Conclusion

Dickens, because of his keen awareness of his

audience's general beliefs, was able to use in David

Copperfield popular religious typology to help unify the

novel as well as assist it in its delivery of his social

message. Using the Christian's expectations about

every individual's loss and reclamation, Dickens forms a

pattern which he repeats several times and on different

levels throughout the work, artistically bringing

together a wide variety of characters to emphasize his

social concept of benevolent interaction.

The most obvious example of the loss and

reclamation pattern in David Copperfield is the story of

Little Em'ly who is seduced by David's aristocratic

friend Steerforth, is sought throughout Europe by her

loving uncle, Daniel Peggotty, escapes from "sin"

herself when she realizes she has been deceived, makes

her way back to London where she falters, and is

restored to her Uncle Daniel's fellowship, thanks

especially to one individual, Martha, whom Em'ly had

shown mercy upon herself years before. Em'ly is then

able to start a new and redeemed life in Australia.

From her experience, underlined by various

religious references used by Dickens, several character

types become clear who play out the pattern of a pilgrim

making his or her way through life. The pattern is

based on basic biblical types as well as expectations

created by Pilgrim's Progress, and goes as follows: The

pilgrim begins in grace. Because of a weakness in his

or her self-vision, the pilgrim is vulnerable to a

channel of perdition. Because of the influence of

perdition, the pilgrim falls. The pilgrim recognizes

the fall, repents, and demonstrates this repentance by

attempting to be in some manner or another a channel of

grace to another individual. Although too weak to

effect a complete restoration alone, the pilgrim changes

direction and finds assistance in channels of grace who

form a net of benevolent interdependence. The pilgrim

is restored and the faulty vision of self renewed.

This basic pattern finds multiple versions within

David Copperfield's plot, ranging in tone from the

dramatic to the comic. Some examples of pilgrims

besides Little Em'ly are Martha, Mr. Wickfield, Mrs.

Strong, Mr. Micawber, and Mrs. Gummidge. Although their

plot-lines are very different, yet the pattern in each

life displays the same basic elements described above.

What is remarkable is that while following this

pattern, Dickens never becomes simplistic or trite in

his presentation of individual characters. Through

their stories he is able to examine personal problems

caused by social elitism, alcoholism, non-communication

in marriages, economic mismanagement and self pity.

As mentioned, the story of Em'ly because of its use

of religious references awakens the reader to the

existence of the pattern of loss and reclamation. These

many other characters also use religious images, if not

so consistently, continuing the pattern.

Once the reader is aware of these cycles in the

novel, it then also becomes clear that the main

character, David Copperfield himself has also passed

through the cycle of loss and reclamation not once but

several times. Within his narrative there seems to be

at least five times when his soul, or his vision of

himself, is in jeopardy. And in each case, a channel of

grace steps forward to pull him back.

When David is a child, it is the hand of his nurse,

Clara Peggotty who affirms his worth when it is badly

wounded by his abusive step-father, Murdstone. As a boy

abandoned in London, it is the kindness he has heard

about his Aunt Betsey which encourages David to make his

way to Canterbury where she helps him start a new life

and leave behind the poverty of a working existence at a

bottling factory as well as the wretched education he

received from the sadistic Mr. Creakle in Salem House.

When David is a young man, his childhood friend Agnes is

able to sharpen his perception of the nature belonging

to his best and most dangerous friend, Steerforth, so

that he does not fall into the trap of measuring all of

humanity (especially himself) by social rank. When he

is married, his Aunt stops him from becoming in his

behavior to his silly but sweet wife, Dora, the

repressive type of husband his own step-father had been

to his mother. And when he finally loses through death

his wife, an old companion, and his dearest friend,

Agnes reaches out in a letter and pulls him away from a

despairing vision of the universe controlled by

randomness. Although exceeding his wildest hopes, David

discovers that Agnes loves him romantically, and so

David is able to recreate the lost home shattered by

Murdstone years before. Thus, David's life seems to be

a confirmation that providential grace is a part of

human existence.

What is also apparent, however, is the fact that it

is David himself who is, in the re-telling of his life,

emphasizing (and maybe creating) the pattern he seems to

need to find. This raises the suggestion of an unspoken

crisis in the narrator's life which requires the

assurance of providential care, and there is organic

evidence in the text that the crisis may be David's own

impending death.

However, it should be pointed out that while death

is very likely David's last crisis, the pattern of loss

and reclamation which Agnes embodies, deals with far

more than just David's fear of discontinuance. David

has had some terrible experiences. There is injustice

and misery in his world which is sometimes never undone.

Murdstone may be reported to be miserable, but he is

flourishing as he bears down on another young wife.

The mere fact that Murdstone was able to get into

Clara Copperfield's life at all raises questions about

"the mysterious dispensations of Providence" (213). Mr.

Creakle may be laughable in his belief in his reform

prison system, yet no one repays him for the cruelty he

inflicted upon the boys under his charge. Ham is never

recompensed for his loss but instead dies in a futile

attempt to save the destroyer of his own happiness. The

list continues.

What David seems to suggest is that having attained

the happiness he has found with Agnes, he affirms a

pattern which supports the belief in providential grace.

Even the terrible events which make up his life are

redeemed in that they are now the source of wisdom he

now expresses in his writing. So, in spite of all the

pain which David has endured he is able to say like St.

Paul "that the final outcome is of worth for "where sin

abounded, grace did much more abound" (Rom. 5:20 KJV).

David's religious point of view should not be

confused as Dickens' perspective. For Dickens, the

particular nature of beliefs of an individual would not

be as important as how those beliefs affect a person's

response to those around him or her. In David

Copperfield, the Murdstone faith dominates and crushes,

the Heep faith allows subterfuge, but the faith

exemplified by Clara and Daniel Peggotty, Agnes

Wickfield, Betsey Trotwood and eventually incorporated

by David which advocates that salvation is possible when

individuals choose to function as channels of grace for

one another. To this view, Dickens subscribed whole-

heartedly.