Jonas Barish, in his seminal work, "The Antitheatrical Prejudice" (1981), adopts the view that by 1814 Austen may have turned against theatre following a supposed recent embracing of evangelicalism. Austen certainly read and, to her surprise, enjoyed Thomas Gisborne's "Enquiry into the Duties of the Female Sex", which stated categorically that theatricals were sinful, because of their opportunities for "unrestrained familiarity with persons of the other sex". She may well have read William Wilberforce's popular evangelical work that challenged the decadence of the time and also expressed strong views about theatre and its negative influence on morality.