piled up till the catastrophe in which the victim suddenly changes places with the oppressor. The sentiment is nearly that of Browning's Instans Tyrannus. Browning's tyrant 'sets his wits on the stretch to inveigle the wretch,' till, when he has 'laid his last plan to extinguish the man,' the man suddenly starts to his feet and prays, to the tyrant's confusion. Godwin's hero does not pray—it would be against his principles—he invokes the force of reason; but the result is the same, and the gradual working up of the catastrophe, the slow and steady evolution of the diabolical agency, has a fascinating power. We catch something of the writer's own profound interest in the story, and admire at least the persistence and ingenuity (perverse as its means) with which variations are performed upon the theme which is always in view. Godwin, of course, had not a trace of the peculiar skill exemplified in Pride and Prejudice, where every incident is both perfectly natural and conducive to the effect. Yet his incidents are so well combined that the book has the same sort of unity and co-ordination, and even the formality of the style is congenial to his own ideals. Godwin, in his Enquirer, gives a curious discourse upon that subject. English style, he
