Pia K. Jakobsson

Public Ambition as Moral Obligation: The Intellectual Career of Elizabeth Carter (1717–1806)

To do Good is to endeavor after the Comfort and Pleasure of others. It is to embrace all reasonable Opportunities of making them wiser, and better, and happier; to lend them all fitting Assistance to procure and improve every equitable Advantage of Body, Mind, and Condition .… It is to extricate the Perplexed, raise the Depressed, comfort the Afflicted, ease the Tormented, relieve the Necessitous, forgive the Penitent, congratulate the Prosperous, and be pleased with every fair Occasion, either of mitigating the Sufferings, or increasing the Delights of our Fellow Creatures (N. Carter 1738: 54).

Feminist scholars have done important work exploring the role and impact of the Bluestocking Circle in the past few decades (Kelly 1999, Harcstark Myers 1990, Eger 2010, eds. Pohl and Schellenberg 2003). In that scholarship, Elizabeth Carter (1717 – 1806) is given a prominent role and her translation of the Greek philosopher Epictetus makes her a suitable symbol of the intellectual ambitions of the circle. Even so, she is regularly described as something of an odd and even marginal character, at the same time part of and separate/d from her environment. Judith Hawley speaks at length about “the difficulties in the representation of Carter and presentation of her works,” whereas Harriet Guest asserts that “Carter’s position at the margins of fashionable society allows her to function as both its ornament and its conscience.” (eds. Hawley, Kelly and Eger 1999: xii, Guest 2000: 133) In some ways Carter’s life and works affirm the emerging modernity of the Enlightenment, but her upbringing as the daughter of a priest, her profound religiosity, and the trajectory of her later life make her a more traditional character.
Carter was unusual in some ways, even for a Bluestocking. She was intimidatingly learned (she certainly read in more languages than any woman and most men around her), she never married, and she had a professional writing career while remaining reassuringly domestic. As Samuel Johnson put it, “My old friend, Mrs. Carter … could make a pudding, as well as translate Epictetus from the Greek, and work a handkerchief as well as compose a poem.” (Boswell 1799: 142) Our understanding of Carter has been further confused by her nephew, Montagu Pennington. He thankfully made sure to publish a biography of Carter’s life and substantial portions of her letters and some other writings, but he edited the letters heavily, with the express purpose of demonstrating her virtues and in the hopes that “the contemplation of so much piety, virtue, and learning may be attended with better effects than the gratification of mere curiosity; that her precepts and example may serve to rouse the indolent, while they confirm and strengthen the good.” (Pennington 1807: preface) He then points out that “the deep scholar and pious moralist” also “loved dancings; was somewhat, when very young, of a romp, and subscribed to assemblies; nay, once at least, she took a part in a play,” adding further complexity to an already confounding account (Pennington 1807: 12).

To the modern reader, it is difficult to reconcile the “modern” female scholar and public intellectual with the traditional, unmarried daughter of a priest whose obedient virtue colored every aspect of her life. To Guest this tension demonstrates “the difficulty of reconciling polite femininity with publicly acclaimed scholarship” (Guest 2000: 133). Carter easily becomes a bit of a conundrum, particularly if her piety is taken to imply subservience. As Mendelson and Crawford argue, men not only “monopolized the institutional expression of religion,” but “the trappings of Protestant Symbolism also reinforced a general sense of male spiritual hegemony” (Mendelson and Crawford 2000: 31 – 32). Thus religion, deeply felt, would seem to inhibit any public role and stand in conflict with our notions of the Bluestockings as representatives of newly emerging forms of public female intellectuals.

From her writings, no such conflict appears to have bothered Carter herself; to her, life and work, pudding and translation, sociability and solitude seem to have formed a harmonious whole, part and parcel of the same moral obligations that directed everything in her life. She had taken to heart other strains of Protestant thought on what it means to be a Christian, inculcated in her by her father, the Reverend Nicholas Carter, Perpetual Curate of Deal Chapel, and one of the six preachers at Canterbury Cathedral.

In an untitled poem published in 1762 and dedicated to her father, Carter articulates the importance of her father’s role in shaping her life (this is not long after Carter had bought a house for herself and her father in Deal, with money earned by her publications). The epigraph is from Horace, “causa fuit Pater his [the reason for these things being my father],” an apt choice considering that Horace’s text describes how his father, despite his low social standing, gave him an education equal to that of the sons of senators, guarded both his virtue and his chastity, and made him content with his lot in life (Horace 1926: 82 – 83).

Carter speaks directly to her father, “thou by whose fondness and paternal care, Distinguish'd blessings glad my cheerful days,” and argues that after Heaven, he is the most important influence on her life. She tells us that he “formed her mind” to science, and “gently let it thro’ the thorny Road” from “idle toys to real Good (Carter 1762: 63).” Better than ambition, wealth, fame, or even health is the studious search for wisdom and “the treasured Stores of each enlighten’d Age” that he directed her toward (Carter 1762: 63). The next two verses very specifically speak to the relationship between faith and reason, and the need to lead by example and explanation, rather than by command.

N’er did thy Voice assume a Master’s Pow’r,
Nor force Assent to what thy Precepts taught;
But bid my independent Spirit soar,
In all the Freedom of unfetter’d Thought.

Nor e’er by blind Constraint and servile Awe,
Compell’d to act a cold external Part:
But fixt my Duties by that sacred Law,
That rules the secret Movements of the Heart (Carter 1762:63)

Faith cannot be blind obedience; it must be a conscious personal choice, based on reason. Wisdom comes not just from repeating received knowledge, but from deep personal conviction and understanding.

Carter then makes clear that the principles and attitudes she learned are not in the past, not just about how she was raised, but how she interacts with the world: “Still be that sacred law my faithful guide / Conduct my actions, and my soul engage.” The sacred law is still a guide for her decision-making, but never a rule to be blindly followed. Training her to think for herself, with the understanding that it is a responsibility to use her capacity for reason, will pay off, as “ev’ry generous care, thy youth apply’d / Shall form the comfort of old age.” As her father once took care of her, Carter is now able to take care of him.

Guest agrees that Carter’s “attitude to her scholarship is of a piece with her religion and upbringing” but then goes on to say that those “endow her with a moral direction which recognizes liberty and independence as the reward of industry.” (Guest 2000:126) I argue that to Carter, liberty and independence are not only rewards, but always also obligations. The world and its wonders are there for us to see, and so we must pay attention, whatever we decide to make of it. “For what end has the lavish hand of Providence diffused such innumerable objects of delight but that all might rejoice in the privilege of existence, and be filled with gratitude to the beneficent author of it?” (Johnson 1752:81) In her opinion, God gave us free will to choose, and if we are not free we cannot choose and so cannot be saved, but the reason with which we were endowed makes it our duty to use it to make the best possible choices. No one else can reason on our behalf.

From those of Dr. Carter’s letters that have been published (most are in a private collection) and from his sermons, it is possible to piece together a sense of how Dr. Carter’s education of and interactions with his daughter are a direct consequence of his understanding of faith and the moral obligations it entailed. We can see how Elizabeth Carter, in turn, took on those obligations and made them the touchstone for her life and works. She may serve as an example of Enlightenment sociability and learned women acting in the public sphere, but her intellectual and public life was a consequence of her father’s interpretation of Christian ethics. (e. g. Eger 2000)

There is limited biographical information about Nicholas Carter, but Pennington begins his biography of Elizabeth Carter with some details about Nicholas Carter, who was the son of a “very considerable farmer” and who was “originally designed for his father's business, and did not begin to study the learned languages till he was nineteen years of age; and very uncommon was the progress he made in them, since he became a very deep and critical scholar in the Latin, Greek, and Hebrew languages; and also acquired a very considerable degree of knowledge of the sciences.” (Pennington 1807: 4) What prompted his change of heart we do not know, and how supportive Dr. Carter’s family was of his professional goals is likewise unknown, so we can only speculate about whether he felt obliged to give his children the same opportunity he was given to determine his own path or wanted to relieve them of an onerous duty to fulfill family obligations that he himself had only narrowly escaped.

When it comes to Elizabeth, Pennington states that from a very early age, it was Elizabeth’s “most eager desire to be a scholar” but insists that “she gained the rudiments of knowledge with great labour and difficulty; and her perseverance was put to a most severe trial. The slowness with which she conquered the impediments, that always oppose the beginning of the study of the dead languages, was such that it wearied even the patience of her father. He repeatedly encouraged her to give up all thoughts of becoming a scholar.” (Pennington 1807: 6) The accuracy and purpose of this claim is unclear, and the evidence from later years suggests rather the opposite. Maybe her purported slowness was a way for Pennington to focus on her perseverance and commitment, qualities that any reader could potentially emulate, over innate talent that would be difficult to mimic and that might indicate an unsuitably masculine turn of mind.

Carter’s studies were extensive. Pennington tells us that she learned Greek, Latin, and Hebrew. Her father sent her for a year to board in the house of Mr. Le Sueur, a French refugee minister at Canterbury, where she learnt French as well as needle-work and music. She also studied Italian, Spanish, and German, the latter as part of a scheme planned by her father to find her a position at court. Later in life she learned Portuguese and taught herself Arabic. Moreover, Carter “bestowed a great deal of attention upon astronomy; which she thought a noble science” and also studied geography and mathematics. She “gained a knowledge of history, both ancient and modern, such as is very rarely acquired,” but apparently did somewhat less well with drawing and painting, “which she learnt and practiced for some time, but without much success” (Pennington 1807: 10 – 17).

Dr. Carter “gave all his children, daughters as well as sons, a learned education.” As far as can be ascertained, he had five children with his first wife Margaret; Elizabeth (b. 1717), John (b. 1723), and Margaret (mother of Montagu, b. 1725), as well as Nicolas and James, birthdate unknown, but who both died abroad at a young age while serving as Lieutenants in the Royal Navy. With his second wife, Mary Bean, Dr. Carter had at least two children, Mary and Henry. We are not told details of their individual studies, but Pennington specifies that his mother Margaret (Elizabeth’s younger sister) was “a very good Latin and French, and a tolerable Greek and Italian scholar, with some knowledge also of Hebrew.” (Pennington 1807: 5) Elizabeth Carter would later explain that:

If I have any natural gift, it is right that it should be attributed to God All-mighty … . If, on the contrary, I seem to have improved this gift in any way, the credit for it is due to the care and attention of my most loving father, who … led me by examples and encouragement to the study of the humanities, and supported me until such time as I should be able to swim by myself without assistance. (Hampshire 2005: 50)

Dr. Carter was unusually close with his oldest daughter, but raised her to be highly independent. He gave her an education worthy of a scholar and treated her generally as an intellectual equal. His consistent respect and support for his daughter are well documented in his letters, but he does not discuss his parenting goals there. Scholars speculate that he perhaps “was wise enough to perceive the quality of his eldest daughter’s mind and personality from an early age” (Hampshire 2005: 17) or suggest that his approach was due to “the special views and hopes of her father,” but do not explore what exactly those views were and how they were special (Myers 1990: 46). From his Sermons, (he published seventeen of them on one volume and at least six others separately) it is clear that Dr. Carter saw reason as an intrinsic part of any meaningful faith. To him, “the Laws of Reason … are the Laws of God,” so understanding one would enable understanding of the other. As a guide for our reason, we have the Bible, which he described as “that settled Rule, which the Spirit of God has published for the secure Direction of all Believers and which is the only one by which they can safely compare their Behaviour.” (Carter 1738: 162)

Understanding is a necessary, but not sufficient condition of faith, since faith is not something to be passively believed, but something to be actively performed. Dr. Carter argued that “every kind and degree of faith, which proves neither an help, nor incitement to good works, is, in religious estimation, unprofitable. Virtue has intrinsic excellencies, which faith is destitute of, and which give it a vast pre-eminence.” (Carter 1752: 7) It is, Dr. Carter stated, a “necessary practice on our Part, both in Scripture and Reason, as the Condition of our being admitted into Communion with God and to a Participation of his Love is, that we copy after his moral Perfections, in a uniform Observation of Righteousness, Purity and Holiness.” (10) As a Christian, a priest, and a father, Dr. Carter saw it as his moral obligation to encourage the development of reason that would lead to understanding of the Laws of God, which would incite in his children (and his parishioners) good works and virtue. And they had to do it themselves; he could not make them. “Nor was it ever yet heard of, that Faith came by Beating. To Dragoon others into believing, can be thought a proper Method by those only, who care not what becomes of Men’s Souls, if they can but get the Dominion of their Bodies.” (9)

Thus, it makes sense that Dr. Carter would want to give his children the best education possible as the means to attaining reason and thereby the tools to imitate the moral perfection of God, but he did not stop there. Carter wrote to his daughter regularly, now and then in Latin, and he apparently chose to advertise Elizabeth’s talents enough to get her noticed “by some of the most respectable families in Kent” (Pennington 1807: 8). In a letter to his daughter, Dr. Carter explains that he has shown one of her letters to his patron Sir George Oxenden who “commended it extremely [and] could hardly believe that one of your age could spell so exactly and choose such proper expressions.” (Hampshire 2005: 17)

In the next few years, Carter’s life and work became increasingly public. In 1734 some of her verses, signed “Eliza,” started appearing in the Gentleman's Magazine whose publisher, Edward Cave, was well known to Dr. Carter (Cave had published some of his sermons). In 1737, Elizabeth’s An Elegy to Mrs Rowe was published in Cave’s magazine. “The publication of these poems, and her character now beginning to be known, produced her many compliments in the same Magazine,” including from Samuel Johnson, who became a lifelong friend (Pennington 1807: 25). It is likely that Dr. Carter made the arrangements for these first pieces to be sent to Cave and while Dr. Carter does not directly discuss why he accepted, indeed encouraged, his daughter’s writing, he had a clear set of priorities for his own writing that likely informed his view. If “the Matter of a Discourse be good, it is capable of doing some Service; and when every Degree of Service is Necessary, all Imperfections in the Manner of it are excusable.” (Carter 1716: 3) He raised his daughter to be able to make thoughtful contributions and to be capable of doing some service, despite any imperfections.

He was also mindful about the details of his daughter’s public character. When some other person signed as Eliza, Dr. Carter directed his daughter how to make sure her reputation was not confused with the work of a stranger, telling Carter that:

It is generally believed by all who know Eliza, that that riddle was wrote by you, because signed Eliza. An advertisement in the Magazine asserting only a matter of fact (that the Eliza in the Magazine is not the Eliza in that Almanack) I think would not savour of ostentation, but be very right and prudent. (Pennington 1807: 25)

He had no issue with her appearing in print, and actively built her reputation, but he wanted to make sure that no inferior writing would color people’s perception of his daughter’s wit and wisdom.

At some point, Carter appears to have taken up residence in London, possibly with an uncle who was a silk merchant. Hampshire states that this move took place in March of 1738, while Pennington is a bit more vague, telling us that “from the age of 18 or 19 years, Mrs. Carter generally passed a great part of the winter in London, where her acquaintance was much courted, and estimated as it deserved,” whereas the summers were “chiefly spent with her father at Deal, or with her friends at Canterbury.” (Hampshire 2005: 8) Dr. Carter told the Dean of Canterbury in 1738 that his daughter was in London for her education (Myers 1990: 47) (incidentally indicating a temporary arrangement), whereas Pennington emphasized the networking opportunities, noting that “Mr. Cave was much connected with the literary world, and his friendship for Mrs. Carter was the means of introducing her to many authors and scholars of note.” (Pennington 1807: 26) If this was indeed intended as a temporary arrangement or was meant to become permanent, and whether there were hopes of finding a husband for Carter or the time in London was strictly a career move is not known, only that much of her time while she was there appears to have been taken up with her work for and with Cave and that her reputation was spreading.

Her father not only accepted her unusual finishing school, but made the arrangements for it, and it paid off. In 1738, Cave published a collection of Elizabeth’s writing, Poems upon Particular Occasions. The same year saw a poem on the planetary system addressed to Mr. Wright, the astronomer, and in November, 1739 her Ode to Melancholy was published. The latter was not signed, but was “soon traced … to its source, and, more than any of her former productions, contributed to spread the reputation of her name. So widely, indeed, was her celebrity diffused, that it reached many parts of the Continent, and occasioned the celebrated Barratier, then nearly of her own age, to solicit a correspondence with her.” (Drake 1810)

In 1739, she translated from French an attack on Pope's Essay on Man by J. P. de Crousaz; and in the same year appeared her translation from the Italian of Algarotti's Newtonianismo per le Dame, under the title of Sir Isaac Newton's Philosophy explained for the use of the Ladies, in six Dialogues on Light and Colour. Translations hold an odd position, since the translator is usually not understood to be articulating original ideas, but instead making someone else’s thoughts available in a new language. Carter’s friend, Hester Chapone, complained that a translation is “much less than your genius is capable of acquiring in other ways … you ought to be an original writer,” but as Guest points out, Chapone may have “simply failed to grasp the implications of Carter’s translation of a work central to the most exclusively masculinist and Shaftesburian forms of civic humanism.” (Guest 2000: 129) Any translation is dependent on a particular reading of the text, an interpretation. The level of command of a language required to render scientific ideas in a new form indicate a profound depth of knowledge, sophistication, and professionalism. Additionally, both the translation of Crouzac and that of Algarotti contained notes and comments that engaged in a dialogue with the texts, inserting Carter as a voice of authority debating the authors and explicating the text to the reader. The two translations, “however little they may now be supposed to add to Mrs. Carter's fame, had a considerable influence upon it then.” (Pennington 1807: 34) Johnson “gave it his entire approbation; and Dr. Birch, another writer in Cave’s circle, addressed a Latin epistle to her, in commendation of the propriety and elegance of the style which she had adopted.” (Drake 1810: 77) Carter was established as a phenomenon.

Birch’s Latin epistle is thought to have led to something of a change in Carter’s circumstances. Pelz suggests that Birch’s “hyperbole contrasting Carter with famous female achievers from ancient and modern times was evidently a public embarrassment.” (Pelz 2008: 70) Ruhe goes further and suggests that Dr. Birch harbored a more personal interest, indeed that they spent considerable time together and that Birch actually proposed marriage to Carter, which she turned down. Whatever the immediate cause, Birch’s diary entry for June 2 of 1739 notes that “Elisa Carter rus redibat” [Elisa Carter left for the country]. These lines have been broadly accepted as evidence that Carter abruptly left London and from then spent most of her life in retirement with her father (Birch’s diary entry is related in Hampshire (2005: 24) and Myers (1990: 57) follows the traditional narrative closely). Even those scholars who note inconsistencies in this version of events, feel the need to mention Carter’s “abrupt departure from London.” Hawley notes that “it is commonly supposed that Carter spent the next decade in Deal in retreat from marriage and from writing,” even as she acknowledges that Carter’s letters evidence “frequent and flirtatious attendance at balls and parties” and that Carter was still writing poetry (Hawley 2008). Looking at Carter’s letters tells us that she did go back to her father’s house in the summer of 1739, since there is a letter from Deal, dated in June. Further evidence of Carter’s return to Deal and to some sort of quasi-monastic seclusion, has been proffered in a letter from her father, in which Dr. Carter appears to have very specific ideas about what she should do. He tells her that “If you intend never to marry, as I think you plainly intimate in one of your letters, then you certainly ought to live retired, and not appear in the world with an expense which is reasonable upon the prospect of getting a husband, but not otherwise.” (Pennington 1807: 22) This has been understood to mean that he thought it was time for Carter to return to Deal and live in a manner more suitable for an unmarried woman. Carter did set up house in Deal, but she did not retire there for good. In November of 1740 she was back in London, and all evidence suggests that she resumed the regular long stays there that she would keep up for most of her life. Using the winter of 1744 – 45 as an example, Pennington claims that “the greatest part of Mrs. Carter's time seems to have been spent either in London, or with her friends at Canterbury.” (77) As with so many aspects of her life, Carter was at the same time part of and separate/d from her environment, both in Deal and in London.

Since she never married, yet clearly did not withdraw from the world, did her choices put her at odds with her father? According to Pennington, Dr. Carter firmly believed it was in his daughter’s best interest to get married since “though he was able and willing to maintain her [Elizabeth Carter] while he lived, should he die and leave her unprovided for, her situation would have been very painful and distressing.” (19) At the same time, Dr. Carter consistently and unhesitatingly left it up to her judgment.

[…] I will lay no commands upon you, because it is more immediately your own affair, and for life: but you ought certainly to consider with a great attention, before you reject an offer, far more advantageous in appearance that any other you can ever expect. You may always depend upon my indulgence; but do not let my indulgence mislead you. If you cannot bring your mind to a compliance, I and all your friends will be sorry for your missing so good a prospect: but I will give you no uneasiness. Consult calmly what you think will be for your own good; and may God direct you to come to that final resolution which will prove best for you. (21)

As with faith, he leaves it up to her reason and free will to make a decision, and his confidence in her judgment is reinforced by his belief in Providence. “I end, as I began, in leaving you to your own inclinations, and in assuring you of my indulgence and affection in whatever part you take. I recommend you in this, and in all concerns of life, to the kind direction of Providence.” (21)

There is nothing that suggests that Dr. Carter had concerns about his daughter’s judgment or reputation, and he had the utmost respect for her ability to handle herself. So what kind of retirement did he have in mind? His desire to see her married in the first place appears to have been grounded in the financial security it would hopefully entail, and in the letter where he suggests she consider her circumstances, he specifically mentions the expense of appearing in the world. Norma Clarke points to Reverend Carter’s concern with his daughter’s standing in the world since single life “is often errant, and seldom meets with much respect” (2000: 37). If that is what he meant, limiting her expenses rather than her social interactions, it fits better with what we know of Carter’s life. She still spent time in London and Canterbury, but she did not at this point, or for some years ahead, have her own establishment either in London or Deal. She stayed with her father when she was in Deal and with friends when in London (Pennington 1807: 90).

The focus of this period in Elizabeth’s life appears to have been her friends, with her either spending time or exchanging letters with a growing circle of people, including Catherine Talbot, the friendship that so profoundly affected her, and brought her “more into the world than ever, although she had never lived a life of seclusion even in the country.” (69) They met in 1741 through a mutual friend, the astronomer and mathematician Thomas Wright. According to Pennington, it was the “fame of [Talbot’s] virtues and of her superior understanding” that made Carter “so earnestly desirous” to meet her (Carter 1809: 1:I). Talbot was of a good family, but more importantly she read and spoke French and Italian, and had some knowledge of Latin; and at some point she taught herself German. (1:x) The delight they took in their correspondence and friendship, which would last almost thirty years until Talbot’s death from cancer in 1770, is obvious from their letters. Carter writes from Deal in 1741:

People here are not in the least danger of losing their wits about you, but proceed as quietly and as regularly in their affairs as if there was no such person in being. Nobody has been observed to lose their way, run against a door, or sit silent and staring in a room full of company in thinking upon you, except my solitary self, who (as you may perceive in the description) have the advantage of looking half mad when I do not see you, and (as you know by many ocular proofs) extremely silly when I do.70 (1:9)

For the next decade, Carter’s publication record appears thin, but she is still writing. Kelly lists some of her pieces appearing in The Gentleman’s Magazine in 1741 and one in 1744 (Hawley, Kelly and Eger 1999: 2: xxviii). She did keep up correspondence with Cave about possible projects and at least at one point sent him some verses for publication, on the strict condition that he “print them without any name, & never tell any one person [wha]tsoever that they are mine … . They have never been seen only by one person. either my papa or my friends in London know any Thing of the matter.” (Hampshire 2005: 75) This is, incidentally, a rare example of Carter explicitly not consulting her father or other friends about her writing, but without knowing what she had written, there is no way to know what her concerns were or her reasons for secrecy. It is possible she wrote and even published other texts, but all this letter tells us with certainty is that she did not treat everything she wrote in the same way; putting her name to some of her works but not to others, distributing some writings only in manuscript form while other texts went directly to a printer.

We know of at least one text, The Ode to Wisdom, that first circulated only in manuscript form until Samuel Richardson read a copy and included it in his novel Clarissa. Carter then had a corrected version published in the Gentleman’s Magazine.71 She also wrote to Richardson to express her concerns on learning that he had “thought proper to print an Ode, which, I apprehended, no one had a right to publish, if I did not choose to do it myself.” (McGeary 2012: 442) When she wrote to Talbot about it, she refered to the poem having “flown post through the kingdom upon a hackney newspaper” and thought that “to see it fluttering in two or three journals is beyond all sufferance.” (Carter 1809: 2:249)

Here it appears she was concerned more with controlling the text (the publication in Gentleman’s Magazine claims to be a “corrected” version) and the context of its publication, rather than with publication itself. When Talbot encouraged Carter to contribute some pieces to an edition of Dodsley’s Miscellanies, she suggests that since “things will steal abroad some time or other,” it would be better for Carter if they “appear in the dress you wish them, and in proper company,” at least if they are published “without any name than by a lady.” (2:200) Carter in her response to this again emphasized the matter of control of her texts, saying that “If I ever writ anything worth printing, I should rather chuse to publish them myself than have them published by anybody else.” (2: 203) Letters to and from Dunscombe indicate Carter translated an Ode by Horace (number fifteen) around 1751, which she offered for Dunscombe’s use on condition she was not named. She contributed two pieces to Johnson’s Rambler, #44 and #100 (in 1750 and 1751 respectively). She also commented on the complete translation of Horace, and she read and commented on Hawkins Browne’s Poem on Immortality. Providing commentary on and suggestions for other people’s writing was not common for a woman writer at the time, but it is the kind of mentoring and support expected of a scholar, and the extent to which her knowledge and opinion was sought out by male writers is notable.

In 1752, Carter published something of a very different nature. Her father had been taken to task by the Mayor and Corporation of Deal for refusing to read the Athanasian Creed in Church. He believed it was a tradition that did not exactly match the articles of faith and read instead that of the Apostles, which he believed the more important since “it requires no profession of faith, at baptism or by sick persons, in order to receive absolution, but that which is expressed in the words of the Apostles creed only.” (Carter 1752: 9) If the Apostles‘ Creed on its own had that power, it should be sufficient for the weekly services. Dr. Carter was kept from preaching for some time. A number of pamphlets arguing the various positions were published (including at least one by Dr. Carter himself). Finally, Elizabeth Carter entered the fray. Using her education, her language skills, and her superior reason to defend both her father and her faith must have seemed a very worthwhile opportunity and she adamantly defended her father’s position. She pointed out, in no uncertain terms, that the Athanasian Creed is inconsistent with scripture (which has primacy) and that its insistence on the unity of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit is at odds with reason. Although she did not put her name on the pamphlet and Pennington nowhere mentions it as hers, other sources are confident that she was the author and that her authorship was common knowledge at the time (The Monthly Magazine 1812: 108 – 110). The incident demonstrates the importance both Dr. Carter and his daughter assigned to reason in matters of faith, but also that they were both willing to stand up for the beliefs their reason led them to, at the risk of censure and, at least theoretically, criminal prosecution.

The 1750s was otherwise marked by two major endeavors – one domestic and one very public. The domestic assignment was the preparation of her younger brother Henry for University. She tutored him for several years before he went to Cambridge in 1756, where he so impressed his teachers they thought he had been to some unknown elite school – they were stunned that his training was the work of a woman. She had taken her work seriously; Carter was so engaged with Henry as to “spend but little time from Deal” and resisted the urgings of her friends to spend part of the winters with them in London” (Pennington 1807: 108).

The other major venture was a project encouraged by and completed with the steady support of Talbot and the Bishop of Oxford (Thomas Secker; with whom Talbot and her mother lived) – a complete translation of all the extant works of Epictetus, started in 1749. This was an ambitious and very demanding undertaking which Carter apparently began as a personal favor to Talbot who was not able to read the text in the original Greek. Talbot is quoted in Pennington’s Memoir as saying the translation of Epictetus was undertaken at her request “and rather contrary to [Carter’s] own inclination.” (131) The translation was originally finished in 1753, when Carter went to London for the first time in several years. Pennington believes this is when Talbot and the Bishop persuaded Carter to publish the work, setting off a whole new round of additions, edits, and corrections to make it presentable to a wider audience. Talbot had concerns that reading a heathen thinker would be problematic. She worried that “it is so much the way of the world to reduce Christianity to a mere moral system (not only consonant with, as it is, but) discoverable by mere reason and natural light, that I could not help earnestly wishing to have persons continually reminded in reading his excellent morals, how insufficient and imperfect mere morality is, and how much of his is borrowed, at least, if not stolen, from true Religion.” (131) The solution was a series of notes, intended to set out where Epictetus’ philosophy was misleading or wrong. The process took several years and it was only in 1758 that the whole text was finally printed, to much acclaim. It remained the standard translation of Epictetus for more than a century, but more immediately, the publication served to cement Carter’s reputation as one of the most learned women in Europe. “Curiosity was excited, not only here, but upon the continent, to learn the particulars of her life; and even in Russia an account was published, in 1759, of her studies and acquisitions” (Drake 1810: 83).

Carter had become a national icon and an international celebrity, but Pennington claims that “her character was truly feminine, however strong the powers of her mind might be; and even to the last, she shrunk from too much notice.” (Pennington 1807: 104) The two positions seem impossible to reconcile, at least as long as her public writing persona is considered in terms of personal expression or even indulgence. In this case, being able to do something for a friend probably had been a powerful motivation, but the project also allowed her to use every ounce of her talents and the particular training her father had given her to make available to her contemporaries a text she thought was useful and morally instructive. Carter had explained in The Rambler No. 44 that “whoever would be really happy must make the diligent and regular exercise of his superior powers his chief attention, adoring the perfections of his Maker, expressing goodwill to his fellow-creatures, cultivating inward rectitude.” (Johnson 1752: 2:77) Her father similarly believed that there is “an essential Fitness also in the Exercise of our Faculties, and which we are constantly obliged to pursue.” (Carter 1738: 21) If you have the knowledge and capacity to do something extraordinary, it is your obligation to regularly use those abilities. The translation allowed her an opportunity to do just that.

And yet, it was not acceptable for a woman to focus all her time and energy on intellectual work. Pennington took pains to set Carter’s scholarly work in a domestic context, reminding us that she considered those duties as important as any others, repeatedly referring to her doing needlework for herself and her family. He proudly reports that Carter, in response to a request from Talbot for a biography of Epictetus to go with the translations, told her friend that “Whoever that somebody or other is, who is to write the life of Epictetus, seeing I have a dozen shirts to make, I do opine, dear Miss Talbot that it cannot be I.” (Pennington 1807: 126) Clearly aware of the dissonance – one was a chore any number of people could do and the other a challenge for which she was uniquely suited – she may still have been serious in her rebuff, intending it as a reminder that her intellectual work was of a kind with her domestic concerns, both ways to express good will to fellow creatures and both equally important moral obligations. Virtue was to use your faculties “in Proportion to the Means and Power of which we are possessed” to do good, and the good had to be directed outward, toward neighbors, since “society is the true sphere of human virtue.” (Carter 1738: 62, Johnson 1752: 2: 84)

The translation of Epictetus did not only bring fame to Carter, it also brought tangible benefits. With the money from the translation, Carter bought a house in Deal for her and her father to live in. She was also able to spend several months each winter in London in a rented apartment. She could socialize freely and she had a broad network of correspondents. The salonnière Elizabeth Montagu had sought her out after reading Epictetus and around the two of them, and some of their friends and acquaintances, the Bluestocking circle formed.

Montagu and the Lord of Bath conspired to make Carter put out a book of her own poetry in 1762, Poems on Several Occasions. This time Carter demonstrated considerable reluctance and anxiety, warning Montagu that this was a “scheme which I always drive as fast as possible out of my head, because I never think of it without a very painful degree of confusion.” (Carter 1817: 1:389) Later on she expressed more worry about sending Montagu “the Ode” to be included in the collection and prays that Montagu “will not fail to admire the hand writing, for to be sure it is marvelously (sic) pretty, I heartily wish there may be anything else in it worth admiring; but of this I am no judge.” (Carter 1817: 1:142) Guest sees Carter’s hesitation as ambivalence toward publication, stating that “on the one hand she expresses modesty and even reluctance about publishing her work […] and on the other she evidently takes pleasure in its favorable reception, and in her increasing fame.” (Guest 2000, 114) It is possible that the inclusion of the poem to her father is a sign of her ambivalence and that it was intended as an apologia for the endevor, but the epigraph draws a comparison between herself and Horace and the tone of the whole poem is joyous and exuberant rather than defensive. What Carter expresses seems less of a concern about publication and being immodest, or fear that her moral reputation will suffer, than uncertainty about the merit of her work, the constant apprehension of the scholar that her contribution may not hold up. She leans on Montagu’s judgment, barraging her with questions about the details:”Do you think what I have inclosed will do for the dedication? Do you rather chuse I should put my name to it? Pray tell me all about this, and everything else that you think necessary; and be so good, not to forget to furnish me with a title, about which I am utterly at a loss.” (Carter 1817: 142) Because it was her own work, it was more difficult for her to judge its merit and accept the attending notoriety.

As Carter grew older and wrote less, she seems to have focused more on enjoying the world around her, her friendships and learning from strangers about how they saw the world. The year after her collection of poems was published, she, Montagu, Lord Bath, and some others went on a trip to continental Europe to take the waters at Spa (now in Belgium). Her letters from the trip detail not only what she saw and experienced, but numerous interviews with locals from all walks of life. She seems to have been particularly curious to see how other nations practiced religion. She conversed with nuns at the monasteries they visited, shocked at the lack of knowledge they exhibited and sometimes playfully teasing church wardens with detailed, sophisticated questions about the relics and rituals they encountered (Pennington 1807: 221 – 225). Always interested and never condescending, she must have served as a missionary of sorts in every encounter, both by sharing insights about her faith and as a living embodiment of her beliefs.

As far as we know, for the rest of her life, Carter wrote nothing at all for publication. She did see to it that Talbot’s Reflections on the Seven Days of the Week was published after her death in 1770, which to her may have been as important as having her own writings or translations published (Talbot 1770). She wrote copious numbers of letters, but at least according to Pennington, did not want to see them published. She did, still according to Pennington, leave some groups of letters neatly organized, and she did tell him to do as he pleased with at least some of her writings, but she did not actively set out to have any of them published. Maybe she wanted to let others decide if they were useful, trusting Providence to make or let happen what would be best in the long run. Maybe Pennington had instructions to organize and circulate the letters in their extended family or maybe she did intend for at least some of them to be published, and Pennington added her protestations to safeguard her reputation in a time that in some ways was becoming more hostile to women in the public sphere.

Carter was in many ways deeply traditional. Although she embraced female friendships and encouraged intellectual and public ambitions of other women, she had no proto-feminist agenda and loathed radicals like Mary Wollstonecraft. And though she saw reason as a guiding light, she detested the Philosophes and new-fangled British empiricists like David Hume. Just like her father, she believed in the development and practice of reason, not in opposition to faith, but as a means to salvation. Dr. Carter was certain that

[…] every Man from mere natural Notions of his Understanding may sufficiently discern, that there is a God of infinite Perfections, who is the Maker, Governor, and Judge of the World […]. Thus Reason, or natural Conscience, if it were duly regarded, would, without other Help, convince all Men, that their Duty is, To be just, and pure, and holy. (Carter 1738: 89)

Her training as a scholar, her public life as a writer, and her social life as a friend and conversationalist were all aimed at fulfilling the moral obligation put on her by her father to use reason to find eternal truth, to be just, and pure, and holy, and to do good to her fellow human beings. Her father supported her as an equal because he respected her intellect and as a person, but he encouraged her to pursue her studies with a view to religious principle. Carter was a product of Enlightenment ideas, but an Enlightenment that did not radically break with the past, one that rather incorporated change with tradition, in order to better fulfil the obligation to “endeavor after the Comfort and Pleasure of others” (54).