The Virtuous Victorian
standards of taste. Freedom has come to us, not broadening down
"from precedent to precedent,"
but swiftly and comprehensively. There are no more taboos, no more silent or sentimental hypocrisies. We should now know a great many interesting details concerning the Marquis of Steyne and the Duke of Omnium, if these two imposing figures had not passed forever from our ken. We should have search-lights thrown upon Becky Sharp, if Becky had not escaped into the gloom. Her successors sin exhaustively, and with a lamentable lack of esprit. We are bidden to scrutinize their transgressions, but Becky's least peccadillo is more engaging than all their broken commandments. The possibility of profound tediousness accompanying perfect candour dawns slowly on the truth-tellers of fiction. It takes a great artist, like Edith Wharton, to recognize
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