ap-books of the time with the
reasoned, finished work of art: not in any spirit of pedantry--since
accuracy in these matters is of small account, but with intent to show
how doubly fortunate Fielding was in his genius and in his material. Of
course the writer rejoiced in the aid of imagination and eloquence;
of course he embellished his picture with such inspirations as Miss
Laetitia and the Count; of course he preserves from the first page to
the last the highest level of unrivalled irony. But the sketch was
there before him, and a lawyer's clerk had treated Jonathan in a vein of
heroism within a few weeks of his death. And since a plain statement
is never so true as fiction, Fielding's romance is still more credible,
still convinces with an easier effort, than the serious and pedestrian
records of contemporaries. Nor can you return to its pages without
realising that, so far from being 'the evolution of a purely
intellectual conception,' Jonathan Wild is a magnificently idealised and
ironical portrait of a great man.

III--A PARALLEL

(MOLL CUTPURSE AND JONATHAN WILD)

THEY plied the same trade, each with incomparable success. By her, as
by him, the art of the fence was carried to its ultimate perfection. In
their hands the high policy of theft wanted nor dignity nor assurance.
Neither harboured a single scheme which was not straightway translated
into action, and they were masters at once of Newgate and the Highway.
As none might rob without the encouragement of his emperor, so none
was hanged at Tyburn while intrigue or bribery might avail to drag a
half-doomed neck from the halter; and not even Moll herself was
more bitterly tyrannical in the control of a reckless gang than the
thin-jawed, hatchet-faced Jonathan Wild.

They were statesmen rather than warriors--happy if they might direct
the enterprises of others, and determined to punish the lightest
disobedience by death. The mind of each was readier than his right arm,
and neither would risk an easy advantage by a misunderstood or unwonted
sleight of hand. But when you leave the exercise of their craft to
contemplate their character with a larger eye, it is the woman who at
every point has the advantage. Not only was she the peerless inventor
of a new cunning; she was at home (and abroad) the better fellow. The
suppression of sex was in itself an unparalleled triumph, and the
most envious detractor could not but marvel at the domination of her
womanh