The Vicar of Wakefield

I had not gotten very far into The Vicar of Wakefield before I realized I was not sure whether it is best described as quite serious and sincere or rather sarcastic and comic. It was only after wrestling with this question for a while that I looked to see what others had to say. Imagine my delight on finding that the entire literary world since Goldsmith first published it seems to have asked the same questions and never to have reached a conclusion. Now having finished the book, and with long and hard thought, after much prayer, I can conclusively and definitively provide the answer: Yes, it is.