LETTER XXII.
To Jane Talbot.
You had reason to fear my reproaches, yet you have
strangely erred in imagining the cause for which I should
blame you. You are never tired, my good friend, of humbling
me by injurious suppositions.
I do, indeed, reproach you for conduct that is rash;
unjust; hurtful to yourself; to your mother; to me; to
the memory of him who, whatever were his faults, has done
nothing to forfeit your reverence.
You are charged with the blackest guilt that can be imputed
to woman. To know you guilty produces more anguish
in the mind of your accuser, than any other evil could
produce, and to be convinced of your innocence, would
be to remove the chief cause of her sorrow, yet you are
contented to admit the charge; to countenance her error
by your silence. By stating the simple truth, circumstantially
and fully; by adding earnest and pathetic assurances
of your innocence; by shewing all the letters that have
passed between us, the contents of which will shew that
such guilt was impossible; by making your girl bear witness
to the precaution you used on that night, to preclude
misconstructions, surely you may hope to disarm her suspicions.
But this proceeding has not occurred to you. You have
mistrusted the power of truth, and even are willing to perpetuate
the error. And why? because you will not blast the
memory of the dead. The loss of your own reputation;
the misery of your mother, whom your imaginary guilt
makes miserable, are of less moment in your eyes than—
what? let not him, my girl, who knows thee best, have most
reason to blush for thee.
Talbot, you imagine, forged this calumny. It was a
wrong thing and much unhappiness has flowed from it. This
calumny, you have it, at length, in your power to refute.
Its past effects cannot be recalled, but here the evil may
end, the mistake may be cleared up, and be hindered from
destroying the future peace of your mother.
Yet you forbear from tenderness to his memory, who,
if you are consistent with yourself, you must believe to look
back on that transaction with remorse, to lament every evil
which it has hitherto occasioned, and to rejoice in the means
of stopping the disastrous series.
My happiness is just of as little value. Your mother's
wishes, though allowed to be irrational and groundless, are
to be gratified by the disappointment of mine, which appear
to be just and reasonable, and since one must be sacrificed,
that affection with which you have inspired me; and those
benefits you confess to owe to me; those sufferings believed
by you to have been incurred by me for your sake, do not,
it seems, entitle me to preference.
On this score, however, my good girl, set your heart at
ease. I never assumed the merits you attributed to me. I
never urged the claims you were once so eager to admit.
I desire not the preference. If, by abjuring me, your happiness
could be secured; if it were possible for you to be
that cheerful companion of your mother, which you seem so
greatly to wish; if, in her society, you could stifle every
regret, and prevent your tranquillity from being invaded by
self-reproach, most gladly would I persuade you to go to
her, and dismiss me from your thoughts forever.
But I know, Jane, that this cannot be. You never will
enjoy peace under your mother's roof. The sighing heart
and the saddened features, will forever upbraid her, and
bickering and repining will mar every domestic scene. Your
mother's aversion to me is far from irreconcilable, but that
which will hasten reconcilement will be marriage. You
cannot forfeit her love as long as you preserve your integrity,
and those scruples, which no argument will dissipate, will
yield to reflection on an evil (as she will regard it) that cannot
be remedied.
Admitting me, in this respect, to be mistaken, your mother's
resentment will ever give you disquiet. True, but will
your union with me, console you nothing? in pressing the
hoped for fruit of that union to your breast; in that tenderness
which you will hourly receive from me, will then
be nothing to compensate you for sorrows in which there is
no remorse, and which, indeed, will owe their poignancy to
the generosity of your spirit?
You cannot unite yourself to me, but with some view to
my happiness. Will your contributing to that happiness be
nothing?
Yet I cannot separate my felicity from your's. I can
enjoy nothing at the cost of your peace. In whatever way
you decide, may the fruit be content.
I ask you not for proofs of love; for the sacrifice of others
to me. My happiness demands it not. It only requires
you to seek your own good. Nothing but ceaseless repinings
can follow your compliance with your mother's wishes;
but there is something in your power to do. You can hide
these repinings from her, by living at a distance from her.
She may know you only through the medium of your letters,
and these may exhibit the brightest side of things. She
wants nothing but your divorce from me, and that may take
place without living under her roof.
You need not stay here. The world is wide and she
will eagerly consent to the breaking of your shackles by
change of residence. Much and the best part of your country
you have never seen. Variety of objects will amuse you,
and new faces and new minds erase the deep impressions
of the past. Colden and his merits may sink into forgetfulness,
or be thought of with no other emotion than regret that
a being so worthless was ever beloved.—But I wander from
the true point. I meant not to introduce myself into this
letter.—Self! That vile debaser whom I detest as my worst
enemy, and who assumes a thousand shapes and practises a
thousand wiles to entice me from the right path.
Ah! Jane. Could thy sagacity discover no other cause
of thy mother's error than Talbot's fraud? Could thy
heart so readily impute to him so black a treachery? Such
a prompt and undoubting conclusion, it grieves me to find
thee capable of.
How much more likely that Talbot was himself deceived.
For it was not by him that thy unfinished letter was purloined.
At that moment he was probably some thousands
of miles distant. It was five weeks before his return from
his Hamburg voyage, when that mysterious incident happened.
Be of good cheer, my sweet girl. I doubt not all will
be well. We shall find the means of detecting and defeating
this conspiracy, and of re-establishing thee in thy mother's
good opinion. At present, I own, I do not see the
means; but to say truth, my mind is clouded by anxieties;
enfeebled by watching and fatigue.
You know why I came hither. I found my friend in a
very bad way, and have no hope but that his pangs, which
must end within a few days, may, for his sake, terminate
very soon. He will not part with me, and I have seldom
left his chamber since I came.
Your letter has disturbed me much, and I seize this interval,
when the sick man has gained a respite from his pain,
to tell you my thoughts upon it. I fear I have not reasoned
very clearly. Some peevishness, I doubt not, has crept into
my style. I rely upon your wonted goodness to excuse it.
I have much to say upon this affecting subject, but must
take a future opportunity.
I also have received a letter from Mrs. Fielder, of which
I will say no more, since I send you enclosed that, and my
answer. I wish it had come at a time when my mind was
more at ease, as an immediate reply seemed to be necessary.
Adieu.
