Today marks the 250th anniversary of the birth of fiction author Jane Austen, who examined ordinary, day-to-day, small-town family life within an Overton window-frame which once included Biblical civilization and ethics.

The world of Jane Austen's generation was rapidly pivoting the Overton window to a secular worldview, and so were the cultures of contemporary nations.

Lord David Cecil, a biographer of Miss Austen, noted this comparison between authors:

"If I were in doubt as to the wisdom of one of my actions, I should not consult Flaubert or Dostoyevsky. The opinion of Balzac or Dickens would carry little weight with me: were Stendhal to rebuke me, it would only convince me I had done right: even in the judgment of Tolstoy I should not put complete confidence. But I should be seriously upset, I should worry for weeks and weeks, if I incurred the disapproval of Jane Austen."