This heightened tension between her moral and materialistic values makes Mary's future search for a suitable husband more complex.

Mary Crawford, often characterised as the anti-heroine, first appears in the novel in the July of the year when Fanny Price, the shy and apparently insignificant heroine, is eighteen.

Mary, accompanied by her brother, Henry, comes to the country with sophisticated London airs, tastes, and manners and with a decided interest in courtship.

The Crawfords have been living in London with their uncle, the Admiral, but when he brings his mistress into the house, Mary decides it is time to leave.

Colleen Sheehan says that Austen subtly creates the conditions that allow the reader to reach a morally ambiguous view of the Crawfords.

She consciously makes Henry and Mary Crawford vibrant, intelligent, witty, and alluring while, at the same time, they engage in actions that are morally repugnant.

[2] Like Eliza, Mary plays the harp, is elegant and fashionable, adores London, laces her vocabulary with French phrases, is witty, loves amateur dramatics and enchants every man she meets.

This displeases Fanny who believes Mary's speech and actions are too much influenced by the morality of London society that prizes only frivolity, money and status.

Byrne argues that it is the friction between Mary, the sexually confident coquette and Edmund, the grave, prudish, religious figure that gives their relationship its dynamic.

Byrne further maintains that although some critics are perplexed by Mary's admiration for the rather stolid Edmund, this is to misunderstand the workings of the coquette/clergyman relationship.

In defending his intended profession Edmund makes no reference to any inner spiritual experience, preferring instead the stolid language of logic and duty.

[6] However, Byrne argues that the "Crawfords are merely the agents of change: the real corruption rests at the door of the flawed custodians of the house, Sir Thomas and Lady Bertram and Mrs Norris".

Mary reveals an extensive knowledge of church practice when she suggests that a wise clergyman would do better to read aloud from Hugh Blair's books of sermons than to preach his own.

[8][9] Illicit misconduct and sexual temptation are suggested by Austen from the moment the young people reach a door, 'temptingly open on a flight of steps which led immediately to... all the sweets of pleasure-grounds, [and] as by one impulse, one wish for air and liberty, all walked out'.

[13] Edmund acknowledges from his own experience that long services can be boring but maintains that without self-discipline a private spirituality will be insufficient for moral development.

Mary having declared that the occupation of a clergyman is neither prestigious nor profitable, now argues that the profession is unworthy, filled only by lazy and gluttonous men like her brother-in-law, Dr Grant.

She arrives at the jaundiced conclusion that a 'clergyman has nothing to do, but be slovenly and selfish, read the newspaper, watch the weather and quarrel with his wife.

[14] Mary's view of Regency clergy is widely confirmed by historians; Edmund's commitment to integrity and morality represents a minority vision.

[15] Mary also challenges the widespread practice of patronage; she attacks Edmund's expectation of a living for being based on privilege rather than on merit.

Ross argues for an alternative interpretation, namely that "Mary’s naughty innuendo clearly concerns flagellation: utterly unfit for a lady’s conversation, but legal; widely popular, not only with old roués and young bucks, but even among such eminent figures as the future Prime Minister, Lord Melbourne".

The practice is represented in the satirical cartoons of Gillray and Rowlandson, where birches and buttocks make frequent appearances.

Thomas Edwards suggests that the inherent danger of Lovers' Vows for the young actors is that they cannot distinguish between acting and real life.

Mary recognises Edmund’s worth and is attracted by his steadiness and integrity, but cynically insists that there is no glamour in being 'honest and poor' – 'I have a much greater respect for those that are honest and rich'.

When the other young people are away she is quickly bored and invites Fanny to come to the parsonage, hear her play on the harp, and take walks together.

After Maria's marriage, Henry returns to Mansfield parsonage and tells Mary that he intends to amuse himself by making Fanny fall in love with him.

[22] Mary, reflecting with Fanny on their time at Sotherton, teasingly commends her brother for his flirtatious behaviour, so making her complicit in his misconduct.

She continues to encourage Fanny to accept Henry's suit and discusses her own mixed feelings with regard to Edmund.

Mary offends Edmund by her openness as she discusses the adulterous affair between her brother and his sister without any embarrassment or modesty.

Mary responds angrily to Edmund, "At this rate, you will soon reform every body at Mansfield and Thornton Lacey; and when I hear of you next, it may be as a celebrated preacher in some great society of Methodists, or as a missionary in foreign parts."

She has denied the reader the commonplace and unrealistic romantic ending in which the worldly coquette is reformed and marries the hero.