ABSTRACT
The antithesis suggested in the title of this chapter is, as a matter of fact, somewhat blurred, for not only was English fiction 1 during the last decade of the eighteenth century and the first decade of the nineteenth developing along other lines besides the Gothic romance and the doctrinaire novel but such categories as have been set up are ill-defined and the characteristics of one kind are often found in another. Writers whose aim is to entertain and astound often aim also to edify; and conversely, writers whose intention is starkly doctrinal often employ the technique of the romancers. Between extreme specimens of one group and another there may be nothing in common; but in general the classes tend to shade off into one another. Looked at from a distance, fiction at this time seems to be at once sentimental, doctrinal, historical, and Gothic.
