characters than with theirs; or rather, though no one of these
characters has the defects of Blifil or of Allworthy, it is easy to
say that no one of them has the charm of the best personages of the
earlier books. The idolaters of Amelia would of course exclaim at this
sentence as it regards that amiable lady; and I am myself by no means
disposed to rank amiability low in the scale of things excellent in
woman. But though she is by no means what her namesake and spiritual
grand-daughter. Miss Sedley, must, I fear, be pronounced to be, an
amiable fool, there is really too much of the milk of human kindness,
unrefreshed and unrelieved of its mawkishness by the rum or whisky of
human frailty, in her. One could have better pardoned her forgiveness
of her husband if she had in the first place been a little more
conscious of what there was to forgive; and in the second, a little
more romantic in her attachment to him. As it is, he was _son homme_;
he was handsome; he had broad shoulders; he had a sweet temper; he was
the father of her children, and that was enough. At least we are
allowed to see in Mr. Booth no qualities other than these, and in her
no imagination even of any other qualities. To put what I mean out of
reach of cavil, compare Imogen and Amelia, and the difference will be
felt.

But Fielding was a prose writer, writing in London in the eighteenth
century, while Shakespeare was a poet writing in all time and all
space, so that the comparison is luminous in more ways than one. I do
not think that in the special scheme which the novelist set himself
here he can be accused of any failure. The life is as vivid as ever;
the minor sketches may be even called a little more vivid. Dr Harrison
is not perfect. I do not mean that he has ethical faults, for that is
a merit, not a defect; but he is not quite perfect in art. His
alternate persecution and patronage of Booth, though useful to the