Jane Austen

Pride and Prejudice

The extract below occurs after the Bennets' flaky young sister Lydia has eloped--without getting married-- with the charismatic but untrustworthy Wickham.  Mary, a caricature of a "bluestocking" (essentially an embarassingly learned woman - often depicted as having lots of facts but no common sense), here demonstrates her lack of appropriate feeling in moralizing cheerfully on the fall of her sister.  She is parroting Rousseauian sentiments--widely diffused in 19c culture--about the importance of a woman's reputation.  Mary's prim views are implicitly critiqued when Lydia is eventually able to bribe Wickham into marrying her, and the two flourish rakishly ever after.

Mary says,

"This is a most unfortunate affair; and will probably be much talked of. But we must stem the tide of malice, and pour into the wounded bosoms of each other the balm of sisterly consolation."

Then perceiving in Elizabeth no inclination of replying, she added, "Unhappy as the event must be for Lydia, we may draw from it this useful lesson:  that loss of virtue in a female is irretrievable--that one false step involves her in endless ruin--that her reputation is no less brittle than it is beautiful--and that she cannot be too much guarded in her behavior towards the undeserving of the other sex."

Elizabeth lifted up her eyes in amazement, but was too much oppressed to make any reply.  Mary, however, continued to console herself with such kind of moral extractions from the evil before them.