., vol. i. p. 123) by reading Mrs. Radcliffe's
Mysteries of Udolpho
, he wrote
Ambrosio, or the Monk
. The book, published in 1795, made him famous in fashionable society, and decided his career. Though he sat in Parliament for Hindon from 1796 to 1802, he took no part in politics, but devoted himself to literature.
The moral and outline of
The Monk
are taken, as Lewis says in a letter to his father (
Life, etc.
, vol. i. pp. 154-158), and as was pointed out in the