Fordyce's Sermons

"Other books were produced, and after some deliberation he chose Fordyce's Sermons." (Austen 67).

This is a good example of Austen's use of wit in order to exaggerate a character point. Mr. Collins, the Bennett's cousin, reads James Fordyce's Sermons for Young Women to the young ladies at their home. He is a very straight-laced man, who thinks young women should be proper, kind, and sophisticated; his views on them, like Fordyce's in his Sermons, are very conservative. It is ironic that Austen would have chosen this book for Collins to be reading, seeing as he himself is a clergyman, and the book is not a real sermon, but only entitled as one. Also, the "Sermons" advise against young ladies reading novels and romances...like Pride and Prejudice.

http://www.users.muohio.edu/mandellc/projects/mclainjl/beinecke.htm#Sermons