Jan Fergus scrutinizes Catherine's poor judgement:.
Catherine is notorious, certainly, for her hilariously poor judgement of Isabella Thorpe - .
for taking Isabella at her own valuation and for believing all her professions of affection.
This flagrant error somewhat obscures Catherine's capacity to estimate other characters .
correctly.
Catherine's generosity, which, although puts her in no danger of underrating sincere people like Henry and Eleanor Tilney, puts her at great risk from the likes of General Tilney and the Thorpes. It appears that the function of manners here, serve as a direct correlation to Catherine's naiveté. Catherine's chief aspiration throughout the novel, then, is to develop practically as an adult; an adult who is able to distinguish between the likes of the truly virtuous Tilneys, and the Thorpes and the General who can only ever proclaim their virtues. .
Isabella's polite performance enraptures Catherine, but the reader soon recognises her egotistical nature. Her conversations with Catherine usually serve as a source of self-glorification. One such instance is manifest in the following quotation where Isabella is supposed to be defending Miss Andrews: .
There is nothing I would not do for those who are really my friends. I have no notion of .
loving people by halves, it is not my nature. My attachments are always excessively .
strong. I told Captain Hunt, at one of our assemblies this winter, that if he was to .
tease me all night, I would not dance with him, unless he was to allow Miss Andrews to .
be as beautiful as an angel. The men think us incapable of real friendship you know, and .
I am determined to shew them the difference. (p27).
This rather lengthy account effectively functions as a catalogue of Isabella's own virtues, and exposes the true Isabella. .
John Thorpe creates an even worse impression than his sister because he is actually lacking the rhetorical knowledge of good manners.
