“HONOUR " =-_--- The Country Wife is a play about honor. Much the same could be said of much * .* «,7 seventeenth-century drama. Wycherley's treatment-of honor-in-Phe-Country-Wife-conveyet-a ~complex range of values; reflecting-the diversities among-Anglican ‘and-Dissenter, aristocrat-and- titizens royalist and.tepubliean-rake-and-pilgrim. Although in practice the term holds various Shades of meaning, which The Counny Wife fully explores, Wycherley could expect that his hat honor should be. As Robert South put it in his sermon, are such inseparable companions,.that the heathens would admit no man into the temple of honour, wi audience shared a similar view of wh "Virtue and honour ‘ho did not pass to it thro’ the temple of virtue." This commonplace provides Wycherley with a norm against which he measures the words a ind actions of his characters—most of whom associate honor with outward reputation alone, Lacking the Substance of virtue, theit honor resides only in words and appearances, the fashionable garments ofa Restoration-style Vanity Fair, = ee | A glance at the minor characters of Wycherley’s play reveals how thoroughly they have separated their sense of honor from virtuous action. By "honor," Sparkish refers only to his Teputation as a town wit, Because he believes that jealousy dishonors a wit, he willfully ignores even the most overt and apparently compromising assaults upon the affections of his fiancee, Alithea. Pinchwife, at the opposite extreme of folly, associates his honor solely with the chastity of his wife. Disregarding the virtue of his own conduct, he will (unlike Sparkish) endure any amount of private insult but bristles with the fear of dishonor whenever he thinks that Marjorie's virtue isin danger. Lady Fidget and her circle, as self professed "women of honor and reputation,” embody most vividly the town's distorted values.' In public, they repeat the word "honor" with Smbody most vividly the town's distorted values calculated regularity, implying their absolute and strict probity. In private, all covet the loose pleasures of illicit sex (quote from the text). One prominent character that Wycherley distinguishes from the other characters is Homer, who embodies an urbane cynicism and rejects honor and virtue altogether. The world’s "bigots in honor" (LV. 1-22) cannot deceive him, and in fact he bases his scheme of multiple seduetions on the knowledge that "women of honor ... are only chary of their reputations, not their (1i.153-54). He is an outsider who has reputation but also the true honor of virtue. Honor simply lies outside his frame of personal values. persons... rejected not only the false honor of mere His total liberation from conventional standards suggests that ultimately he accepts the HobbesianAvon notion that the only real honor is power. As a Hobbesian realist,amid the dra ‘oom affectations of Restoration comedy, he pursues sexual power while shrewdly concealed behind the illusion of impotence. This stratagem proves doubly effective because it blinds husbands as it simultaneously manipulates the ladies’ already corrupted notions of honor. "But, poor gentleman," Lady Fidget whispers upon discovering his ruse, "eould you be so generous, so truly a man of honor, as for the sakes of us women of honor, to cause yourself to be reported no man?" (11Li.525-27). Seventeenth-century writers frequently argued that language and civilization are intricately Se eee ee eee connected. Language, for Hobbes, allowed man to escape the warring state of nature, just as “traditionally it had been viewed as a mark of human dignity, dis jguishing man from the beasts. The Country Wife presents a world of corrupted language and perverse values in which fraud, perjury, and breach of trust are the normative condition, Everyday speech reflects the close link between language and honor, since to pledge one's honor is to give one's "word.", The Country Wife words mean virtually whatever the speaker pleases, and language has become the ultimate form of appearance. The "china" scene holds an immense importance in widening the scope of Wycherley’s satire beyond the ridicule of individual characters. . Honor, as Horner and lady fidget Afier Homer use the term, is the metaphor for a cluster of ideas all associated with adulte n, is the metaphor for a cluster of ideas all essociated with adultery. pledges his "word" (11.i.534) to Lady Fidget that he is no eunuch, she immediately signals her understanding. "I have so strong a faith in your honor, dear, dear, noble sir, that I'd forfeit mine for yours at any time, dear sir" (I1.i.510-542). Since there are others present, the code both permits secrecy and advances their liaison, while the bare fact of adultery is veiled in a decorous (highly civilized) language of virtue and gallantry. China vessels traditionally served as an image of women and female virginity so one might well understand the china vessel a fitting emblem for honor, since genuine honor (like china) was regarded as both precious and frail. This is a traditional significance ironically at odds with the grossly flawed sexual appetite of the far from virginal Lady Fidget. While Lady Fidget brazenly maintains her facade of honor, the ceramic vessel she holds, like the coided metaphor she employs, vividly reveals the alarming disparity between fair surface and foul depths that marks the entire play.