MR. VILLARS TO EVELINA Berry Hill, March 28.
TO resist the urgency of intreaty, is a power which I have not yet
acquired: I aim not at an authority which deprives you of liberty,
yet I would fain guide myself by a prudence which should save me the
pangs of repentance. Your impatience to fly to a place which your
imagination has painted to you in colors so attractive, surprises me
not; I have only to hope, that the liveliness of your fancy may not
deceive you: to refuse, would be raising it still higher. To see my
Evelina happy, is to see myself without a wish: go, then my child;
and may that Heaven, which alone can direct, preserve and strengthen
you! To that, my love, will I daily offer prayers for your felicity. O
may it guard, watch over you, defend you from danger, save you from
distress, and keep vice as distant from your person as from your heart!
And to me, may it grant, the ultimate blessing of closing these aged
eyes in the arms of one so dear-so deservedly beloved! ARTHUR VILLARS.