Conclusions
Godwin has been identified as having a distinctive style in the materials examined, which cover much of his writing life. The two main features of his style are that he generally has a much higher lexical richness score than any of the other writers analyzed, and that he makes much less use of the core vocabulary than many of his contemporaries. Of the two pamphlets in question, Reflexions sits within the boundaries of Godwin's other writings in all the charts and in all examinations provides positive indications that he is the likely author. Investigation of the pamphlets of other writers at the time certainly offers no other candidate. This is significant, since the external evidence for the authorship of Reflexions is the weaker of the two pamphlets under consideration. The focus of this examination has been Law because it is the better attested of the two pamphlets, yet it appeared to be outside the boundary of Godwin material in one crucial respect, that of lexical richness. However, further analysis revealed that Law sits well within the norms for Godwin's use of the core vocabulary and shares with Reflexions very similar use or non-use of marker functional vocabulary, and that lexical vocabulary is present at the phrasal level linking Godwin's known work with both Law and Reflexions. The low lexical richness score has been identified as having its source in the unusually high level of repetition contained in the central portion of the pamphlet, which is a function of the way the author has chosen to lay out the argument. This authorial decision has greatly reduced the amount of vocabulary items relative to the length of text, not only in respect of Godwin's work, but also in relation to what would be expected in any text of a similar length. This means that the statistical scores, without the large historical segments and the regular references to parliamentary procedures, could be expected to be more like Defence and Strictures. In the light of all these factors, it is our opinion that there is sufficient internal evidence from this investigation to support the contemporary manuscript ascriptions and the related evidence in Godwin's diary, and to attribute authorship of both anonymous pamphlets to Godwin.
These two pamphlets on the Regency Crisis are important additions to the canon of Godwin's works.[13] They are significant for what they reveal about both his developing political views and his consistent resourcefulness as a pamphlet writer. They demonstrate that his practical engagement with contemporary British politics did not lessen towards the end of the 1780s, as is often thought, but that he continued to support the Foxite Whigs right up to the spring of 1789. At the same time, they indicate just how much Godwin was preoccupied with constitutional questions on the eve of the French Revolution, two years before he began writing Enquiry. Finally, Godwin's Regency pamphlets, in their mixture of abstract speculation and engagement
with concrete political questions, adumbrate a central feature of his thought as it developed through the 1790s, and beyond. As experiments in combining speculative and practical politics,
Law and
Reflexions help to explain how Godwin became the author of not only
Enquiry but also
Strictures, his most successful intervention in contemporary politics, in which he demolished the government's case of high treason brought against twelve leading radicals in 1794.
