpenter."
It is not a novel in the strict sense of the word, but in simple language, easily understood, it teaches the labouring people the inconsistent attitude of France, and the strength and safety of the English constitution. It is not a deep book, but has good work-a-day common-sense, such as keeps the world jogging on, ready to endure the ills it has rather than fly to others it knows not of.
The book is in the form of a dialogue between Jack Anvil, the blacksmith, and Tom Hood, the mason.
"Tom. But have you read the Rights of Man?
"Jack. No, not I: I had rather by half read the Whole Duty of Man. I have but little time for reading, and such as I should therefore only read a bit of the best."
"Tom. And what dost thou take a democrat to be?
"Jack. One who likes to be governed by a thousand tyrants, and yet can't bear a king."
"Tom. What is it to be an enlightened people?
"Jack. To put out the light of the Gospel, confound right and wrong, and grope about in pitch darkness."
"Tom. And what is benevolence?
"Jack. Why, in the new-fangled language, it means contempt of religion, aversion to justice, overturning of law, doating on all mankind in general, and hating everybody in particular."
For a long time the authorship of the book remained a secret, and Will Chip became a notable figure. The clergy and the land-owners in particular rejoiced over his homely common-sense, and distributed these pamphlets broadcast over the land. One hundred thousand copies were sold in a short time. Village Politics is said to have been one of the strongest influences in England to awaken the common people to the dangers which lie in a sudden overthrow of government. The book was timely, for that decade had become intoxicated by the name of Liberty. To-day democracy and equality are no longer feared.
During many years Hannah More worked industriously among the poor of Cheddar and its vicinity. On a visit to the Cliffs of Cheddar she found an ignorant, half-savage people, many of whom dwelt in the caves and fissures of the rocks, and earned a miserable subsistence by selling stalactites and other minerals native to the place, to the travellers who were attracted thither by the beautiful scenery. Among these people Hannah More opened a Sunday-school, and later a day school, where the girls were taught knitting, spinning, and sewing. A girl trained in her school was presented on her marriage day with five shillings, a pair of white stockings, and a new Bible. The teaching in the schools was so practical that within a year schools were opened in nine parishes.
In this missionary work, Miss More became intimately acquainted not only with the very poor, but also with the rich farmers living in the neighbourhood and the prosperous tradespeople of the villages. From these better educated men she met with great opposition. One petty landlord met her request for assistance with the remark: "The lower classes are fated to be poor, ignorant and wicked; and wise as you are, you cannot alter what is decreed." Another man informed her that religion was the worst thing for the poor, it made them so lazy and useless.
But the minds of the people had been awakened by the French Revolution. They were beginning to think. Books and ballads attacking church and constitution were hawked through the country and placed within reach of all. To counteract the influence of these "corrupt and inflammatory publications" Hannah More, between the years 1795-1798, published The Cheap Repository, the first regular issue of this kind. Every month a story, a ballad, and a tract for Sunday were published. Hannah More knew so well the common reasoning and the mental attitude of those for whom she wrote, that she was able to make her lessons most effective. So great was the demand for these chap-books that over two million were sold the first year.[1]
[1] For a complete bibliography of these chap-books, see the Catalogue of English and American Chap-Books in Harvard College Library, pp. 8-10; compiled in part by Charles Welsh.
These stories were divided into two classes, those for "persons of middle rank" and those for the common people. The former point out the dangers of pride and covetousness; of substituting abstract philosophy for religion; and warn masters not to forget their moral obligations towards their servants. The latter aim to teach neatness, sobriety, regularity in church attendance, and point out the happiness of those who follow these precepts, and the misery of those who neglect them.
Her two best known stories are Mr. Fantom and The Shepherd of Salisbury Plain. Mr. Fantom: or the History of the New-Fashioned Philosopher, and his Man William was written to warn masters of the danger of teaching their servants disrespect for the Bible and for civil law. Mr. Fantom was a shallow man, who glided upon the surface of philosophy and culled those precepts which relieved his conscience from any moral obligations. When he was asked to help the poor in his own parish, he refused to consider their wants because his mind was so engrossed by the partition of Poland. Like Mrs. Jellyby of a later time, he was so much troubled by sufferings which he could not see that he neglected his family and servants. When he reprimanded his butler, William, for being intoxicated, the young man replied: "Why, sir, you are a philosopher, you know; and I have often overheard you say to your company, that private vices are public benefits; and so I thought that getting drunk was as pleasant a way of doing good to the public as any, especially when I could oblige my muster at the same time." In course of time William became a thief and a murderer, and expiated his crimes on the scaffold.
In contrast to this is The Shepherd of Salisbury Plain. This shepherd was contented with his lot, and says: "David was happier when he kept his father's sheep on such a plain as this, and employed in singing some of his own psalms perhaps, than ever he was when he became king of Israel and Judah. And I dare say we should never have had some of the most beautiful texts in all those fine psalms, if he had not been a shepherd, which enabled him to make so many fine comparisons and similitudes, as one may say, from country life, flocks of sheep, hills and valleys, fields of corn, and fountains of water." The shepherd's neat cottage with its simple furnishings, his frugal wife and industrious children are described in simple and convincing language.
In the stories of the poor there are many interesting details of the everyday life of that class that did not blossom into heroes and heroines of romance for nearly half a century. Mrs. Sponge, in The History of Betty Brown, the St. Giles's Orange Girl, is a character that Dickens might have immortalised. Mrs. Sponge kept a little shop and a kind of eating-house for poor girls near the Seven Dials. She received stolen goods, and made such large profits in her business that she was enabled to become a broker among the poor. She loaned Betty five shillings to set her up in the orange business; she did not ask for the return of her money, but exacted a sixpence a day for its use, and was regarded by Betty, and the other girls whom she thus befriended, as a benefactor. At last, Betty was rescued from the clutches of Mrs. Sponge. By industry and piety she became mistress of a handsome sausage-shop near the Seven Dials, and married a hackney coachman, the hero of one of Miss More's ballads:
I am a bold coachman, and drive a good hack
With a coat of five capes that quite covers my back;
And my wife keeps a sausage-shop, not many miles
From the narrowest alley in all broad St. Giles.
Though poor, we are honest and very content,
We pay as we go, for meat, drink, and for rent;
To work all the week I am able and willing,
I never get drunk, and I waste not a shilling;
And while at a tavern my gentleman tarries,
The coachman grows richer than he whom he carries,
And I'd rather (said I), since it saves me from sin,
Be the driver without, than the toper within.
The Cheap Repository was written to teach moral precepts. Neither Hannah More nor her readers saw any artistic beauty in the sordid lives of this lower stratum of society. They were not interested in the superstitions of "Poor Sally Evans," who hung a plant called "midsummer-men" in her room on Midsummer eve so that she might learn by the bending of the leaves if her lover were true to her, and who consulted all the fortune-tellers that came to her door to learn whether the two moles on her cheek foretold two husbands or two children. Hannah More recorded these simple fancies of poor Sally only to show her folly and the misfortunes that afterwards befell her on account of her superstitions. Writers of that century either laughed at the ignorant blunders of the poor, or used them to point a moral. An interest in them because they are human beings like ourselves with common frailties belongs to the next century. Nothing proves more conclusively the growth of the democratic idea than the changed attitude of the novel toward the ignorant and the criminal.
Hannah More was always interested in the education of young ladies. She wrote a series of essays called Strictures on the Modern System of Female Education, in which she protested loudly against the tendency to give girls an ornamental rather than a useful education. This was so highly approved that she was asked to make suggestions for the education of the Princess Charlotte. This led to her writing Hints towards Forming the Character of a Young Princess.
Hannah More finally embodied her theories on the education of women in a book which she thought might appeal most strongly to the young ladies themselves, Cœlebs in Search of a Wife. Running through it, is a slight romance. Cœlebs, filled with admiration for Eve, as described in Paradise Lost, where she is intent on her household duties, goes forth into the world to find, if possible, such a helpmate for himself. As he meets different women, he compares them with his ideal, and, finding them lacking, passes a severe criticism upon female education and accomplishments. Finally, he meets a lady with well-trained mind, who delights in works of charity and piety, one well calculated to conduct wisely the affairs of his household. She has besides proper humility, and accepts with gratitude the honour of becoming Cœlebs's wife.
Until her death at the advanced age of eighty-eight years, Hannah More continued to write moral and religious essays, so that she was before the public view for over fifty years, Mrs. S. C. Hall in her book Pilgrimages to English Shrines thus describes her in old age:
"Hannah More wore a dress of very light green silk—a white China crape shawl was folded over her shoulders; her white hair was frizzled, after a by-gone fashion, above her brow, and that backed, as it were, by a very full double border of rich lace. The reality was as dissimilar from the picture painted by our imagination as anything could well be; such a sparkling, light, bright, 'summery'-looking old lady—more like a beneficent fairy, than the biting author of Mr. Fantom, though in perfect harmony with The Shepherd of Salisbury Plain."