Boundaries, Symmetry and Continuity in Radcliffes The Mysteries of Udo

Below is a passage from I.2 of Radcliffes The Mysteries of Udolpho concerning the concept of precepts in relation to the characters of St. Aubert and his daughter Emily I have attempted to teach you from your earliest youth, the business of self- command not only as it pre sets us from the various and dangerous temptations that call us from rectitude and virtue, but as it limits the indulgences which are termed virtuous, in time which, extended beyond a certain boundary are viciousAll excess is vicious even that sorrow, which is amiable in its origin, becomes a self-centered and unjust passion, if indulged at the expense of our duties. The indulgence of excessive grief enervates the mind, and almost incapacitates it for again partaking of those various innocent enjoyments which a benevolent God designed to be the sun-shine of our lives. My dear Emily, recollect and practice the precepts I have so often given you . (20) The kinds of precepts instilled by St. Aubert are those that enjoin such virtues as moderation, simplicity, circumspection, and respect (5). throughout the above passage and in her initial chapter, Radcliffe is establishing several binaries through which the novel as a whole can be mapped, and retirement in the rural versus involvement in the world (1, 4), economy versus dissipation (2), simplicity versus exaggeration, serenity with congeniality versus tumult with incongruity (4), happiness and misery (4-5), affection versus ambition (11), health versus disease (physical and emotional 8, 18), and life versus death, are only a few ways in which to articulate them. However, in the end, one binary can serve to organize the many symmetry versus deformity. And it is in apprehending the logic of h... ...s dissatisfied with is the extent of Quesnels improvements, for the enlargemenmt of which Quesnel boasts is characterized by excess. (It is to be noted that, when improving his own house, St. Aubert adapted his enlargements to the style of the sexagenarian one 2). Thus, as an exploration of the importance of boundaries, and of the symmetry and continuity that those boundaries give, Radcliffes novel enters into the discourse of its decade. Works Cited Burke, Edmund. Proportion Further Considered. A Philosophical Inquiry into the pedigree of Our Ideas of the Sublime and the Beautiful. New York P.F. Collier & Son, 1909-1917 (New York Bartleby.com, 2001). http//www.bartleby.com/24/2/305.html Lewis, C. S. The Discarded Image. Cambridge Cambridge University Press, 1967. Radcliffe, Anne. The Mysteries of Udolpho. Oxford Oxford University Press, 1998.