Pamela: Allusions 3 key examples

John Locke's 1689 treatise lays out many of the foundational concepts of liberal government. While today the term "liberal" is often associated with progressive policies that provide robust social supports for individuals, the liberal government Locke envisioned was a government that was as minimal as it could possibly be while empowering and protecting individuals' right to make their own choices and pursue their own beliefs. The treatise is made up of short essays on various topics pertaining to Locke's central premise that government is meant to help individuals live in harmony without taking them too far away from what he calls the "state of nature," in which they act according only to God's laws.

One of Locke's essays, "Of Property" articulates the idea that humans turn things into their property by "mixing" their labor with them—for instance, by farming land or by killing deer. Another essay, "Of Slavery," addresses the troublesome idea that under the law, one human being can own another. Locke claims that every person has an unalienable right to their own self. This right can be partially surrendered if someone commits a serious crime, including theft or violence; in that case, Locke claims, the victim of the crime has the right to enslave the person who has wronged them until the debt is repaid. He extends this idea to society writ large, justifying the harsh treatment of prisoners. Disturbingly, he claims that enslavement does not necessarily contradict the idea that everyone has a right to their own self because enslaved people can always take themselves back through suicide.

Pamela refers to Locke's argument to underscore the injustice of her kidnapping and imprisonment. According to Locke's philosophy, Mr. B. would have a right to detain Pamela if she had done him a great wrong. She has not. As a woman, she admits, she can be classified as property more readily than a man could be (during this time period, that is). But she can only be the property of a father or husband who has labored to care for her. Especially given Pamela's refusal thus far to accept any money she hasn't earned through her own labor, Mr. B. can make no such claim on her. By detaining her, Mr. B. is in fact acting as a thief who will now owe Pamela's family for wronging them.

According to Mr. B., he is pleased to discover that Mr. Williams is putting his energy toward reading the French Telemachus to work on his French skills. After all, as long as he is doing this, he is not teaching French to Pamela or otherwise spending time with her. The particular book Mr. Williams is reading is significant. This book, written in the early 18th century by the Archbishop François Fénelon, is a didactic novel. This means that it uses fiction as a means to deliver instructive lessons to its readers. It focuses on the character of Telemachus, Odysseus's son from Homer's Odyssey, and his relationship with his tutor, who is literally named "Mentor." Through the story of their relationship, Fénelon argues the merits of an aristocratic republic, in which a king's autocratic tendencies are checked by a constitution and a council of aristocratic advisers. The novel was widely understood to be a critique of the tyranny of the French King Louis XIV, with whom Fénelon had a strained personal relationship. Personal politics notwithstanding, the book had an enormous impact on political philosophy at the time, figuring into the beliefs and writings of revolutionary thinkers like Rousseau and Thomas Jefferson.

By telling Pamela that Mr. Williams is reading this particular book, he insinuates that Mr. Williams is not a very exciting romantic prospect. He is more interested in government and language learning than in weddings and Pamela. Mr. B. sees Mr. Williams as his most dangerous rival for Pamela's affection. In fact, he is so threatened that he later asks her that she never marry Mr. Williams in the event of his own death. Here, Mr. B. portrays Mr. Williams as a good-hearted but boring intellectual who does not deserve Pamela's attention.

In the Book of Genesis, Jacob must flee his homeland after he angers his brother Esau and Esau vows revenge. One night, Jacob lays his head on a rock and has a dream about a ladder that ascends up to heaven. Angels travel up and down the ladder. In the course of the dream, God appears to Jacob and tells him that the land the ladder stands on is to belong to Jacob and his descendants. When Jacob wakes, he turns the stone he has been resting on into the first stone of the city that will come to be known as Bethel. Jacob thus becomes a patriarch of the Israelites.

Pamela's father, too, dreams of Jacob's ladder. The allusion is explicit, but it is also allegorical. Pamela's father thinks of himself as Jacob. Through his daughter, he is about to become the patriarch of a new people. In this allegory, the ladder is not just a moral pathway to heaven. It is also a moral pathway to the upper echelons of society. Pamela's parents were once wealthier, but they have sacrificed their material wealth. However, they have never sacrificed their virtue and have spent their lives instilling into their daughter that her virtue will be rewarded. At long last, Pamela is about to marry a wealthy man and bring the family up the socioeconomic ladder. Pamela's stalwart virtue is the reason Mr. B. is marrying her, so Pamela's father is finally seeing a direct payoff for his faithful Christianity and Christian parenting. Class and morality are indelibly linked in his mind; he is finally seeing proof that morality can lead to riches, not just to interminable poverty.