LETTER XIV.
HARRINGTON to WORTHY.
How incompetent is the force of
words to express some peculiar sensations!
Expression is seeble when emotions are exquisite.
I WISH you could be here to see with
what ease and dignity every thing comes
from the hand of Harriot—I cannot give a
description equivalent to the great idea I
wish to convey—You will tell me I am in
love—What is love? I have been trying to
investigate its nature—to strip it of its mere
term, and consider it as it may be supported
by principle—I might as well search for the
philosopher's stone.
EVERY one is ready to praise his mistress
—she is always described in her “native
simplicity,” as “an angel” with a “placid
mein” “mild, animated” “altogether captivating,”
and at length the task of description
is given up as altogether “undescribable.”
Are not all these in themselves bare
insignificant words? The world has so long
been accustomed to hear the sound of them,
that the idea is lost. But to the question—
What is love? Unless it is answered now,
perhaps it never will be. Is it not an infinitude
of graces that accompany every thing
said by
Harriot? That adorn all she does?
They must not be taken severally—they cannot
be contemplated in the abstract.—If you
proceed to a chymical analysis, their tenuous
essence will evaporate—they are in themselves
nothing, but the aggregate is love.
WHEN an army composed of a great number
of men, moves slowly on at a distance,
nobody thinks of considering a single soldier.
Adieu!
