'"[195] On the testimony of Wesley and of Kingsley, all
the merits of a moral nature which they claim for the "Fool of Quality"
will readily be accorded to it. But it is very doubtful that such
qualities would necessarily interfere with the success of a work of
fiction. The real reason why very few who can help it will read this
novel, lies in those characteristics which Kingsley himself admitted
would appear to the average reader. "The plot is extravagant as well as
ill-woven, and broken, besides, by episodes as extravagant as itself.
The morality is quixotic, and practically impossible. The sermonizing,
whether theological or social, is equally clumsy and obtrusive. Without
artistic method, without knowledge of human nature and the real world,
the book can never have touched many hearts and can touch none
now."[196]
It is singular that Kingsley should have expected that a book with so
many and so evident faults could have remained popular simply because
its moral was a good one. If he had sat down to warn the world against
Henry Brooke's novel, he could hardly have expressed himself with more
effect. Whatever merit it may have is buried under a mass of dulness
almost impossible to penetrate, and a silliness pervades the characters
and the conversations which makes even the lighter portions unreadable.
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