Clarissa Harlowe; or the history of a young lady Volume VI Part 14

PAPER II (Scratch'd through, and thrown under the table.)

--And can you, my dear, honoured Papa, resolve for ever to reprobate your poor child?--But I am sure you would not, if you knew what she has suffered since her unhappy--And will n.o.body plead for your poor suffering girl?--No one good body?--Why then, dearest Sir, let it be an act of your own innate goodness, which I have so much experienced, and so much abused. I don't presume to think you should receive me--No, indeed!--My name is--I don't know what my name is!--I never dare to wish to come into your family again!--But your heavy curse, my Papa--Yes, I will call you Papa, and help yourself as you can--for you are my own dear Papa, whether you will or not--and though I am an unworthy child--yet I am your child--

PAPER III

A Lady took a great fancy to a young lion, or a bear, I forget which--but a bear, or a tiger, I believe it was. It was made her a present of when a whelp. She fed it with her own hand: she nursed up the wicked cub with great tenderness; and would play with it without fear or apprehension of danger: and it was obedient to all her commands: and its tameness, as she used to boast, increased with its growth; so that, like a lap-dog, it would follow her all over the house. But mind what followed: at last, some how, neglecting to satisfy its hungry maw, or having otherwise disobliged it on some occasion, it resumed its nature; and on a sudden fell upon her, and tore her in pieces.--And who was most to blame, I pray? The brute, or the lady? The lady, surely!-- For what she did was out of nature, out of character, at least: what it did was in its own nature.

PAPER IV

How art thou now humbled in the dust, thou proud Clarissa Harlowe!

Thou that never steppedst out of thy father's house but to be admired!

Who wert wont to turn thine eye, sparkling with healthful life, and self-a.s.surance, to different objects at once as thou pa.s.sedst, as if (for so thy penetrating sister used to say) to plume thyself upon the expected applauses of all that beheld thee! Thou that usedst to go to rest satisfied with the adulations paid thee in the past day, and couldst put off every thing but thy vanity!---

PAPER V

Rejoice not now, my Bella, my Sister, my Friend; but pity the humbled creature, whose foolish heart you used to say you beheld through the thin veil of humility which covered it.

It must have been so! My fall had not else been permitted--

You penetrated my proud heart with the jealousy of an elder sister's searching eye.

You knew me better than I knew myself.

Hence your upbraidings and your chidings, when I began to totter.

But forgive now those vain triumphs of my heart.

I thought, poor, proud wretch that I was, that what you said was owing to your envy.

I thought I could acquit my intention of any such vanity.

I was too secure in the knowledge I thought I had of my own heart.

My supposed advantages became a snare to me.

And what now is the end of all?--

PAPER VI

What now is become of the prospects of a happy life, which once I thought opening before me?--Who now shall a.s.sist in the solemn preparations? Who now shall provide the nuptial ornaments, which soften and divert the apprehensions of the fearful virgin? No court now to be paid to my smiles! No encouraging compliments to inspire thee with hope of laying a mind not unworthy of thee under obligation! No elevation now for conscious merit, and applauded purity, to look down from on a prostrate adorer, and an admiring world, and up to pleased and rejoicing parents and relations!

PAPER VII

Thou pernicious caterpillar, that preyest upon the fair leaf of virgin fame, and poisonest those leaves which thou canst not devour!

Thou fell blight, thou eastern blast, thou overspreading mildew, that destroyest the early promises of the s.h.i.+ning year! that mockest the laborious toil, and blastest the joyful hopes, of the painful husbandman!

Thou fretting moth, that corruptest the fairest garment!

Thou eating canker-worm, that preyest upon the opening bud, and turnest the damask-rose into livid yellowness!

If, as religion teaches us, G.o.d will judge us, in a great measure, by our benevolent or evil actions to one another--O wretch! bethink thee, in time bethink thee, how great must be thy condemnation!

PAPER VIIII

At first, I saw something in your air and person that displeased me not. Your birth and fortunes were no small advantages to you.--You acted not ign.o.bly by my pa.s.sionate brother. Every body said you were brave: every body said you were generous: a brave man, I thought, could not be a base man: a generous man, could not, I believed, be ungenerous, where he acknowledged obligation. Thus prepossessed, all the rest that my soul loved and wished for in your reformation I hoped!--I knew not, but by report, any flagrant instances of your vileness. You seemed frank, as well as generous: frankness and generosity ever attracted me: whoever kept up those appearances, I judged of their hearts by my own; and whatever qualities I wished to find in them, I was ready to find; and, when found, I believed them to be natives of the soil.

My fortunes, my rank, my character, I thought a further security. I was in none of those respects unworthy of being the niece of Lord M.

and of his two n.o.ble sisters.--Your vows, your imprecations--But, Oh!

you have barbarously and basely conspired against that honour, which you ought to have protected: and now you have made me--What is it of vile that you have not made me?--

Yet, G.o.d knows my heart, I had no culpable inclinations!--I honoured virtue!--I hated vice!--But I knew not, that you were vice itself!

PAPER IX

Had the happiness of any of the poorest outcast in the world, whom I had neveer seen, never known, never before heard of, lain as much in my power, as my happiness did in your's, my benevolent heart would have made me fly to the succour of such a poor distressed--with what pleasure would I have raised the dejected head, and comforted the desponding heart!--But who now shall pity the poor wretch, who has increased, instead of diminished, the number of the miserable!

PAPER X

Lead me, where my own thoughts themselves may lose me; Where I may dose out what I've left of life, Forget myself, and that day's guile!---- Cruel remembrance!----how shall I appease thee?

[Death only can be dreadful to the bad;*

To innocence 'tis like a bugbear dress'd To frighten children. Pull but off the mask, And he'll appear a friend.]

* Transcriber's note: Portions set off in square brackets [ ] are written at angles to the majority of the text, as if squeezed into margins.

----Oh! you have done an act That blots the face and blush of modesty; Takes off the rose From the fair forehead of an innocent love, And makes a blister there!

Then down I laid my head, Down on cold earth, and for a while was dead; And my freed soul to a strange somewhere fled!

Ah! sottish soul! said I, When back to its cage again I saw it fly; Fool! to resume her broken chain, And row the galley here again!