Frances Burney, Cecilia

 Introduction

Opening Passage: 

“Peace to the spirits of my honoured parents, respected be their remains, and immortalized their virtues! may time, while it moulders their frail relicks to dust, commit to tradition the record of their goodness; and Oh, may their orphan-descendant be influenced through life by the remembrance of their purity, and be solaced in death, that by her it was unsullied!” 

Such was the secret prayer with which the only survivor of the Beverley family quitted the abode of her youth, and residence of her forefathers; while tears of recollecting sorrow filled her eyes, and obstructed the last view of her native town which had excited them.

Summary: Cecilia satirizes a society obsessed with Money and Family Name, which are treated as more important than intelligence, virtue, noble title, or usefulness to society. Cecilia Beverley is a country heiress, although still a minor, who is destined for money, standing to inherit when she comes of age 10000 pounds in her own right and, from her uncle the Dean, an estate worth 3000 pounds a year. The Dean, however, has attached a requirement to his legacy: when she marries, Cecilia must keep the Beverley name and her husband must change his name to Beverley. The Dean also arranges for her to have three guardians and trustees: Mr. Harrel; Mr. Briggs; and Mr. Delvile. Mr. Harrel was chosen because he was the husband of an old friend of Cecilia; the Dean had not known him, but thought it would be good for Cecilia to be able to live among friends, and Mr. Harrel had money and was from a good family. Mr. Briggs was chosen for his money-acumen; having been in business his entire life, Mr. Briggs had amassed a large fortune himself and knew how best to cultivate Cecilia's funds until she came of age. Mr. Delvile is from an old family that could trace its roots back to the Anglo-Saxons, and was chosen on the idea that he would watch her with honor to prevent her from being in any way harmed. As it happens, the Dean's choices were singularly unfortunate. Mr. Harrel is a profligate spendthrift, Mr. Briggs is a miser who works on the principle that money is meant to be earned and rarely spent, and Mr. Delvile is so absorbed by family pride and self-importance that he has little room in his life for vigilance about anything else. Things are further complicated by an additional figure, Mr. Monckton, who in practice does more that you would expect a guardian to do than any of the three guardians, guiding Cecilia through various situations. But Mr. Monckton is not a disinterested friend; having married an old and ugly woman for money, he is unhappy in his marriage, and is already thinking ahead to the question of second wife, with Cecilia as the prime candidate. But this is going to be difficult; he has to try to maneuver things to keep a young, pretty, wealthy, amiable heiress single long enough for his wife to die.

Life with the Harrels in the city starts out pleasantly enough, although Cecilia quickly learns that her friend Mrs. Harrel has changed and that, in fact, they were probably mostly friends because they grew up in proximity to each other rather than from any personal affinity. The Harrels are involved in a never-ending string of parties, and are constantly making luxurious improvements to their house. As time goes on, though, it becomes clear that something is not quite right here. The parties are lavish to the point of exhausting and the improvements Mr. Harrel keeps making are well beyond what you would expect even given his family money. As it turns out, he is a gambler and highly in debt; he affords the improvements by doing everything on credit and never paying the poor workmen, but has so far managed to maintain his credit by the expedient of looking quite wealthy. And having the wealthy Cecilia stay with them has been a great boon: not only does he get paid 250 pounds a year for her room and board, her being there keeps up the appearances for his creditors. What is more, while staying with the Harrels, Cecilia finds herself constantly pestered by suitors who will not take No for answer, to her utter bafflement; but it turns out that Mr. Harrel is behind this, as well, using access to Cecilia as a sort of collateral on loans, and no matter how much she tries to put them off, he is encouraging them (which they believe easily because that's how they see women, as really expecting to be overcome by perseverance, and because it flatters their vanity).

I confess I had some difficulty getting through parts of the Mr. Harrel episodes. I have a temperamental revulsion to obvious emotional manipulation, and holy moly, is Mr. Harrel manipulative, and he doesn't bother to hide it. Despite the fact that Cecilia has good sense about the whole thing, he still manages to play on her good nature, and her sense of duty to her friend; since she finds she can't get any advance at all from Mr. Briggs despite its being her own money, she eventually through Mr. Harrel's manipulations finds herself in debt to the tune of almost her entire personal fortune, to be paid (with interest, of course) once she is of age. Inevitably, all of this is going to end in catastrophe, and catastrophe comes in a way that directly severs her link with Mr. Harrel. Mr. Monckton will take over her debt himself, so that she won't be hit so hard with the interest. This might sound generous, but it is less so when you consider that the debt is illegal. Not only did Mr. Harrel violate his responsibility as a trustee in setting it up, Cecilia is still a minor, and therefore cannot legally be bound by a loan contract. The reason Mr. Monckton takes over the debt rather than advise her to repudiate it is that it now puts her in debt to himself.

The story is far from over. Cecilia and the son of the Delviles, Mortimer, obviously are attracted to each other, but of course, do you think that it's going to end well that to marry her, the only son of the ancient family will have to change his name? A catastrophe can be expected there, as well.

The book, while it sold well and was highly regarded, was often criticized even by its fans for its ending. It's a happy ending, of sorts, but Burney deliberately avoids any hint that any of this greed and pride won't have a lasting effect. This world is a world of partial good and partial evil; our good fortune never entirely erases the bad fortune we must endure; and they are best served who put their trust in something other than the gods of Money and Name.

Favorite Passage:

“Let me but,” said Cecilia, looking gratefully at him, “be as secure from exciting as I am from feeling contempt, and what can I have to wish?”

“Good and excellent young lady!” said Dr Lyster, “the first of blessings indeed is yours in the temperance of your own mind. When you began your career in life, you appeared to us short-sighted mortals, to possess more than your share of the good things of this world; such a union of riches, beauty, independence, talents, education and virtue, seemed a monopoly to raise general envy and discontent; but mark with what scrupulous exactness the good and bad is ever balanced! You have had a thousand sorrows to which those who have looked up to you have been strangers, and for which not all the advantages you possess have been equivalent. There is evidently throughout this world, in things as well as persons, a levelling principle, at war with pre-eminence, and destructive of perfection.”

Recommendation: Highly Recommended; it's a very long work, but there's always something interesting happening. And while I didn't find her quite as delightful as Evelina, Cecilia is a quite charming heroine.

Filibuster

People trying to eliminate the Senate filibuster have been quite noisy recently; given that the filibuster has been a practice allowed by rules in the Senate for 215 years, and given recent attempts to argue against the Electoral College, the Senate, the authority of Congress over the District of Columbus, the authority of states to determine their own election laws, and then some, it's very hard to avoid the feeling that people have just been running through all longstanding American institutions to see which can be destroyed in order to 'save American democracy'. I've noted before that attacks on the Senate as 'undemocratic' don't actually make all that much sense; attacks on the filibuster as 'undemocratic' don't make much sense, either. The filibuster is a legislative rule; no legislative rules are determined democratically. Nor does it make any sense to say that it is undemocratic because by means of it a minority of legislators can force a majority to work with them rather than simply force things past them all the time. Forcing legislators to work together reduces the oligarchical tendencies of legislatures and increases the quality of that legislature's representation of the people. Nor does history show the filibuster to be any kind of definitive act; it is a cooling-down measure. Most filibusters only delay things for a day or two; those that are successful are often overcome simply by regrouping or renegotiating. If we go back to its early beginnings, when Cato the Younger used the Roman equivalent of the filibuster to block several of Julius Caesar's attempts to seize an ever-expanding power, it didn't actually prevent Caesar from seizing power; but it was successful at slowing him down and forcing him to regroup. The filibuster can't actually stop anything in the long run, so attacks on it are often overblown; and that it's 'bad for democracy' to have a mechanism for slowing down controversial seizure of power is not as obvious as many of its critics suggest.

In any case, we know more or less what will happen if the filibuster is eliminated in the Senate; Senators will find other ways to throw gears into the works, because in fact, raising obstacles in order to force re-negotiation is one of the ways legislative business is conducted in every legislature that has ever existed. The House had the filibuster for a long time, but eliminated it (actually it went back and forth on eliminating it for a while). Then the Representatives started messing with the quorum, which went on until the rules were changed to rule that out. This, however, only made the routes more indirect; today, minorities in the House largely slow things down by horse-trading within committees, interfering with votes for bills brought up under suspension of rules, motions to recommit, and the like. Unless you insist on an up-down vote for everything, you aren't going to eliminate shenanigans in a legal forum filled with lawyers. The real question is whether what would replace the filibuster would actually be an improvement. I don't think it's clear that the elimination of the filibuster by the House was an improvement; I think it can be argued, for instance, that House legislation became considerably more erratic after the loss of the filibuster. But in any case, it's always important in these matters not to focus only on what you see now but on what you don't see -- whatever things that wait in the wings to replace it.

Corpus Christi

 Corpus Christi 

Bread is broken on the table;
into the cup is poured the wine;
by this word the Word our Savior
becomes the substance of the sign. 

Adam's flesh from fleshly Adam
is freed from sinful flesh once more,
for we, by blood and by slain body,
are flesh and blood with Christ our Lord. 

Speak, my tongue, of His scourged body,
now blessed and broken for our race,
of pricelessness of blood now flowing
to pay our price and grant us grace. 

Sing, my voice, the song of angels
as here they wonder at his tomb,
which, with side-sprung water flowing,
encompassed us to be our womb. 

Love, my heart, the changeless ancient
who descends from God above
to be a babe and passion's patient;
He is God, for God is Love. 

Trust, my soul, in Truth most holy:
for Truth is true and does not lie.
All free from lie, from lies He freed us;
here see the sign Truth truly died! 

Hope, my spirit in your Savior,
for He is life, in dying lives,
for us is given by the Father
to be this Bread of Life we give. 

Shout, my sisters; shout, my brothers!
From on the housetops make it known
and tell the tale on every mountain
to own this well: you are His own!

Come Thoughts, for You Must Muster on Parade

 On the Difficulties of Writing a Sonnet at Home
by Anne Higginson Spicer

Come thoughts, for you must muster on parade,
A sonnet on the rain, my fancy orders.
(We'll have to sell the house or take in boarders
If things keep soaring skyward, I'm afraid.)
The rain—I'll make it spatter in a glade
Where larches tall o'er spreading flowers are warders.
(The old provision dealers are such hoarders;
It's all their fault that prices high have stayed.)
The rain, down-dropping in a scented wood.
(That recipe for scrapple sounded good.)
The rain, it rings with elfin laughter running.
(This pattern for my new frock will be stunning.)
The rain, where breezes sing and zephyrs laugh.
(Our oil stock cut its dividends in half!)

Having just been writing poems for an entire month that ended with a lot of rain, I've been thinking about this, one of the best poems about writing poems (which ironically is one of the most difficult topics to write a poem about).

Ceremonial Mythoi

To give an addendum to the previous post's comment on how generalizing from the Poetics gives one a framework for analysis of ceremonial rituals, when Aristotle speaks of the kinds of Plot (mythos), he recognizes that they can be of all kinds, but he identifies two major types: simple and complex, the complex ones being those with 'plot twists', as we might say. And Aristotle identifies two kinds of plot twist as particularly important for tragedy:

Peripeteia -- a change by which the action  with narrative plausibility turns around to its opposite

Anagnorisis -- a change from ignorance to knowledge that changes love and hate between those destined for good and bad fortune

The two twists are not exclusive; for instance, the most famous tragic twist of all, that in the story of Oedipus involves a discovery (anagnorisis) that overturns everything (peripety).

Many ceremonies have a simple organization of incidents, but some of the most important have a ceremonial equivalent of peripety. In a wedding, for instance, the bride and groom move, by the course of the ceremony itself, from unmarried to married; in a baptism, the one to be baptized moves from catechumen to Christian; in the Mass, the bread and wine flip over into the Body and the Blood; in a Presidential inauguration, one who was previously just a candidate presumptively elected becomes the President.

I think there are quite a few ceremonies that are structured as if they had peripety that they do not actually have. An obvious example of a pseudo-peripety is in the modern graduation ceremony in high schools and colleges. You do not actually graduate and receive your formal diploma at most such ceremonies today; that happens entirely independently of the ceremony. Rather, the ceremony is structured as if you graduated and received your diploma when they call you up, but in reality that is a false peripety -- nothing actually changes in or through the ceremony itself, it's just a symbolic recognition of a change outside the ceremony. Reflection shows that a very great many ceremonies are structured this way -- you aren't actually initiated, your status doesn't actually change, you are not different because of the ceremony, but the ceremony is structured as if it did work that way. I think there are three reasons for this: (1) by and large, ceremonies with peripety are more interesting; (2) since most of our most important ceremonies involve peripeties, it is natural that when a ceremony symbolizes some major, important change, we structure the ceremony as if it had peripety in order to emphasize that what is symbolized is, in fact, very important; (3) people in developing other ceremonies just imitate other ceremonies without thinking, and some of the most salient, precisely because most important, are ceremonies with peripety. In some cases, and graduation ceremonies are perhaps a case, the peripety-structure might be residual from an ancient day when the ceremony did involve a change that has since moved outside the ceremony entirely.

Discovery is much more rare among ceremonies, but you can still find occasional cases. Certain kinds of award ceremonies, for instance, seem to be this way, as when the winner of a contest is unveiled.

Evening Note for Monday, May 31

Thought for the Evening: An Aristotelian Account of Ceremonial Rites

I've previously noted that, while ritual is not as central to Aristotle's philosophy as it is to some others, and he certainly has no significant discussion of everyday rituals, Aristotle does have a fair amount to say about civic rituals, because this is the topic of the Poetics. Drama in the ancient Greek world wasn't primarily a kind of literature or even a work of art but a ritual in civic festivities; tragedies, comedies, and satyr plays were originally highly structured contributions to festal days dedicated to the gods, especially Dionysus. We have Aristotle's close analysis of tragedy; unfortunately, his analysis of comedy has not survived. But we do have enough to abstract a more general account of public ceremonial ritual in general?

Aristotle takes tragedy, comedy, dithyrambs, flute-playing, and the like, as imitative, differing only in their means, object, or modes of imitation. Human beings are naturally imitative, and these arts arise out of this aspect of human nature. On the basis of this, he argues for his influential definition of tragedy as imitation of actions serious and complete in itself using language with pleasurable accessories in distinct parts, taking dramatic rather than narrative form, with incidents arousing pity and fear so as to achieve purification (catharsis). He breaks this down into its essential elements: 

(1) Plot: the combination of incidents or things done

(2) Character: qualities of persons as found in the actions, revealing their moral purposes

(3) Thought: saying what is appropriate to the occasion

(4) Diction: expression of thoughts with words, composition of verses

(5) Melody:  the music of song

(6) Spectacle: the stage-appearance of the actors

Melody and Diction are the means by which tragedy accomplishes its effect; together they form the 'language with pleasurable accessories part of the definition. The action itself is imitated by three things: Plot, Character, and Thought. Plot, which is the end and most important element of tragedy, is what organizes the other two; Thought and Character get their importance in being causes of actions, and so are important insofar as they are necessary to the imitation of the action. And Spectacle is the least important and artful of the elements, although still an attraction of the whole work, contributing to its dramatic nature.

Since Aristotle says that the imitative arts differ according to means, object, and mode, and these are the elements contributing to the means (Melody, Diction), object (Plot, Character, Thought), and mode (Spectacle) of tragedy, we wouldn't expect them to be exactly the same for other arts, like comedy or dithyrambs or rhapsodies. But all imitations will have something to imitate (object), means of imitating, and a manner of imitating, and at the very general level, one would expect at least similar elements, with some variation (and considerable variation in relative importance), across them all.

So let's start with this. All ceremonial rituals are imitative, and public ceremonial rituals especially are either direct imitations or adaptations of other, customary rituals (which may or may not be ceremonies). Every public ceremonial ritual would need to have a structuring of incidents -- you can't have a ceremony if things are happening every which-way. As part of this structuring, you will have signs of moral purpose and thoughts appropriate to context. You will have to have means by which you can carry out this ceremony, which will be signs or forms of expression; these forms of expression may have accessories like music; and there will be the presented appearance.

In a typical commencement ceremony, for instance, we have a basic structuring of incidents -- march in, speeches, being called up, receiving diploma, march out; these are done from purpose and thought (advice, congratulations) . They are done by forms of expression (speech, symbolic handing of the diploma), and these are usually assisted by music. And, of course, we have the presented appearances of cap and gown and stage and banners and whatever else. Likewise, in a Western wedding, we have a movement of incidents from not-married to married, with the climax at the I Do stage, with actions expressive of purpose and thought, and done by forms of expression (the presider's speech, any speeches by others that are incorporated into the ceremony, the expression of consent by saying 'I do' and giving the ring, the kiss). We also have music to help time the ceremony and make it more pleasant, and we have the spectacle of wedding costumes. It's easy enough from these to parse out how the elements are involved in other ceremonies, like award ceremonies, inaugurations, liturgies, commemorations, and the like. The purposes of these ceremonies differ widely, of course, and this will shift around the relative importance of the elements, and also the exact range of forms they are allowed to take. But these elements do seem to recur across a quite wide range of public ceremonies.

Various Links of Interest

* Michael Kowalik, Phenomenology of Abortion (PDF)

* Scott Alexander on the Rise and Fall of Online Culture Wars

* Jessica J. Williams, Kant against the cult of genius (PDF)

* Natalia Carrillo & Sergio Martinez, The Metaphoric Sources of Scientific Innovation (PDF)

* Peter Kwasniewski, Notes on a Christian Seeker: Soren Kierkegaard, Father of Existentialism

* Karol Wojtyla, Participation or Alienation

* Graham Renz, Form as Structure: It's Not so Simple (PDF)

* Colin Chamberlain, The Most Dangerous Error: Malebranche on the Experience of Causation. I'm not sure I'm convinced by some of the load-bearing pillars of this argument, but it's an interesting one.

* Chad Engelland, Dispositive Causality and the Art of Medicine (PDF)

* John Hardwig, The Role of Trust in Knowledge (PDF)

* Yongyi Li, A New Incarnation of Latin in China

* Jana Mohr Lone, Philosophy with Children

Currently Reading

Frances Burney, Cecilia
Courant & Robbins, What Is Mathematics?
Peter Martyr Vermigli, Commentary on Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics
Aristotle, Rhetoric

Poem a Day 31

 A Poet's Bow

Swiftly comes the end;
It leaps upon us.
Nothing can stop it.
Centuries may pass,
Each thing falls at last.
Read well these poems,
Each in daily place,
Lay them in your heart,
Yet they now will cease.

Bow I must then take,
Render my last due,
After a whole moon
Near to Parnassus.
Dear reader, I give
Open thanks to you.
Now I take my bow.