Some I told them from my reading, as true; others from my
head, as mere invention; of which they would be most fond. * * * _All
my stories carried with them, I am bold to say, an useful moral._"[163]
In such a manner, and with such an intention, Richardson began his
career as a novelist.
The life of the stout, vain little printer was already well advanced,
his fortune was assured, and he was surrounded by a group of
affectionate relatives and admiring female friends, when he was asked
by a publisher to write "a little book of familiar letters on the
useful concerns in common life." While thinking over this proposal, be
recollected a story once told him of a young servant-girl, whose honor
was long attempted by a dissolute master, and who, by her resolute
chastity, finally conquered his vicious intentions, and was rewarded
by honorable marriage with her thwarted seducer. And then it occurred
to Richardson, that this story, "if written in an easy and natural
manner, suitable to the simplicity of it, might possibly introduce a
new species of writing, that might possibly turn young people into a
course of reading different from the pomp and parade of romance
writing, and, dismissing the improbable and marvellous, with which
novels generally abound, might tend to promote the cause of religion
and virtue.
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