During Sir Peter’s first appearance on stage in The School for Scandal, in Act 1, Scene 2, he delivers a short soliloquy. Recounting recent troubles with his wife of six months, Sir Peter’s soliloquy introduces another of the play’s subplots, which centers on the relationship between himself and Lady Teazle:
When an old bachelor marries a young wife, what is he to expect? ’Tis now six months since Lady Teazle made me the happiest of men—and I have been the most miserable dog ever since! [...] Yet I chose with caution—a girl bred wholly in the country, who never knew luxury beyond one silk gown, nor dissipation above the annual gala of a race ball. Yet now she plays her part in all the extravagant fopperies of the fashion and the town [...] She dissipates my fortune, and contradicts all my humours; yet, the worst of it is, I doubt I love her, or I should never bear all this. However, I’ll never be weak enough to own it.
In a play full of slanderers and gossips who take pleasure in competitive demonstrations of wit and frivolous cruelty, Sheridan’s decision to include an in-depth exploration of a married couple’s relationship deserves consideration. Sir Peter’s early ruminations on the state of his marriage to Lady Teazle are startling in their sincerity (if also played up to humorous effect). His speech is full of extremes and juxtapositions—he is old, Lady Teazle is young; he became “the happiest of men,” and yet he is now “the most miserable dog”; she has been transported from the mere rural country to the “extravagant fopperies” of luxurious London Town— and yet Sir Peter cannot help but recognize (privately, to an empty stage) that he loves Lady Teazle anyway. It is important to note that the issues Sir Peter observes in his marriage all stem from the couple’s differing social and economic starting points (Sir Peter has always been a member of the upper class, while Lady Teazle has just entered an entirely new social strata). By setting up this direct contrast within the confines of the Teazle’s marriage, Sheridan examines the underpinnings of his contemporary society while also letting the couple’s relationship grow over the course of the play’s five acts.
The School for Scandal concludes with the Epilogue, in which Lady Teazle soliloquizes on the final message of the play. Written by dramatist George Colman the Elder, Lady Teazle’s ending speech summarizes the play’s events and offers a closing word on the negative impacts of both gossip and miscommunication:
Old bachelors, who marry smart young wives,
Learn from our play to regulate your lives:
Each bring his dear to town, all faults upon her—
London will prove the very source of honour.
Plunged fairly in, like a cold bath it serves,
When principles relax, to brace the nerves:
Such is my case; and yet I must deplore
That the gay dream of dissipation’s o’er.
[...]
Save money—when I just knew how to waste it!
Leave London—just as I began to taste it!
In the passage above, Lady Teazle provides a word of warning to couples in the audience, imploring them to learn from the mistakes of her marriage. Importantly, this is not a gloomy speech—her lamentation is tempered by the audience’s knowledge of her and Sir Peter’s earlier reconciliation. The audience is instead left with the sense that all will be well, now that the gossips have been duly chastised and she and her husband have in fact learned to see past their differences and “regulate” their lives accordingly. However, the message of the play is not entirely cheerful—Lady Teazle’s speech makes it clear that, at the end of the day, the characters are all human with human virtues and human faults, and it is possible that the play could have ended very differently:
All this I told our bard; he smiled, and said ’twas clear,
I ought to play deep tragedy next year.
Meanwhile he drew wise morals from his play,
And in these solemn periods stalk’d away:
Blest were the fair like you; her faults who stopt,
And closed her follies when the curtain dropt!
No more in vice or error to engage,
Or play the fool at large on life’s great stage.
Coleman, like Sheridan (and like Garrick), was a writer of plays that blended satire and sentiment to hold a light up to contemporary society. With this final, somewhat ominous concluding note, the combined efforts of these three playwrights leave the audience to contemplate the patterns of their own behavior, and the potential fallout that might occur in reality should they choose to act like the characters in the play.
