gion, sense, and decency." Modern readers have been
kinder. The following is Miss Mathilde Blind's criticism, which, though a
little too enthusiastic perhaps, shows a keen appreciation of the
redeeming merits of the book:--

"For originality of invention, tragic incident, and a certain fiery
eloquence of style, this is certainly the most remarkable and
mature of her works, although one may object that for a novel the
moral purpose is far too obvious, the manner too generalized, and
many of the situations revolting to the taste of a modern reader.
But, with all its faults, it is a production that, in the
implacable truth with which it lays open the festering sores of
society, in the unshrinking courage with which it drags into the
light of day the wrongs the feeble have to suffer at the hands of
the strong, in the fiery enthusiasm with which it lifts up its
voice for the voiceless outcasts, may be said to resemble 'Les
Miserables,' by Victor Hugo."

The other contents of these four volumes are as follows: a series of
lessons in spelling and reading, which, because prepared especially for
her "unfortunate child," Fanny Imlay, are an interesting relic; the
"Letters on the French Nation," mentioned in a previous chapter; a
fragment and list of proposed "Letters on the Management of Infants;"
several letters to Mr. Johnson, the most important of which have been
already given; the "Cave of Fancy," an Oriental tale, as Godwin calls
it,--the story of an old philosopher who lives in a desolate sea-coast
district and there seeks to educate a child, saved from a shipwreck, by
means of the spirits under his command (the few chapters Godwin thought
proper to print were written in 1787, and then put aside, never to be
finished); an "Essay on Poetry, and Our Relish for the Beauties of
Nature," a short discussion of the difference between the poetry of the
ancients, who recorded their own impressions from nature, and that of the
moderns, who are too apt to express sentiments borrowed from books (this
essay was published in the "Monthly Magazine" for April, 1797); and
finally, to conclude the list of contents, the book contains some "Hints"
which were to have been incorporated in the second part of the "Rights of
Women" which Mary intended to write.

These fragments and works are intrinsically of small value. The "Cave of
Fancy" contains an interesting definition of sensibili