CHARACTERISTICS.
Of Lady Tilney's character a hasty outline has been attempted in the preceding chapter; falling short, however, as it is confessed every attempt must do, to delineate all its varied features. Something, however, may have been gathered, by viewing her in the midst of the group assembled in her boudoir; and the portraiture will be rendered still more distinct, as the character of her associates are further developed.
Of Lady Tilney herself it may be said, that that real or pretended contempt of rank which she affected to entertain, arose from the circumstances of her own parentage, which, on her mother's side at least, was not noble; to the same cause, also, may perhaps be attributed her anxious irritability, ill concealed under a forced gaiety, lest the respect and homage which she considered to be her due, should not be paid her. There was a restlessness in her assumed tranquillity, wholly unlike the easy natural languor of her friend Lady Ellersby, to which she would gladly have attained, and which it was always the object of her ambition to imitate; but she never reached that perfectibility of insouciance, which marks a superiority of birth and station.
Notwithstanding the part which she consequently was obliged to play, there was still a good deal of nature in her composition; much more than in that of the person whose demeanour she envied;—and had not her character been influenced by a life of dissipation, she seemed designed to have passed through existence diffusing usefulness and cheerfulness around her. Much might be said in extenuation of Lady Tilney's faults and follies, courted and caressed as she was; as indeed there is ever much indulgence to be extended to all who, in situations of power and of temptation (however many their foibles) remain free from positive vice. The voice of censure should be guarded therefore in its condemnation; remembering that the inability to do wrong, or the want of allurement to yield to it, are often the sole preservatives against similar errors.
In commenting upon such characters as Lady Tilney's, it is not for the purpose therefore of attaching blame to the defects of the individual, so much as to point out the dangers attendant on their peculiar stations, and to shew how far even noble natures are liable to be debased by constant exposure to a baneful influence. Were not this the object of a writer, idle and contemptible indeed would be the pen, which could waste its powers in tracing the vanities and follies of a race which always has existed in some shape or other, and possibly will always continue to do so.
There is an indulgence of spleen, a silly gossiping espionage, which delights in prying into the faults of others, without any motive but that of the gratification of its own mean nature—but there is an investigation into the habits and manners of the actors in the scene of fashionable folly, which, by dispelling the illusion, may preserve others from being heedlessly drawn into the vortex of so dangerous a career. A sermon would not, could not, descend from its sacred dignity, to effect this—a philosophical or moral discourse, would have as little chance of working such an end;—but a narrative of actual occurrences may perhaps give warning of a peril, which is the greater because it bears outwardly, and on a cursory view, no appearance of future evil; for to the young, and indeed to all, there is a charm, and a very great charm too, in being something superior, something that others are not, or cannot be. No one acquainted with human nature will ever contradict this. The question of vital importance to be asked is—In what ought this distinction to consist? and what will really give it? Certainly not a life of dissipation, in which the affectation of new modes and manners constitute the business of existence; certainly not the sacrifice of moral and religious duty, to a courting of frivolous homage and the pursuit of an empty éclat.
These, however, it is to be feared, are more generally the spurious objects of ambition with persons in fashionable life, than the solid advantages, and lasting fame, which their situations afford them the means of securing. And if it is thus with the world of fashion in general, how much more was it the case in the circle in which Lady Tilney reigned! Herself and her friends had no thought that tended to any specific moral purpose, in the strict sense of the word. The duties that were performed, were such only in a negative sense; they went to church, they lived with their husbands; some of them, but not all, had escaped scandal; they were fond mothers, at least in the eye of their world; they were alive to their offsprings' interests, at least their worldly interests; and beyond this, it is to be feared, neither for them, or for themselves, did their views extend.
Here may be closed the catalogue of their moral possessions. Of their outward shew of manner and courtesy, where so much in a soi-disant empire of ton might be expected, perhaps, there was still less to praise: a brusquerie of address took place of polished breeding, where intimacy permitted any address at all; and where none was allowable, an insolent carelessness marked the behaviour, instead of that polite courtesy which is ever the distinguishing mark of really good manners.
Lady Tilney, had she not stood on the 'vantage ground of ton, might have been called vulgar: the loud and incessant talking, the abrupt and supercilious glance and motion, had it not been backed by title and an assumed superiority, would have been designated by a very different name from that under which her manners passed current; and even as it was, they sometimes received a reproof which, however affectedly scorned, was deeply felt. An instance of this occurred on the occasion of her receiving the homage of a distinguished foreigner; when, in the intoxication of the moment's vanity, Lady Tilney forgot the respect due to one of exalted station, rudely turning her back, and brushing past him in the dance, a disregard of etiquette which he whose manners are all elegance and condescension, would never in his station have shewn to the meanest of his subjects, and whose sense of delicacy and propriety is so acute, that wherever female manners are concerned, none could better know how to condemn whatever derogated in the slightest degree from them.
It was to the displeasure incurred by this circumstance, and to the loss of favour which all who have ever lived in its sunshine cannot fail to lament when withdrawn, that allusion was made, in speaking of Lady Tilney's contempt of sovereigns and courts. Here was to be found one bad effect of a system which, while false in every sense, arrogated to itself perfection in all.