In this story, Mark Twain is satirizing (or mocking) moralist British children's literature, in which virtue is rewarded or early death is romanticized so long as the dying child has behaved like a little saint. This literature, as Twain well knew, was unrealistic. He shows this by creating Jacob, a Don Quixote-like little boy who buys into what he reads as truth and tries to be as morally good as the children in his stories; however, life doesn't follow the artificial path of these tales, and Jacob's good is punished while the bad boys prosper and have a good time.

Twain is satirizing both American and British moralistic literature, but on the British side, very popular moral stories that come to mind are "The History of Little Goody Two Shoes," in which an orphan's goodness is rewarded, and Maria Edgeworth's "The Purple Jar," in which a bad little girl does not die but is rejected by her father. Twain also satirizes various tracts put out by the Society for the Promotion of Christian Knowledge. Quotes that point to traditional features from the "old country" that Twain is mocking include Jacob wanting to be pictured

standing on the doorstep giving a penny to a poor beggar-woman with six children, and telling her to spend it freely, but not to be extravagant, because extravagance is a sin.

He longs to meet one of the "supernaturally" virtuous boys from his books only to remember

that good little boy always died in the last chapter, and there was a picture of the funeral.