Article
Books
Culture
Paganism
6 min read

Mr. Darcy: pagan hero?

Just over 200 years ago, Jane Austen died on July 18 1817. Not happy with how some today might interpret Mr. Darcy, the most beloved of Austen's male protagonists, Beatrice Scudeler re-examines the virtues he practises.

Beatrice writes on literature, religion, the arts, and the family. Her published work can be found here

A man dressed in Georgian clothes walks out of the mist.
Mr Darcy, portrayed by Matthew Macfadyen, in the 2005 TV adaptation of Pride & Prejudice.

For as long as I can remember, I’ve been interested in how Jane Austen thinks about morality, and how she uses the characters in her novels to explore ideas about what it means to be ethical or virtuous.  

‘Virtue’, a word not particularly popular in our contemporary society, is what all her characters must attain if they are to be happy; but which virtues exactly take priority, is a matter that remains up for debate.  

When I first read British philosopher Gilbert Ryle’s piece on Austen, ‘Jane Austen and the Moralists’, I began to seriously question whether her heroes and heroines exhibit virtues which are more distinctly secular or Christian. Ryle argues that Austen’s virtue ethics follows the Aristotelian tradition. For Aristotle, virtue consists in finding the golden mean between a lack of a quality, and an excess of it. For example, courage is the virtue in-between cowardice, which is a lack of courage, and rashness, an excess of courage.  

Similarly, Austen’s characters must find a balance, for instance between Elinor’s excessive reserve and Marianne’s excessive feeling in Sense & Sensibility. So far, so good. But Ryle’s take is that, while Austen was most likely ‘genuinely pious’ in her own life – especially as the ‘dutiful daughter of a clergyman’ – her ethics remain essentially ‘secular’, rather than presenting an evolved, Christianised version of Aristotle’s virtue ethics. Ryle notes that Austen’s heroines and heroes are rarely seen discussing religion or praying, and thus leaves the question at that. 

The more I thought of Ryle’s explanation, the less convinced I was by it. So, I started wondering, can we really think of Mr. Darcy, the most beloved of Austen’s male protagonists, as an essentially pagan hero? Or, in contrast to that, can his narrative arch better be compared to Dante’s spiritual pilgrimage in the Divine Comedy?  

He is magnanimous, – that is, neither too vain nor too timid – generous without being excessively so, and careful in all his actions.

Let’s test these two possibilities by looking at which virtues Mr. Darcy practises and learns in Pride & Prejudice. From the very beginning of the novel, Mr. Darcy acts the part of the ideal Aristotelian hero. He is magnanimous, – that is, neither too vain nor too timid – generous without being excessively so, and careful in all his actions. Rash characters such as Lydia, and occasionally even his own sister Georgiana, are described as acting with ‘imprudence’. On the other hand, Elizabeth Bennet confesses to her sister Jane that she believes Charlotte Lucas, in accepting Mr. Collins’ marriage proposal, has acted with excessive ‘prudence’, which becomes tantamount to ‘selfishness’. Not so for Mr. Darcy, who is prudent in the right way, and to the right extent.  

The entire proposal scene is one of the most elegantly crafted clashes of values in fiction.

And then we come to the crux of the problem, that is, pride. While all the qualities I listed above are pagan virtues which Christians have historically had no trouble accepting, pride stands apart as a distinctly pagan virtue. For Aristotle, pride was entirely acceptable. While the excess of pride, hubris, is undesirable, pride is positively laudable when it consists in the acknowledgement of one’s accomplishments. Aristotle believed humility, on the other hand – a key virtue to Christians – to be symptomatic of a deficiency of truthfulness. For the first half of Pride & Prejudice at least, Mr. Darcy is in perfect agreement with Aristotle on these points. While Elizabeth is staying at Netherfield, he remarks that, while vanity is indeed a vice, ‘pride—where there is a real superiority of mind—pride will be always under good regulation’. 

Elizabeth’s reaction is telling. Not only does she disagree with Mr. Darcy, in that she lists pride as a weakness of mind, but she responds to his confident assertion by turning away ‘to hide a smile’. Her sarcastic smile is a hint of the reproach that will find its full expression following Mr. Darcy’s first marriage proposal. After insulting her family and reminding her of his superiority of character and station in life, Mr. Darcy is firmly chastised by Elizabeth, who freely admits that his manner has impressed her ‘with the fullest belief of your arrogance, your conceit, and your selfish disdain of the feelings of others’. The entire proposal scene is one of the most elegantly crafted clashes of values in fiction. Here is the hero of the story, perfect in every pagan virtue of character, being confronted by the heroine with the truth that he substantially lacks in the one virtue that would distinguish him as Christian, humility. 

I am struck by how much this proposal scene mirrors Dante’s meeting with Beatrice at the very end of Purgatory in the Divine Comedy. Up until this point, Dante has been led through hell and purgatory by Virgil but, lacking the Christian faith, Virgil cannot enter heaven. Although Virgil has been both ‘father’ and ‘mother’ to Dante, who has relied on him unconditionally, by the end of purgatory he must leave Dante’s side and be surpassed by Beatrice. Virgil’s guidance as an impeccable paragon of pagan virtue is simply not sufficient in the final stage of Dante’s spiritual growth. Virgil having silently departed, Dante finally sets eyes on Beatrice, expecting a happy reunion after not seeing her for years following her death. Instead, she is peremptory and unsentimental in her greeting: ‘Look here! For I am Beatrice, I am!’. She is reproaching him for not remaining constant to her memory after her death. Instead of letting his love for her lead him to a greater love of God, she says, Dante allowed himself to become distracted by worthless intellectual pursuits. Dante feels the ‘bitter savor’ of her sternness, but he knows that she is right in chiding his intellectual pride. He confesses his past sins, and only then is he truly prepared to enter heaven.

By the time Darcy proposes a second time, his attitude has changed entirely. He no longer values pride as the chief indicator of virtue. 

Now, if Pride & Prejudice ended with the proposal scene I described, Gilbert Ryle would be correct in suggesting that Austen’s characters, or at least her male protagonist, are virtuous in an essentially secular and pagan way. But this is not the case. Instead, exactly what happens to Dante happens to Mr. Darcy. Like Beatrice’s chiding, Beatrice’s refusal and scolding lead Darcy to repent and learn humility. By the time Darcy proposes a second time, his attitude has changed entirely. He no longer values pride as the chief indicator of virtue, and thus he has become much more explicitly Christian in his way of exercising virtue. After Elizabeth has accepted his marriage proposal, he confesses to her:  

I have been a selfish being all my life, in practice, though not in principle. As a child I was taught what was right, but I was not taught to correct my temper. I was given good principles, but left to follow them in pride and conceit… I was spoiled by my parents, who, though good themselves…allowed, encouraged, almost taught me to be selfish and overbearing… to think meanly of their sense and worth compared with my own. Such I was… and such I might still have been but for you, dearest, loveliest Elizabeth! What do I not owe you! You taught me a lesson, hard indeed at first, but most advantageous. By you, I was properly humbled.  

Just as Dante was reminded that he must confess and repent of past pride by Beatrice, so Mr. Darcy is ‘properly humbled’ by Elizabeth. Humility thus becomes central to the resolution of Pride & Prejudice, for without it there could have been no reconciliation between hero and heroine, no marriage at the end. Although Mr. Darcy may not be seen kneeling to pray, or declaring his love of God, the deepening of his virtues as a Christian is what ensures the forgiveness of the woman he loves. He may be the perfect pagan hero when the novel begins, but by the end he becomes the Christian hero we all know and love. 

Article
Books
Culture
Morality
Sin
7 min read

After the Salt Path revelations I’m liking it even more

We edit our own reality by the stories we tell ourselves

Roger is a Baptist minister, author and Senior Research Fellow at Spurgeon’s College in London. 

A newspaper front page shows its title and a falling sea bird
How The Observer broke the story.

The Observer held nothing back in its exposé headline:

“The real Salt Path: how a blockbuster book and film were spun from lies, deceit and desperation”

The truth behind the summer’s feel-good movie and the reputation of author Raynor Winn lie in tatters, shredded by the revelations unearthed by relentless investigative journalism.

The uplifting story of how a couple face financial ruin, homelessness and a terminal illness by walking the South West Coast Path has been an inspiration for many who’ve either read the book or seen the film, or both. The story works because it reflects back to us the life we know, the lives we live. And when you add the seaside of Somerset, Devon, Cornwall and Dorset, what’s not to love?

But now it needs to be seen in an altogether different light.

The article beneath the headline was thoroughly researched, carefully constructed and uncompromising in the allegations implied by the discoveries, observations and commentary of its narrative.

“… not her real name”

“… she was a thief … embezzled the money”

“… arrested and interviewed by the police”

“… five county court judgements”

“… they owned land in France”

“… nine neurologists … were sceptical”

Point by point the back story of the Salt Path is pulled apart.

First, Raynor and Moth Winn are not the “real”, “legal” names of Sally and Tim Walker.

Second, The Observer uncovered that the couple had money troubles for reasons other than the failed business investment they had claimed. Rather, as a part-time bookkeeper for an estate agent and property surveyor, Sally was accused of syphoning off £64,000 from the company’s accounts. Concerning which, it was reported that she was arrested and interviewed by the police.

Third, it was mounting debts from settling the matter with her former employer, alongside other debts, that actually led to the repossession of their home and their resulting homelessness. Not the failed business venture.

Fourth, they weren’t actually homeless as they owned a property in France, near Bordeaux. While it was in a state of disrepair and not habitable, they had previously stayed on site in a caravan.

And then finally, in a revelation that undermined the very heart of the story of their journey together, medical experts observed that it was extremely doubtful that Moth had suffered from corticobasal degeneration (CBD) for 18 years. The journalist had consulted nine neurologists, and this was the reported consensus. Not only were Moth’s presenting symptoms not what were expected, the normal life expectancy with the condition was tragically short at six to eight years.

Pulling the various strands of its investigation together The Observer thumps the tub about the importance of ‘truth’. It is not acceptable to be mis-sold an idea of truth where important passages of the book are invented. There are both “… sins of omission and commission”:

“The story, no doubt, has elements of truth, but it also misrepresents who they were, how they started out on their journey and the financial circumstances that provided the backdrop.”

However, life is complicated and there are always two sides to a story.

In a response posted to her website Raynor Winn answers each of the accusations in turn. Amid the storm of vitriol and threat unleashed online by the article, she protests that, “… [it] is grotesquely unfair, highly misleading and seeks to systematically pick apart my life.”

Most distressing has been how Moth has been traumatised by the suggestion his diagnosis was made up. Along with her online statement Winn has posted appropriately redacted letters from the neurologists treating Moth that confirm his diagnosis and the narrative of the book.

As for the charges of embezzlement, she does concede that there were difficulties with a former employer. Allegations were made to the police, and she was questioned about them. However, no charges were brought, and a settlement was reached that included her paying back money on a “non-admissions basis”.

“Any mistakes I made during the years in that office, I deeply regret, and I am truly sorry.” Raynor Winn

This, however, was not the failed business deal that lay behind their financial difficulties and which triggered their homelessness and the Salt Path story.

Winn reports that the property in France is an “uninhabitable ruin in a bramble patch” with its own, unrelated, back story. When they did explore selling it at the height of their difficulties, a local French agent valued it as virtually worthless and saw marketing it as pointless.

Ultimately, they chose not to declare themselves bankrupt and simply wipe out their debts. Rather, they made an agreement with their creditors for minimal repayments. The success of the book has enabled all their debts to be cleared.

Which leaves the implicit accusation of not being who they said they were, of hiding behind pseudonyms and not owning their “real”, “legal” names. She explains that the reasons Sally Ann and Tim Walker are Raynor and Moth Winn is really quite straightforward.

In the early years of their relationship she told Moth how much she disliked being called Sally Ann and would have preferred the family name, Raynor. Moth called her Ray from that point on. Winn is her maiden name. As for Moth, well his name is Timothy, get it? Friends and family use the names interchangeably, Sal/Ray, Tim/Moth.

Having read the book and seen the film earlier this summer I was particularly taken with The Salt Path. The humanity of their story, the journey they’d been on and the insights to a life well-lived that it offered.

Goodness, which one of us has never made a mistake, a bad call, or a wrong choice, “through weakness, through ignorance or through our own deliberate fault”?

When The Observer’s bombshell broke my heart fell. Moral high horses were being mounted and outrage expressed. Raynor Winn was being cancelled, literally cancelled.

She pulled out of her forthcoming Saltlines tour, which would have seen her perform readings from her books alongside the music of the Gigspanner Big Band during a string of UK dates. There were also calls for Penguin to cancel her next book, On Winter Hill, set for publication in October.

But do you know what? On reflection, after the revelations about the Salt Path story I’m liking it even more. And for exactly the same reasons I liked it before. Because it reflects back to us the life we know, the lives we live.

For a start, life is messy. Sometimes it’s even murky, full of misunderstanding, misinterpretation and constructed narratives. Goodness, which one of us has never made a mistake, a bad call, or a wrong choice, “through weakness, through ignorance or through our own deliberate fault”? Skeletons and cupboards come to mind.

Then, on the back of that, we all fashion the story of our lives. Whether it’s curating our online presence with the images we post to social media, or the anecdotes we share and the face we present to those who are part of our day-to-day lives. The pull is always towards a version that shows us in the best light.

In fact, it can even go right down to the stories we tell about ourselves, to ourselves. The interpretation of what has happened to us and why. Interpreting how much of our experience is down to what has been done to us or is the fruit of our own responsibility.

Now, I may not want to go as far as University of Sussex Professor of Neuroscience, Anil Seth, whose books, articles and Ted Talks see us living in a kind of ‘controlled hallucination’. An interpreted version of reality constructed and calibrated by our brains out of our experience. But there is no doubt in my mind that we edit our own version of reality by the stories we tell ourselves and each other.

This is how things are. This is what it means to be human. Some bits are edited in, others edited out. Some experiences we can interpret in one way, while others might view them very differently from where they stand.

When we feel the temptation to write someone off because of what they’ve done we do well to reflect on our own experience. Then we may well be grateful that we haven’t been cancelled because of our past indiscretions.  As the old saying goes, “There, but for the grace of God, go I.”

I’m reminded of how Jesus handled himself is such circumstances. When a self-righteous crowd were swiftly wanting to rush to judgement on a woman’s flawed sexual choices, Jesus encouraged those who were without fault to be the first to act. Slowly they all realised what he was saying and backeddown.

For myself, I have always found the prayer of confession to be profoundly helpful. It keeps us grounded in the reality of our own experience and should caution us about cancelling others and writing them off.

Almighty God, our heavenly Father,

we have sinned against you

and against our neighbour

in thought and word and deed,

through negligence, through weakness,

through our own deliberate fault.

We are truly sorry

and repent of all our sins.

For the sake of your Son Jesus Christ,

who died for us,

forgive us all that is past

and grant that we may serve you in newness of life

to the glory of your name.

Amen.

For our skeletons there is forgiveness.

For what lies ahead, we have the possibilities of starting over.

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