“Her Duty to Disobey Her Father”: Jane Austen’s Religious Vocabulary in the Juvenilia, Part 2

“We had no difficulty to convince her that it was impossible she could love Graham, or that it was her Duty to disobey her Father”—Love and Freindship, Letter the 12^th, Jane Austen’s Juvenilia

Austen’s Juvenilia, the stories she wrote as a teenager, are mostly spoofs on novels of sensibility (stressing strong emotion uncontrolled by reason). Scholar Kathryn Sutherland considers them a training ground, where Austen was experimenting with the form of the novel and learning to write well.

Last week I told you about a linguistics conference on the language Jane Austen used in her early writings. You can read more about it on Jane Austen’s World. I began sharing my presentation at that conference. I talked about Semantic Change—that is, changes in the meanings of words—and Austen’s religious vocabulary. We considered changes in words related to the church, and the use of serious religious words in the novels and early writings.

A number of “faith words” had strong religious connotations in Austen’s time, but modern dictionaries call those meanings “rare” or “obsolete.” Let’s see how Austen used those words in her Juvenilia. We’ll compare that with how she used them in her first published novel, Sense and Sensibility, which has strong religious themes.

Religious Duty

We’ll start with duty. Samuel Johnson’s Dictionary of the English Language (1773) first defines duty as “That to which a man is by any natural or legal obligation bound.” That’s how we mostly use duty now, meaning things we ought to do. However, Johnson’s next two definitions refer to religious duties: “Acts or forbearances required by religion or morality”—actions that religion or morality require us to do or to avoid doing— and “Obedience or submission due to parents, governors, or superiours; loyalty; piety to parents”—a specific religious duty. Jane Austen, a devout Anglican, learned her duties from the Church of England Catechism. The Catechism lists one’s duties to God and to one’s neighbour, such as loving your neighbour as yourself and respecting your elders.

In Sense and Sensibility, Elinor Dashwood constantly exerts herself to fulfill her duty to love her neighbours as she loves herself. When Marianne asks Elinor how she has been able to appear calm and cheerful for four months, knowing the man she loved was engaged to someone else, Elinor responds, “By feeling that I was doing my duty.” She explains that she needed to keep her promise to Lucy not to reveal Lucy and Edward’s secret—that’s a religious duty to keep her word. And she wanted to keep her family from being unhappy because of her religious duty to love her neighbour as herself.

In the Juvenilia, though, Austen humorously and ironically reverses the religious meanings of duty. In Love and Freindship, a grandfather does (much less than) “the Duty of a Grandfather” by giving fifty pounds to each of his supposed grandchildren and disappearing. Laura later convinces Janetta of “her Duty to disobey her Father”: This is ironically the opposite of Janetta’s religious duty of obedience to her parents.

Religious Exertion

The word exertion or exert meant choosing to overcome your natural inclinations in order to do your religious duty. It was a struggle to do what is right, showing up in how we act toward other people. Clergyman Hugh Blair, writing in the 18^th century, said that religious virtues are formed by repeatedly exerting oneself to do one’s duty.

Elinor exerts herself to do her religious duty repeatedly in Sense and Sensibility. After her father’s death, Elinor exerts herself to overcome her grief and treat her brother and sister-in-law with politeness and consideration, to receive them and treat them with proper attention. Politeness for Austen is more than just outward forms. It means treating the other person with attention and kindness, loving one’s neighbor as oneself. Meanwhile, Marianne indulges her grief as a sentimental so-called “duty,” failing in her true religious duties.

Jane Austen ridicules women who have so much sensibility that they cannot exert themselves even on minor issues. In “Frederic & Elfrida,”

“The parents of Elfrida, alltho’ they earnestly wished to see her married to Frederic before they died, yet knowing the delicate frame of her mind could ill bear the least exertion & rightly judging that naming her wedding day would be too great a one, forebore to press her on the subject.”

The simple act of naming a wedding day is called a great exertion, and the wedding is delayed for many years. In Lesley Castle, saying goodbye to a friend is an exertion that puts a woman in tears all morning. These women are like Marianne Dashwood, who thinks she cannot exert herself to do her religious duty, as Elinor does.

In Love and Freindship, we see Laura and Sophia’s ironic exertions against their true duty. After Laura and Sophia convince Janetta to elope with a man her father does not approve of, they have this conversation with her father:

“Your Freindship for my Daughter has indeed been most powerfully exerted by throwing her into the arms of an unprincipled Fortune-hunter.” (replied he)

“Yes, (exclaimed I) amidst every misfortune, it will afford us some consolation to reflect that by this one act of Freindship to Janetta, we have amply discharged every obligation that we have received from her father.”

“It must indeed be a most gratefull reflection, to your exalted minds.” (said he.)

Here Austen is humorously using several faith words. Exertion should be struggling to do one’s duty; instead, Laura and Sophia have struggled to make Janetta fail in her duty to her father, and they have failed in their duty to him as their host and their elder. Principle means religious principles, which a fortune-hunter would not have, so unprincipled is used seriously by the father. Grateful means practicing gratitude, which they are not expressing toward their host. And reflection should enable them to see what’s right and wrong, but they are judging in terms of sensibility, not in terms of religious values. Let’s look more at these words.

Religious Principle and Unprincipled Men

Principle is another faith word. Johnson’s Dictionary calls it “a tenet on which morality is founded.” Religious principles are foundational beliefs about right and wrong that affect people’s actions.

The opposite is unprincipled. An unprincipled person is irreligious or immoral. In Sense and Sensibility, Elinor uses the word quite seriously to describe Willoughby. He seduced Eliza and abandoned both Eliza and Marianne, breaking his implied promises and contradicting religious principles. Elinor considers Marianne’s “disengagement” “an escape from the worst and most irremediable of all evils, a connection, for life, with an unprincipled [irreligious] man.”

We saw earlier how the word unprincipled was used seriously in the Juvenilia about a fortune hunter. It also correctly describes Lady Susan in that novella.

The word unprincipled is also used ironically, though, in Love and Freindship. Laura is traveling on a stagecoach. A man snores loudly and repeatedly in the coach, keeping her awake. She thinks,

“There is no crime too black for such a Character! Thus reasoned I within myself, and doubtless such were the reflections of my fellow travellers. . . At length, returning Day enabled me to behold the unprincipled Scoundrel who had so violently disturbed my feelings.”

Her feelings are her basis for judgment here, not religious principles. The man turns out to be her father-in-law. But she calls him unprincipled simply because he snores and bothers her. The reflections of the travelers, which should be serious, are, ironically, simple grumbling.

Religious (or Serious) Reflection

Reflection has several meanings in Austen’s work that we recognize today. But Austen often uses it for deeper thought, self-examination, even for prayer. In the Juvenilia, it’s used seriously for Catherine, who goes to her bower for “solitude and reflection” when she is upset.

In Sense and Sensibility, Marianne’s severe illness causes her to seriously reflect, examining herself and seeing her faults, choosing to change. Late in Sense and Sensibility, Elinor sees in Marianne “an apparent composure of mind, which, in being the result, as she trusted of serious reflection, must eventually lead her to contentment and cheerfulness.” This is religious reflection, probably prayer.

In the Juvenilia, reflection is sometimes used in a way that appears serious but is superficial or incomplete. In “Frederic and Elfrida”, Charlotte recognizes her error in getting engaged to two men. However, instead of repenting and determining to straighten things out, as Marianne does when she reflects, Charlotte ridiculously chooses to make her sins much worse:

“It was not till the next morning that Charlotte recollected the double engagement she had entered into; but when she did, the reflection of her past folly operated so strongly on her mind, that she resolved to be guilty of a greater, & to that end threw herself into a deep stream.”

Her reflections, rather than leading her to repentance and growth, lead her to suicide.

In Love and Freindship, after her friend Sophia dies, Laura says,

“I yet received some consolation in the reflection of my having paid every attention to her, that could be offered, in her illness. I had wept over her every Day—had bathed her sweet face with my tears and had pressed her fair Hands continually in mine—.”

Here again “reflection” is used ironically, since Laura feels complacent about her sentimental imitations of virtue. “Run mad as often as you chuse—but do not faint,” is the ironic “moral” lesson of this story!

The Virtue of Candour

This final faith word might surprise you. Nowadays we think of candour, or being candid, as saying what we think, no matter if it hurts other people. But in Austen’s time, while that meaning was beginning to develop, candour usually meant giving other people the benefit of the doubt, thinking the best of them. It was considered a Christian virtue.

Jane Bennet of Pride and Prejudice is the best example of this. Her sister says Jane “takes the good of every body’s character and makes it still better, and says nothing of the bad.”

In Sense and Sensibility (ch. 15), Elinor says, “It is my wish to be candid in my judgment of every body.” She is trying to think the best of Willoughby when she is not sure why he is acting strangely. Her mother is better at this form of candor, automatically thinking the best.

We have two humorous uses of candour in the Juvenilia. An older lady gives a younger one advice: “Ride where you may, Be candid where you can.” (“A Collection of Letters,” Letter the Second) She makes riding a horse parallel to a religious virtue. This is a twist on a line in Alexander Pope’s serious Essay on Man, which says “Laugh where we must, be candid where we can; But vindicate the ways of God to man.” (line 15) The idea is that as we consider humanity, we will sometimes laugh at foolishness, and need to be candid when we see flaws and failures, recognizing man’s weaknesses and looking for the good.

We see candour again in a list of virtues in “Jack and Alice.” These are funny because after “though” we expect a contrast, but instead we have only good traits contrasted with other good traits:

“In Lady Williams every virtue met. She was a widow with a handsome Jointure & the remains of a very handsome face. Tho’ Benevolent & Candid, she was Generous & sincere; Tho’ Pious & Good, she was Religious & amiable, & Tho Elegant & Agreable, she was Polished & Entertaining.”

Austen matches benevolent, doing good works, with candid, thinking and speaking well of others.

Faith Words in the Juvenilia and the Novels

Austen uses many words which had strong religious connotations in her time, but their meanings have changed, so we don’t easily recognize them as religious now. When Austen uses these religious words ironically and humorously, she is not making fun of religion. Instead, she is ridiculing those who made sensibility into a religion, worshiping their own feelings instead of God. As you read the Juvenilia and the novels, look for those words, and notice whether she is using them seriously or ironically. They may bring more humor, or more depth, to your readings of Austen.

What is your favorite use of a “faith word,”  like duty or reflection, in Austen’s writings?

Covers of the Juvenilia are editions from Juvenilia Press. These versions are entertainingly illustrated, very fun ways to reread the Juvenilia! You can buy them from Jane Austen Books in the US or directly from Juvenilia Press in Australia. They make great gifts for children, grandchildren, or yourself.

Further Reading

“The Generous Curate”: Jane Austen’s Religious Vocabulary in the Juvenilia, Part 1

The Language of Jane Austen’s Teenage Writings: Part 1

If you want to learn more, I recommend these books as very accessible and helpful:

Austen’s Religious Themes

• Jane Austen and Religion, William Jarvis
• Miniatures and Morals, Peter Leithart
• Praying with Jane, Rachel Dodge

Austen’s Language (on multiple topics)

• Some Words of Jane Austen, Stuart Tave

Austen and the Church

• Fashionable Goodness: Christianity in Jane Austen’s England, Brenda S. Cox. Chapter 3 is on “Faith Words,” with a handy table for reference.
• Jane Austen and the Reformation, Roger E. Moore (includes discussions of Austen and Catholicism)
• Jane Austen and the Clergy, Irene Collins

For articles on linguistic insights from Jane Austen, see the Jane Austen’s World article.

References used in this article

Austen, J. (2005-2008). The Cambridge edition of the works of Jane Austen. (J. Todd, Gen. Ed.). Cambridge University Press.

Book of Common Prayer. (1796).

Collins, I. (1994). Jane Austen and the clergy. Hambledon and London.

Cox, B. S. (2022). Fashionable goodness: Christianity in Jane Austen’s England. Topaz Cross Books.

Cox, B.S. (2022). Faith words in Sense and Sensibility: A story of selfishness and self-denial. Persuasions On-Line, 43(1).

Johnson, S. (1755, 1773). A dictionary of the English language.   

Knox, Vicesimus, ed. (1794). Elegant extracts . . . in prose.              

Oxford English dictionary, online. Oxford University Press.

Tave, S. M. (1973). Some words of Jane Austen. Univ. of Chicago Press.

Vickers, W. (1791). A Companion to the altar. Jarvis.

White, Laura Mooneyham. Jane Austen’s Anglicanism. London: Routledge, 2016.