Jenny Davidson demonstrates how the arguments that define hypocrisy as a moral and political virtue thrived in eighteenth-century Britain's culture of politeness. However, Davidson also concludes that eighteenth-century writers from Locke to Austen believed that the public practice of vice was far more dangerous for society than discrepancies between what people say and do in private.

Davidson examines the attitude of such writers as Locke and Austen towards hypocrisy.

The Enlightenment commitment to reason naturally gave rise to a belief in the perfectibility of man. Influenced by John Locke and Jean-Jacques Rousseau, many eighteenth-century writers argued that the proper education and upbringing--breeding--could make any man a member of the cultural elite.

Yet even in this egalitarian environment, the concept of breeding remained tied to theories of blood lineage, caste distinction, and biological difference. Turning to the works of Locke, Rousseau, Swift, Defoe, and other giants of the British Enlightenment, Jenny Davidson revives the debates that...

A professor, critic, and insatiable reader, Jenny Davidson investigates the passions that drive us to fall in love with certain sentences over others and the larger implications of our relationship with writing style. At once playful and serious, immersive and analytic, her book shows how style elicits particular kinds of moral judgments and subjective preferences that turn reading into a highly personal and political act.

Melding her experiences as reader and critic, Davidson opens new vistas onto works by Jane Austen, Henry James, Marcel Proust, and Thomas Pynchon; adds richer dimension...