I have removed the paywall from “How to Have Good Taste.” This is an increasingly important topic and the post is rapidly becoming one of the more popular things I have written.
The pride in Pride and Prejudice was derived from Adam Smith’s Theory of Moral Sentiments. In their excellent study of the intersection of Smith and Austen, Pride and Profit, economics professors Cecil E. Bohanon and Michelle Albert Vachris trace the ways Austen uses Smith’s ideas in her fiction. (They are drawing on the work of previous scholars, such as Mohler, Knox-Shaw, Valihora). Far from the common-sense moralist she appears, Austen is a true intellectual, as engaged with the philosophy of her times as George Eliot later was.
Mary informs her family that vanity and pride are different: pride is concerned with what we think of ourselves; vanity is concerned with what others think of us. Smith makes the same distinction.
We call it pride or vanity; two words, of which the latter always, and the former for the most part, involve in their meaning a considerable degree of blame. Those two vices, however, though resembling, in some respects, as being both modifications of excessive self-estimation, are yet, in many respects, very different from one another.
All readers know Darcy’s pride. “He declined to be introduced to any other lady.” When Bingley suggests he dance with one of the ladies, Darcy tells him,
I certainly shall not. You know how I detest it, unless I am particularly acquainted with my partner. At such an assembly as this, it would be insupportable. Your sisters are engaged, and there is not another woman in the room whom it would not be a punishment to me to stand up with.
As Smith says, “the proud man never flatters… and is scarcely civil to anybody.” Darcy goes on to reject the idea of dancing with Lizzy because she is “tolerable” but not handsome. He will not humour the women who have been left by other men. Here is what Smith has to say about the proud man.
He disdains to court your esteem. He affects even to despise it, and endeavours to maintain his assumed station, not so much by making you sensible of his superiority, as of your own meanness. He seems to wish not so much to excite your esteem for himself, as to mortify that for yourself.
Could not Jane Austen have written that herself?
When Charlotte talks about Darcy’s pride, she excuses him because of his wealth and station. Lizzy says she could easily forgive his pride if he had not offended hers. Shortly afterwards, there is a discussion about what counts as an “accomplished” lady. Darcy is strict in his standards and Lizzy says he must not know any lady truly accomplished, causing Miss Bingley to complain that Lizzy cuts down her own sex to recommend herself, a trait Smith attributes to proud people.
When they assume upon us, or set themselves before us, their self-estimation mortifies our own. Our own pride and vanity prompt us to accuse them of pride and vanity, and we cease to be the impartial spectators of their conduct.
Lizzy is blind to Darcy’s true character because she too is proud. They have the same failings and must learn the same lessons. It is only when her pride relents that she can see through his. They are both rather too pleased with themselves, and shrug off all sorts of criticism from various people. She knows how to nettle him (pointing to his weaknesses) because that is how to nettle her. When she tells Darcy his defect is to hate everybody, he retorts that hers is to wilfully misunderstand them. This is a temperament Smith defined very clearly.
The proud man is commonly too well contented with himself to think that his character requires any amendment. The man who feels himself all-perfect, naturally enough despises all further improvement. His self-sufficiency and absurd conceit of his own superiority, commonly attend him from his youth to his most advanced age.
Note Smith’s warning that pride means “we cease to be the impartial spectators.” This is the key measurement of virtue in The Theory of Moral Sentiments. The idea is repeated throughout. Smith’s contention is that virtuous conduct is the result of seeing ourselves as an impartial observer would. When Lizzy meets Wickham, he admits “it is impossible for me to be impartial” about Darcy. At that point, it is impossible for proud Lizzy too.
The story Wickham tells about Darcy neglecting to support his education (against the wishes of old man Darcy) is exactly the sort of story you would tell if you believed that proud men acted as Smith tells us they do.
To do the proud man justice he very seldom stoops to the baseness of falsehood. When he does, however, his falsehoods are by no means so innocent. They are all mischievous, and meant to lower other people. He is full of indignation at the unjust superiority, as he thinks it, which is given to them.
Smith’s observation maps neatly onto the novel. This is why Wickham admits that Darcy is generally truthful, and often generous and charitable. This well-behaved exterior, Wickham claims, means no-one will believe anything bad of Darcy. The accusation is not of dishonesty but of the hatred a proud man has towards his low-born adopted brother. It is a Smithian accusation.
When Lizzy refuses his first proposal, she accuses him of snobbishness and of cheating Wickham. He makes no denial, but he does point out that it is her pride that has been offended by his remarks on her family’s social position. “But, perhaps… these offences might have been overlooked, had not your pride been hurt by my honest confession of the scruples that had long prevented my forming any serious design.” (My italics)
Next day, when she reads Darcy’s letter, her pride is broken. “How despicably have I acted!” she cried. “I, who have prided myself on my discernment!… I have courted prepossession and ignorance, and driven reason away where either were concerned. Till this moment, I never knew myself.” These are the tones of love, applied to the development of virtue. Likewise, Darcy has to have his pride broken by the end of the novel. “I have been a selfish being all my life… I was given good principles, but was left to follow them in pride.”
It is once they can both see themselves clearly that they are able to see each other clearly. They must develop the sight of an impartial observer, not a proud one. Or, as Smith puts it,
That degree of self-estimation, therefore, which contributes most to the happiness and contentment of the person himself, seems likewise most agreeable to the impartial spectator.
The man who esteems himself as he ought, and no more than he ought, seldom fails to obtain from other people all the esteem that he himself thinks due.
The moral of Pride and Prejudice is very Smithian. The love of well-matched people will involve just enough pride, but no more.
Great post!
It’s interesting to see how closely Austen follows Smith’s reasoning. I have always wondered at the invisible mechanism in Darcy’s letter that leads Lizzy to recognize her own prideful behavior. She is confronted with two opposing pictures of Darcy but recognizes the truthful one. What is the key to achieving that impartiality? Is it a recognition or reflection of herself in Darcy that allows her to see so clearly? Her younger sisters obviously lack that power, but I’m not sure that even Jane could have done it.