William Hogarth’s “Marriage A La Mode: The Marriage Settlement” sets out to satirize the aristocracy’s obsession with money and wealth. Through arranged marriages in 18th century England, the Georgian Aristocracy was able to acquire the wealth generated by the commercial class, while the bourgeois managed to acquire the title associated with the nobility. These arranged marriages grew so common in the 18th century that the government enacted acts to prevent lovers from eloping. One such act known as “An Act for Better Preventing Clandestine Marriages,” drawn up several years after Hogarth’s Marriage A La Mode series, was put in place to prevent young adults of the aristocracy from thwarting their parents wishes. Thus, this act enabled these
