Part 54

At these words, in spite of all my endeavours not to interrupt him but by my tears, I could not forbear throwing myself round his neck, and crying out; O my dear husband! O thou best and most amiable of men! Tell me what is wanting to compleat my happiness, but to promote your felicity, and to be more deserving... You are as happy as you can be, said he, interrupting me; you deserve to be so; but it is time to enjoy that felicity in peace, which has hitherto cost you such vast pains. If your fidelity had been all I required, that would have been ensured the moment you made me the promise; I wanted moreover to make it easy and agreeable to you, and we have both laboured to this end in concert, without communicating our views to each other. Eloisa, we have succeeded; better than you imagine perhaps. The only fault I find in you is, that you do not resume that confidence which you have a right to repose in yourself, and that you undervalue your own worth. Extreme diffidence is as dangerous as excessive confidence. As that rashness which prompts us to attempts beyond our strength renders our power ineffectual, so that timidity which prevents us from relying on ourselves, renders it useless. True prudence consists in being thoroughly acquainted with the measure of our own power, and acting up to it. You have acquired an increase of strength by changing your condition. You are no longer that unfortunate girl who bewailed the weakness she indulged; you are the most virtuous of women, you are bound by no laws but those of honour and duty, and the only fault that can now be imputed to you, is that you retain too lively a sense of your former indiscretion. Instead of taking reproachful precautions against yourself, learn to depend upon your self, and your confidence will increase your strength. Banish that injurious diffidence, and think yourself happy in having made choice of an honest man at an age which is liable to imposition, and in having entertained a lover formerly, whom you may now enjoy as a friend, even under your husband’s eye. I was no sooner made acquainted with your connections, than I judged of you by each other. I perceived what enthusiastic delusion led you astray; it never operates but on susceptible minds; it sometimes ruins them, but it is by a charm which has power to seduce them alone. I judged that the same turn of mind which formed your attachment would break it as soon as it became criminal, and that vice might find an entrance, but never take root in such hearts as yours.

I conceived moreover that the connection between you ought not to be broken; that there were so many laudable circumstances attending your mutual attachment, that it ought rather to be rectified than destroyed; and that neither of the two could forget the other, without diminishing their own worth. I knew that great struggles only served to inflame strong passions, and that if violent efforts exercised the mind, they occasioned such torments as by their continuance might subdue it. I took advantage of Eloisa’s gentleness, to moderate the severity of her reflections. I nourished her friendship for you, said he to St. Preux; I banished all immoderate passion, and I believe that I have preserved you a greater share of her affections, than she would have left you, had I abandoned her entirely to herself.

My success encouraged me, and I determined to attempt your cure as I had accomplished hers; for I had an esteem for you, and notwithstanding the prejudices of vice, I have always observed that every good end is to be obtained from susceptible minds by means of confidence and sincerity. I saw you, you did not deceive me; you will not deceive me; and though you are not yet what you ought to be, I find you more improved than you imagine, and I am better satisfied with you than you are with yourself. I know that my conduct has an extravagant appearance, and is repugnant to the common received principles. But maxims become less general, in proportion as we are better acquainted with the human heart: and Eloisa’s husband ought not to act like men in common. My dear children, said he, with a tone the more affecting as it came from a dispassionate man; remain what you are, and we shall all be happy. Danger consists chiefly in opinion; be not afraid of yourselves, and you will have nothing to apprehend; only think on the present, and I will answer for the future. I cannot communicate any thing farther to day, but if my schemes succeed, and my hopes do not betray me, our destiny will be better fulfilled, and you two will be much happier than if you had enjoyed each other.

As we rose, he embraced us, and would have us likewise embrace each other, on that spot. On that very spot where formerly... Clara, O my dear Clara, how dearly have you ever loved me! I made no resistance. Alas! How indiscreet would it have been to have made any! This kiss was nothing like that which rendered the grove terrible to me. I silently congratulated myself, and I found that my heart was more changed than I had hitherto ventured to imagine.

As we were walking towards home, my husband, taking me by the hand, stopt me, and shewing me the wood we had just left, he said to me smiling; Eloisa, be no longer afraid of this asylum; it has not been lately profaned. You will not believe me, cousin, but I swear that he has some supernatural gift of reading one’s inmost thoughts: may heaven continue it to him! Having such reason to despise myself, it is certainly to this art that I am indebted for his indulgence.

You do not see yet any occasion I have for your advice; patience, my angel! I am coming to that point; but the conversation which I have related, was necessary to clear up what follows.

On our return, my husband, who has long been expected at Etange, told me that he proposed going thither to-morrow, that he should see you in his way, and that he should stay there five or six days. Without saying all I thought concerning such an ill-timed journey, I told him that I imagined the necessity was not so indispensable as to oblige Mr. Wolmar to leave his guest, whom he had himself invited to his house. Would you have me, he replied, use ceremony with him to remind him that he is not at home? I am like the Valaisians for hospitality. I hope he will find their sincerity here, and allow us to use their freedom. Perceiving that he would not understand me, I took another method, and endeavoured to persuade our guest to take the journey with him. You will find a spot, said I, which has its beauties, and such as you are fond of; you will visit my patrimony and that of my ancestors; the interest you take in every thing which concerns me, will not allow me to suppose that such a sight can be indifferent to you. My mouth was open to add that the castle was like that of Lord B----, who... but luckily I had time to bite my tongue. He answered me coolly that I was in the right, and that he would do as I pleased. But Mr. Wolmar, who seemed determined to drive me to an extremity, replied that he should do what was most agreeable to himself. Which do you like best, to go or to stay? To stay, said he, without hesitating. Well, stay then, rejoined my husband, taking him by the hand: you are a sincere and honest man, and I am well pleased with that declaration. There was no room for much altercation between my husband and me, in the hearing of this third person. I was silent, but could not conceal my uneasiness so well, but my husband perceived it. What! said he, with an air of discontent, St. Preux being at a little distance from us, shall I have pleaded your cause against yourself in vain, and will Mrs. Wolmar remain satisfied with a virtue which depends on opportunity? For my part, I am more nice; I will be indebted for the fidelity of my wife, to her affection, not to chance; and it is not enough that she is constant, it wounds my delicacy to think that she should doubt her constancy.

At length, he took us into his closet, where I was extremely surprized to see him take from a drawer, along with the copies of some of our friend’s correspondences which I delivered to him, the very original letters which I thought I had seen burned by B---- in my mother’s room. Here, said he to me, shewing them to us, are the pledges of my security; if they deceive me, it would be a folly to depend on any thing which concerns human nature. I consign my wife and my honour in charge to her, who, when single and seduced, preferred an act of benevolence, to a secure and private rendezvous. I trust Eloisa, now that she is a wife and a mother, to him who, when he had it in his power to gratify his desires, yet knew how to respect Eloisa when single and a fond girl. If either of you think so meanly of yourselves, as to suppose that I am in the wrong, say so, and I retract this instant. Cousin, do you think that one could easily venture to make answer to such a speech?

I nevertheless sought an opportunity in the afternoon of speaking with my husband in private, and without entering into reasons which I was not at liberty to urge, I only intreated him to put off his journey for two days. My request was granted immediately; and I employ the time, in sending you this express and waiting for your answer, to know how I am to act.

I know that I need but desire my husband not to go at all, and he who never denied me any thing, will not refuse me so slight a favour. But I perceive, my dear, that he takes a pleasure in the confidence he reposes in me, and I am afraid of forfeiting some share of his esteem, if he should suppose that I have occasion for more reserve than he allows me. I know likewise, that I need but speak a word to St. Preux, and that he will accompany my husband without hesitation; but what will my husband think of the change, and can I take such a step without preserving an air of authority over St. Preux, which might seem to entitle him to some privileges in his turn? Besides, I am afraid, lest he should conclude from this precaution that I find it absolutely necessary, and this step which at first sight appears most easy, is the most dangerous perhaps at the bottom. Upon the whole however I am not ignorant that no consideration should be put in competition with a real danger, but does this danger exist in fact? This is the very doubt which you must resolve for me.

The more I examine the present state of my mind, the more I find to encourage me. My heart is spotless, my conscience calm, I have no symptoms of fear or uneasiness and with respect to every thing which passes within me, my sincerity before my husband costs me no trouble. Not but that certain involuntary recollections sometimes occasion tender emotions from which I had rather be exempt; but these recollections are so far from being produced by the sight of him who was the original cause of them, that they seem to be less frequent since his return, and however agreeable it is to me to see him, yet, I know not from what strange humour, it is more agreeable to me to think of him. In a word, I find that I do not even require the aid of virtue in order to be composed in his presence, and, exclusive of the horror of guilt, it would be very difficult to revive those sentiments which virtue has extinguished.

But is it sufficient, my dear, that my heart encourages me, when reason ought to alarm me? I have forfeited the right of depending on my own strength. Who will answer that my confidence, even now, is not an illusion of vice? How shall I rely on those sentiments which have so often deceived me? Does not guilt always spring from that pride which prompts us to despise temptation; and when we defy those dangers which have occasioned our fall, does it not shew a disposition to yield again to temptation?

Weigh all these circumstances, my dear Clara, you will find that though they may be trifling in themselves, they are of sufficient importance to merit attention, when you consider the object they concern. Deliver me from the uncertainty into which they have thrown me. Shew me how I must behave in this critical conjuncture; for my past errors have affected my judgment, and rendered me diffident in deciding upon any thing. Whatever you may think of yourself, your mind, I am certain, is tranquil and composed; objects present themselves to you such as they are; but in mine, which is agitated like a troubled sea, they are confounded and disfigured. I no longer dare to depend upon any thing I see, or any thing I feel, and notwithstanding so many years repentance, I perceive, with concern, that the weight of past failings is a burthen we must bear to the end of our lives.

Letter CXXXII. Answer.

Poor Eloisa! With so much reason to live at ease, what torments you continually create! All thy misfortunes come from thyself, O Israel! If you adhered to your own maxims; if, in point of sentiment, you only hearkened to the voice within you, and your heart did but silence your reason, you would then without scruple trust to that security it inspires, and you would not constrain yourself against the testimony of your own heart, to dread a danger which can arise only from thence.

I understand you, I perfectly understand you, Eloisa; being more secure in yourself than you pretend to be, you have a mind to humble yourself on account of your past failings, under a pretence of preventing new ones; and your scruples are not so much precautions against the future, as a penance you impose upon yourself to atone for the indiscretion which ruined you formerly. You compare the times; do you consider? Compare situations likewise, and remember that I then reproved you for your confidence, as I now reprove you for your diffidence.

You are mistaken, my dear; but nature does not alter so soon. If we can forget our situation for want of reflection, we see it in its true light when we take pains to consider of it, and we can no more conceal our virtues than our vices from ourselves. Your gentleness and devotion have given you a turn for humility. Mistrust that dangerous virtue which only excites self-love by making it centre in one point, and be assured that the noble sincerity of an upright mind, is greatly preferable to the pride of humility. If moderation is necessary in wisdom, it is requisite likewise in those precautions it suggests, lest a solicitude which is reproachful to virtue should debase the mind, and, by keeping us in constant alarm, render a chimerical danger a real one. Don’t you perceive that after we have had a fall, we should hold ourselves upright, and that by leaning too much towards the side opposite to that on which we fell, we are in danger of falling again? Cousin, you loved like Eloisa. Now, like her, you are an extravagant devotee; he even said that you may be more successful in the latter than you were in the former! In truth, if I was less acquainted with your natural timidity, your apprehensions would be sufficient to terrify me in my turn, and if I was so scrupulous, I might, from being alarmed for you, begin to tremble for myself.

Consider farther, my dear friend; you whose system of morality is as easy and natural as it is pure and honest, do not make constructions which are harsh and foreign to your character, with respect to your maxims concerning the separation of the sexes. I agree with you that they ought not to live together, nor after the same manner; but consider whether this important rule does not admit of many distinctions in point of practice; examine whether it ought to be applied indiscriminately, and without exception to married as well as to single women, to society in general as well as to particular connections, to business as well as to amusements, and whether that honour and decency which inspire these maxims, ought not sometimes to regulate them? In well governed countries, where the natural relations of things are attended to in matrimony, you would admit of assemblies where young persons of both sexes, might see, be acquainted, and associate with each other; but you prohibit them, with good reason, from holding any private intercourse. But is not the case quite different with regard to married women and the mothers of families, who can have no interest, that is justifiable, in exhibiting themselves in public; who are confined within doors by their domestic concerns, and who should not be refused to do any thing at home which is becoming the mistress of a family? I should not like to see you in the cellars presenting the wine for the merchants to taste, nor to see you leave your children to settle accounts with a banker; but if an honest man should come to visit your husband, or to transact some business with him, will you refuse to entertain his guest in his absence; and to do him the honours of the house for fear of being left _tete a tete_ with him? Trace this principle to its source, and it will explain all your maxims. Why do we suppose that women ought to live retired and apart from the men? Shall we do such injustice to our sex as to account for it upon principles drawn from our weakness, and that it is only to avoid the danger of temptations? No, my dear, these unworthy apprehensions do not become an honest woman, and the mother of a family who is continually surrounded with objects which nourish in her the sentiments of honour, and who is devoted to the most respectable duties of human nature. It is nature herself that divides us from the men, by prescribing to us different occupations; it is that amiable and timorous modesty, which, without being immediately attentive to chastity, is nevertheless its surest guardian; it is that cautious and affecting reserve, which at one and the same time cherishing both desire and respect in the hearts of men, serves as a kind of coquetry to virtue. This is the reason why even husbands themselves are not excepted out of this rule. This is the reason why the most discreet women generally maintain the greatest ascendancy over their husbands; because, by the help of this prudent and discreet reserve, without shewing any caprice or non-compliance, they know, even in the embraces of the most tender union, how to keep them at a distance, and prevent their being cloyed with them. You will agree with me that your maxims are too general not to admit of exceptions, and that not being founded on any rigorous duty, the same principle of decorum which established them, may sometimes justify our dispensing with them.

The circumspection which you ground on your past failings, is injurious to your present condition; I will never pardon this unnecessary caution which your heart dictates, and I can scarce forgive it in your reason. How was it possible that the rampart which protects your person, could not secure you from such an ignominious apprehension? How could my cousin, my sister, my friend, my Eloisa, confound the indiscretions of a girl of too much sensibility, with the infidelity of a guilty wife? Look around you, you will see nothing but what contributes to raise and support your mind. Your husband who has such confidence in you, and whose esteem it becomes you to justify; your children whom you would train to virtue, and who will one day deem it an honour that you was their mother; your venerable father who is so dear to you, who enjoys your felicity, and who derives more lustre from you than from his ancestors; your friend whose fate depends on yours, and to whom you must be accountable for a reformation to which she has contributed; her daughter, to whom you ought to set an example of those virtues which you would excite in her; your philosopher, who is a hundred times fonder of your virtues, than of your person, and who respects you still more than you apprehend; lastly, yourself, who are sensible what painful efforts your discretion has cost you, and who will surely never forfeit the fruit of so much trouble in a single moment; how many motives capable of inspiring you with courage, conspire to make you ashamed of having ventured to mistrust yourself! But in order to answer for my Eloisa, what occasion have I to consider what she is? It is enough that I know what she was, during the indiscretions which she bewails. Ah! if your heart had ever been capable of infidelity, I would allow you to be continually apprehensive: but at the very time when you imagined that you viewed it at a distance, you may conceive the horror its real existence would have occasioned you, by what you felt at that time, when but to imagine it, had been to have committed it.

I recollect with what astonishment we learnt that there was a nation where the wellness of a fond maid is considered as an inexpiable crime, though the adultery of a married woman is there softened by the gentle term of gallantry, and where married women publicly make themselves amends for the short-lived restraint they undergo while single. I know what maxims, in this respect, prevail in high life, where virtue passes for nothing, where every thing is empty appearance, where crimes are effaced by the difficulty of proving them, or where the proof itself becomes ridiculous against custom. But you, Eloisa, you who glowed with a pure and constant passion, who was guilty only in the eyes of men, and between heaven and earth was open to no reproach! You, who made yourself respected in the midst of your indiscretions; you, who being abandoned to fruitless regret, obliged us even to adore those virtues which you had forfeited; you, who disdained to endure self-contempt, when every thing seemed to plead in your excuse, can you be apprehensive of guilt, after having paid so dearly for your weakness? Will you dare to be afraid that you have less power now, than you had in those days which cost you so many tears? No, my dear, so far from being alarmed at your former indiscretions, they ought to inspire you with courage; so severe a repentance does not lead to remorse, and whoever is so susceptible of shame, will never bid defiance to infamy.