Part 36

You see, my too lovely cousin, that you ought to banish those melancholy terrors, which alarm you without reason. You have long since renounced the person of your friend, and you find that his life is safe. Think of nothing therefore, but how to preserve your own, and how to make the promised sacrifice to paternal affection with becoming grace. Cease to be the sport of vain hope, and to feed yourself with chimeras. You are in great haste to be proud of your deformity; let me advise you to be more humble; believe me you have yet too much reason to be so. You have undergone a cruel infection, but it has spared your face. What you take for seams, is nothing but a redness which will quickly disappear. I was worse affected than you, yet nevertheless you see I am tolerable. My angel, you will still be beautiful in spite of yourself; and do you think that the enamoured Wolmar, who, in three years absence, could not conquer a passion conceived in eight days, is likely to be cured of it, when he has an opportunity of seeing you every hour? Oh! if your only resource is the hope of being disagreeable, how desperate is your condition!

Letter CVIII. From Eloisa.

It is too much. It is too much. O my friend! the victory is yours. I am not proof against such powerful love; my resolution is exhausted. My conscience affords me the consolatory testimony, that I have exerted my utmost efforts. Heaven, I hope, will not call me to account for more than it has bestowed upon me. This sorrowful heart which cost you so dear, and which you have more than purchased, is yours without reserve; it was attached to you the first moment my eyes beheld you; and it will remain yours to my dying breath. You have too much deserved it, ever to be in danger of losing it; and I am weary of being the slave of a chimerical virtue, at the expense of justice.

Yes, thou most tender and generous lover, thy Eloisa will be ever thine, will love thee ever: I must, I will, I ought. To you I resign the empire which love has given you; a dominion of which nothing shall ever deprive thee more. The deceitful voice which murmurs at the bottom of my soul, whispers in vain: it shall no longer betray me. What are the vain duties it prescribes, in opposition to a passion which heaven itself inspire? is not the obligation which binds me to you, the most solemn of all? is it not to you alone that I have given an absolute promise? was not the first vow of my heart never to forget you; and is not your insoluble attachment a fresh tie to secure my constancy? ah! in the transports of love with which I once more surrender my heart to thee, my only regret is, that I have struggled against sentiments so agreeable and so natural. Nature, O gentle nature, resume thy rights! I abjure the savage virtues which conspire to thy destruction. Can the inclinations which you have inspired, be more seductive, than a specious reason which has so often misled me?

O my dear friend, have some regard for the tenderness of my inclinations; you are too much indebted to them, to abhor them; but allow of a participation which nature and affection demands; let not the rights of blood and friendship be totally extinguished by those of love. Do not imagine that to follow you, I will ever quit my father’s house. Do not hope that I will refuse to comply with the obligations imposed on me by parental authority. The cruel loss of one of the authors of my being, has taught me to be cautious how I afflict the other. No, she whom he expects to be his only comfort hereafter, will not increase the affliction of his soul, already oppressed with disquietude: I will not destroy all that gave me life. No, no, I am sensible of my crime, but cannot abhor it. Duty, honour, virtue, all these considerations have lost their influence, but yet I am not a monster; I am frail, but not unnatural. I am determined, I will not grieve any of the object of my affection. Let a father, tenacious of his word, and jealous of a vain prerogative, dispose of my hand according to his promise, but let love alone dispose of my heart; let my tears incessantly trickle down the bosom of my tenderest friend. Let me be lost and wretched, but, if possible, let every one dear to me, be happy and contented. On you three my existence depends, and may your felicity make me forget my misery and despair.

Letter CIX. The Answer.

We revive my Eloisa; all the real sentiments of our souls resume their wonted course. Nature has preserved our existence, and love has restored us to life. Did you suppose, could you be rash enough to imagine you could withdraw your affections from me? I am better acquainted with your heart than yourself: that heart which heaven destined to be mine! I find them united by one common thread, which death alone can divide. Is it in our power to separate them, or ought we even to attempt it? are they joined together by ties which man hath formed, and which man can dissolve? No, no, my Eloisa! if cruel destiny bars our claim to tender conjugal titles, yet nothing can deprive us of the character of faithful lovers; that shall be the comfort of our melancholy days, and we will carry it with us to the grave.

Thus we recover life only to renew our sufferings, and the consciousness of our existence is nothing more than a sense of affliction. Unfortunate beings! how we are altered? how have we ceased to be what we were formerly? where is that enchantment of supreme felicity? where are those exquisite raptures which enlivened our passion? nothing is left of us but our love; love alone remains, and all its charms are eclipsed. O, thou dear and too dutiful girl, thou fond fair one without resolution! all our misfortunes are derived from thy errors. Alas! a heart of less purity would not have so fatally misled thee! yes, the honour of thy heart has been our ruin, the upright sentiments which fill thy breast, have banished discretion. You would endeavour to reconcile filial tenderness with unconquerable love; by attempting to gratify all your inclinations, you confound instead of conciliating them, and your very virtue renders you guilty. O Eloisa, how incredible is your power! by what strange magic do you fascinate my reason! even while you endeavour to make me blush at our passion, you have the art of appearing amiable in your very failings. You force me to admire you, even while I partake of your remorse---- your remorse!----does it become you to feel remorse?----you, whom I loved----you, whom I shall never cease to adore----can guilt ever approach thy spotless heart?----O cruel Eloisa! if you mean to restore the heart which belongs to me alone, return it to me such as it was, when you first bestowed it.

What do you tell me?----will you venture to intimate----you, fall into the arms of another?----shall another possess you?----will you be no longer mine?----or, to compleat my horror, will you not be solely mine?----I----shall I suffer such dreadful punishment---- shall I see you survive yourself?----no I had rather lose you entirely, than share you with another.----Why has not heaven armed me with courage equal to the rage which distracts me?----sooner than _thy_ hand should debase itself by a fatal union which love abhors, and honour condemns, I would interpose my own, and plunge a poignard in thy breast. I would drain thy chaste heart of blood which infidelity never tainted: with that spotless blood I would mix my own, which burns in my veins with inextinguishable ardour; I would fall in thy arms; I would yield my last breath on thy lips----I would receive thine----How! Eloisa expiring! those lovely eyes closed by the horrors of death!----that breast, the throne of love, mangled by my hand, and pouring forth copious streams of blood and life!----No, live and suffer, endure the punishment of my cowardice. No, I wish thou wert no more, but my passion is not so violent as to stab thee. O, that you did but know the state of my heart, which is ready to burst with anguish! Never did it burn with so pure a flame. Never were your innocence and virtue so dear to me. I am a lover, I know how to prize an amiable object, I am sensible that I do: but I am no more than man, and it is not within the compass of human power to renounce supreme felicity. One night, one single night, has made a thorough change in my soul. Preserve me, if thou canst, from that dangerous recollection, and I am virtuous still. But that fatal night is sunk to the bottom of my soul, and the remembrance of it will darken all the rest of my days. O Eloisa, thou most adorable object! if we must be wretched for ever, yet let us enjoy one hour of transport, and then resign ourselves to eternal lamentations.

Listen to the man who loves you. Why should we alone affect to be wiser than the rest of mankind, and pursue, with puerile simplicity, those chimerical virtues, which all the world talks of, and no one practises. What! shall we pretend to be greater moralists than the crowd of philosophers which people London and Paris, who all laugh at conjugal fidelity, and treat adultery as a jest? instances of this nature are far from being scandalous; we are not at liberty even to censure them, and people of spirit would laugh at a man who should stifle the affections of his heart out of respect to matrimony. In fact, say they, an injury which only consists in opinion, is no injury while it remains secret. What injury does a husband receive from an infidelity to which he is a stranger? by how many obliging condescensions, does a woman compensate for her failings? [40] what endearments she employs to prevent, and to remove his suspicions? deprived of an imaginary good, he actually enjoys more real felicity, and this supposed crime which makes such a noise, is but an additional tie, which secures the peace of society.

O God forbid, thou dear partner of my soul, that I should wish to preserve thy affections by such shameful maxims. I abhor them, though I am not able to confute them, and my conscience is a better advocate than my reason. Not that I pride myself upon a spirit which I detest, or that I am fond of a virtue bought so dear: but I think it less criminal to reproach myself with my failings, than to attempt to vindicate them, and I consider an endeavour to stifle remorse, as the strongest degree of guilt.

I know not what I write. I find my mind in a horrid state, much worse than it was, even before I received your letter. The hope you tender me, is gloomy and melancholy; it totally extinguishes that pure light, which has so often been our guide; your charms are blasted, and yet appear more affecting; I perceive that you are affectionate and unhappy: my heart is overwhelmed with the tears which flow from your eyes, and I vent bitter reproaches on myself for having presumed to taste a happiness, which I can no longer enjoy, but at the hazard of your peace.

Nevertheless I perceive that a secret ardour fires my soul, and revives that courage which my remorse has subdued. Ah, lovely Eloisa, do you know how many losses a love like mine can compensate for? do you know how far a lover, who only breathes for you, can make your life agreeable? are you sensible that it is for you alone I wish to live, to move, to think? no, thou delicious source of my existence, I will have no soul but thine, I will no longer be any thing but a part of thy lovely self, and you will meet with such a kind reception in the inmost recesses of my heart, that you will never perceive any decay in your charms. Well, we shall be guilty, yet we will not be wicked; we shall be guilty, yet we will be in love with virtue: so far from attempting to palliate our failings, we will deplore them; we will lament together; if possible, we will work our redemption, by being good and benevolent. Eloisa! O Eloisa! what will you do? what can you do? you can never disengage yourself from my heart: is it not espoused to thine?

I have long since bid adieu to those vain prospects of fortune which so palpably deluded me. I now solely confine my attention to the duties I owe Lord B----; he will force me with him to England; he imagines I can be of service to him there. Well, I will attend him. But I will steal away once every year; I will come in secret to visit you. If I cannot speak to you, at least I shall have the pleasure of gazing on you; I may at least kiss your footsteps; one glance from your eyes will support me ten months. When I am forced to return, and retire from her I love, it will be some consolation to me, to count the steps which will bring me back again. These frequent journeys will be some amusement to your unhappy lover; when he sets out to visit you, he will anticipate the pleasure of beholding you; the remembrance of the transports he has felt, will enchant his imagination during his absence; in spite of his cruel destiny, his melancholy time will not be utterly lost; every year will be marked with some tincture of pleasure, and the short-lived moments he passes near you, will be multiplied during his whole life.

Letter CX. From Mrs. Orbe.

Your mistress is no more; but I have recovered my friend, and you too have gained one, whose affection will more than recompense your loss. Eloisa is married, and her merit is sufficient to make the gentleman happy, who has blended his interest with hers. After so many indiscretions, thank heaven which has preserved you both, her from ignominy, and you from the regret of having dishonoured her. Reverence her change of condition; do not write to her, she desires you will not. Wait till she writes to you, which she will shortly do. Now is the time to convince me that you merit that esteem I ever entertained for you, and that your heart is susceptible of a pure and disinterested friendship.

Letter CXI. From Eloisa.

I have been so long accustomed to make you the confident of all the secrets of my soul, that it is not in my power to discontinue so agreeable a correspondence. In the most important occurrences of life I long to disclose my heart to you. Open yours, my beloved friend, to receive what I communicate; treasure up in your mind the long discourse of friendship, which, though it sometimes renders the speaker too diffusive, always makes the friendly hearer patient.

Attached to the fortune of a husband, or rather to the will of a parent, by an indissoluble tie, I enter upon a new state of life, which death alone can terminate: let us for a moment cast our eyes on that which I have quitted; the recollection of former times cannot be painful to us. Perhaps it will afford some lessons, which will teach me how to make a proper use of the time to come: perhaps it will open some lights which may serve to explain those particulars of my conduct, which always appeared mysterious in your eyes. At least, by reflecting in what relation we lately stood to each other, our hearts will become more sensible of the reciprocal duties, from which death alone can release us.

It is now near six years since I first saw you. You was young, genteel, and agreeable. I had seen others more comely, and more engaging; but no one ever excited the least emotion within me, and my heart surrendered itself to you [41] on the first interview. I imagin’d that I saw, in your countenance, the traces of a soul which seemed the counterpart of mine. I thought that my senses only served as organs to more refined sentiments; and I loved in you, not so much what I saw, as what I imagined, I felt within myself. It is not two months since, that I still flattered myself I was not mistaken: blind Love, said I, was in the right; we were made for each other, if human events do not interrupt the affinity of nature; and if we are allowed to enjoy felicity in this life, we shall certainly be happy together.

These sentiments were reciprocal; I should have been deceived, had I entertained them alone. The love I felt, could not arise but from a mutual conformity and harmony of souls. We never love, unless we are beloved; at least our passion is short-lived. Those affections which meet with no return, and which are supposed to make so many wretched, are only founded on sensuality; if ever they penetrate the heart, it is by means of some false resemblance, and the mistake is quickly discovered. Sensual love cannot subsist without fruition, and dies with it: the sublimer passion cannot be satisfied without engaging the heart, and is as permanent as the analogy which gave it birth. [42] Such was ours from the beginning; and such, I hope, it will ever be to the end of our days. I perceived, I felt that I was beloved, and that I merited your affection. My lips were silent, my looks were constrained; but my heart explained itself: we quickly experienced I know not what, which renders silence eloquent, which gives utterance to the downcast eye, which occasions a kind of forward bashfulness which discovers the tumult of desire through the veil of timidity, and conveys ideas which it dares not express.

I perceived the situation of my heart, and gave myself over for lost, the first word you spoke. I found what pain your reserve cost you. I approved of the distance you observed, and admired you the more; I endeavoured to recompense you for such a necessary and painful silence, without prejudice to my innocence; I offered violence to my natural disposition; I imitated my cousin; I became, like her, arch and lively, to avoid too serious explanations, and to indulge a thousand tender caresses, under cover of that affected sprightliness. I took such pains to make your situation agreeable, that the apprehensions of a change increased your reserve. This scheme turned to my disadvantage: we generally suffer for assuming a borrowed character. Fool that I was! I accelerated my ruin, instead of preventing it; I employed poison as a palliative, and what should have induced you to preserve silence, was the occasion which tempted you to explain yourself. In vain did I attempt, by an affected indifference, to keep you at a distance in our private interviews; that very constraint betrayed me: you wrote. Instead of committing your first letter to the fire, or delivering it to my mother, I ventured to open it. That was my original crime, and all the rest was a necessary consequence of that first fault. I endeavoured to avoid answering those fatal letters, which I could not forbear reading. This violent struggle affected my health. I saw the abyss in which I was going to plunge. I looked upon myself with horror, and could not resolve to endure your absence. I fell into a kind of despair; I had rather that you had ceased to live, than not to live to me: I even went so far as to wish, and to desire your death. Heaven knew my heart; these efforts may make amends for some failings.

Finding you disposed to implicit obedience, I was determined to speak. Chaillot had given me some instructions, which made me too sensible of the danger of avowing my passion. But love, which extorted the confession, taught me to elude its consequence. You was my last resort; I had such an entire confidence in you, that I furnished you with arms against my weakness; such was my opinion of your integrity, that I trusted you would preserve me from myself, and I did you no more than justice. When I found the respect you paid to so valuable a trust, I perceived that my passion had not blinded me in my opinion of those virtues with which I supposed you endowed. I resigned myself with greater security, as I imagined that we should both of us be contented with a sentimental affection. As I discovered nothing at the bottom of my heart but sentiments of honour, I tasted without reserve the charms of such a delightful intimacy. Alas! I did not perceive that my disorder grew inveterate from inattention, and that habit was still more dangerous than love. Being sensibly affected by your reserve, I thought I might relax mine without any risk; in the innocence of my desires, I hoped to lead you to the heights of virtue, by the tender caresses of friendship. But the grove at Clarens soon convinced me that I trusted myself too far, and that we ought not to grant the least indulgence to the senses, where prudence forbids us to gratify them to the full. One moment, one single moment, fired me with a desire which nothing could extinguish; and if my will yet resisted, my heart was from that time corrupted.

You partook of my distraction; your letter made me tremble. The danger was double: to preserve me from you and from myself, it was necessary to banish you. This was the last effort of expiring virtue; but by your flight, you made your conquest sure, and when I saw you no more, the languor your absence occasioned, deprived me of the little strength I had left to resist you.