A marriage proposal may be based on either practicality or romance. When comparing Jane Austen's passage to that of Charles Dickens, one sees the difference between a marriage proposal of realism and a proposal which comes straight from the heart. The two types of proposals merit different strategies in their arguments to the women who weild the power of ultimate acceptance or rejection. First of all, the two men in these passages go about asking for the woman's hand in marriage in extremely different ways such as in their overall attitudes ....