How we cite our quotes: (Book.Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #7
Mr Dowling was indeed very greatly affected with this relation; for he had not divested himself of humanity by being an attorney. Indeed, nothing is more unjust than to carry our prejudices against a profession into private life, and to borrow our idea of a man from our opinion of his calling. […] A butcher, I make no doubt, would feel compunction at the slaughter of a fine horse; and though a surgeon can feel no pain in cutting off a limb, I have known him compassionate a man in a fit of the gout. […] n the same manner an attorney may feel all the miseries and distresses of his fellow-creatures, provided he happens not to be concerned against them. (12.10.8)
The key point here about Fielding's assessment of lawyers, who may be professionally ruthless but who can still be personally sympathetic, appears in that bit where he adds "provided he happens not to be concerned against them." When Mr. Dowling meets Tom in passing at an inn, he sympathizes with Tom's family troubles. But as soon as Mr. Dowling starts working for Mr. Blifil and (he thinks) Squire Allworthy, he does his best to make sure that Tom gets convicted for a murder he didn't commit. So according to Fielding, it's more or less Mr. Dowling's job to hurt whoever he's paid to hurt, no matter what his feelings about the person might be.
Quote #8
"Etoff entertained me last night almost two hours with [stories of Tom Jones]. The wench I believe is in love with him by reputation." Here the reader will be apt to wonder; but the truth is, that Mrs Etoff, who had the honour to pin and unpin the Lady Bellaston, had received compleat information concerning the said Mr Jones, and had faithfully conveyed the same to her lady last night (or rather that morning) while she was undressing; on which accounts she had been detained in her office above the space of an hour and a half. (13.3.6-8)
Lady Bellaston first hears about Tom (and starts lusting after him) from her dresser, a servant woman named Mrs. Etoff. It's odd: in many ways, the social classes seem pretty separate in this novel. Even in a crowded inn, the servants all hang out in the kitchen while rich people like Sophia stay in rooms upstairs. But servants often pass gossip and information on to their employers. It's through the servant-employee relationship that the characters in this novel most often seem to cross class barriers.
Quote #9
I will venture to say the highest life is much the dullest, and affords very little humour or entertainment. The various callings in lower spheres produce the great variety of humorous characters; whereas here, except among the few who are engaged in the pursuit of ambition, and the fewer still who have a relish for pleasure, all is vanity and servile imitation. Dressing and cards, eating and drinking, bowing and courtesying, make up the business of their lives. (14.1.11-2)
You may have noticed that, while there are characters from up and down the social ladder in Tom Jones, most of them are middle or working class. Even the two squires are low down on the hierarchy of landed, titled people in eighteenth-century Britain. Well, here, the narrator gives us an explanation: he thinks that there is more variety among lower-class people. Upper-class people may not always be the same, but they are mostly dominated by "vanity and servile imitation." Fielding implies that there isn't a lot going on at the top. Since the middle class was gaining social and political influence throughout the eighteenth century, we can understand why Fielding felt that his society's movers and shakers were mostly coming from there.