Page:Satire in the Victorian novel (IA satireinvictoria00russrich).pdf/116



a certificate of virtue. And as dubious goods or letters are passed through an oven at quarantine, sprinkled with aromatic vinegar, and then pronounced clean—many a lady whose reputation would be doubtful otherwise and liable to give infection, passes through the wholesome ordeal of the Royal Presence, and issues from it free from all taint."

In his later novels Thackeray used in greater proportion the more artistic indirect method, although he could more easily have plucked out his eye and cast it from him than to have performed the same operation on his habit of moralizing, which most frequently took the form of a semi-whimsical but wholly homiletic exhortation to his dear readers to make a personal application of the lessons involved in the story.

Of these later instances, one illustrates the use of literary allusion, neatly combined with the commercial.

"Though, no doubt, in these matters, when Lovelace is tired of Clarissa (or the contrary), it is best for both parties to break at once, * * * yet our self-love, or our pity, or our sense of decency, does not like that sudden bankruptcy. Before we announce to the world that our firm of Lovelace and Co. can't meet its engagements, we try to make compromises; we have mournful meetings of partners; we delay the putting up of the shutters, and the dreary announcement of the failure. It must