Clarissa Harlowe Samuel Richardson (most important books to read TXT) 📖

an advocate for an absent person, whose discretion was called in question, without having given manifest proofs of indiscretion.

Once I remember, in a large circle of ladies, every one of which (I among the rest) having censured a generally-reported indiscretion in a young lady⁠—Come, my Miss Howe, said she, (for we had agreed to take each other to task when either thought the other gave occasion for it; and when by blaming each other we intended a general reprehension, which, as she used to say, it would appear arrogant or assuming to level more properly), let me be Miss Fanny Darlington. Then removing out of the circle, and standing up, Here I stand, unworthy of a seat with the rest of the company, till I have cleared myself. And now, suppose me to be her, let me hear your charge, and do you hear what the poor culprit can say to it in her own defence. And then answering the conjectural and unproved circumstances, by circumstances as fairly to be supposed favourable, she brought off triumphantly the censured lady; and so much to everyone’s satisfaction, that she was led to her chair, and voted a double rank in the circle, as the reinstated Miss Fanny Darlington, and as Miss Clarissa Harlowe.

Very few persons, she used to say, would be condemned, or even accused, in the circles of ladies, were they present; it is generous, therefore, nay, it is but just, said she, to take the part of the absent, if not flagrantly culpable.

But though wisdom was her birthright, as I may say, yet she had not lived years enough to pretend to so much experience as to exempt her from the necessity of sometimes altering her opinion both of persons and things; but, when she found herself obliged to do this, she took care that the particular instance of mistaken worthiness in the person should not narrow or contract her almost universal charity into general doubt or jealousy. An instance of what I mean occurs to my memory.

Being upbraided, by a severe censure, with a person’s proving base, whom she had frequently defended, and by whose baseness my beloved friend was a sufferer; “You, Madam,” said she, “had more penetration than such a young creature as I can pretend to have. But although human depravity may, I doubt, oftener justify those who judge harshly, than human rectitude can those who judge favourably, yet will I not part with my charity. Nevertheless, for the future, I will endeavour, in cases where the judgment of my elders is against me, to make mine consistent with caution and prudence.”

Indeed, when she was convinced of any error or mistake, (however seemingly derogatory to her judgment and sagacity), no one was ever so acknowledging, so ingenuous, as she. “It was a merit,” she used to say, “next in degree to that of having avoided error, frankly to own an error. And that the offering at an excuse in a blameable manner, was the undoubted mark of a disingenuous, if not of a perverse mind.”

But I ought to add, on this head, (of her great charity where character was concerned, and where there was room for charity), that she was always deservedly severe in her reprehensions of a wilful and studied vileness. How could she then forgive the wretch by whose premeditated villany she was entangled?

You must everywhere insist upon it, that had it not been for the stupid persecutions of her relations, she never would have been in the power of that horrid Lovelace. And yet, on several occasions, she acknowledged frankly, that were person, and address, and alliance, to be allowedly the principal attractives in the choice of a lover, it would not have been difficult for her eye to mislead her heart.

When she was last with me, (three happy weeks together!) in every visit the wretch made her, he left her more dissatisfied with him than in the former. And yet his behaviour before her was too specious to have been very exceptionable to a woman who had a less share of that charming delicacy, and of that penetration, which so much distinguished her.

In obedience to the commands of her gloomy father, on his allowing her to be my guest, for that last time, (as it most unhappily proved!) she never would see him out of my company; and would often say, when he was gone, “O my Nancy! this is not the man!”⁠—At other times, “Gay, giddy creature! he has always something to be forgiven for!”⁠—At others, “This man will much sooner excite one’s fears than attract one’s love.” And then would she repeat, “This is not the man. All that the world says of him cannot be untrue. But what title have I to call him to account, who intend not to have him?”

In short had she been left to a judgment and discretion, which nobody ever questioned who had either, she would soon have discovered enough of him to cause her to discard him forever.

She was an admirable mistress of all the graces of elocution. The hand she wrote, for the neat and free cut of her letters, (like her mind, solid, and above all flourish), for its fairness, evenness, and swiftness, distinguished her as much as the correctness of her orthography, and even punctuation, from the generality of her own sex; and left her none, among the most accurate of the other, who excelled her.

And here you may, if you please, take occasion to throw in one hint for the benefit of such of our sex as are too careless in their orthography, (a consciousness of a defect which generally keeps them from writing).⁠—She was used to say, “It was a proof that a woman understood the derivation as well as sense of the words she used, and that she stopped not at sound, when she spelt accurately.”

On this head you may take notice, that it was always matter of surprise to her, that the sex are generally so