These were the circumstances and the hopes which gradually brought their
alleviation to Sir Thomas, deadening his sense of what was lost, and in
part reconciling him to himself; though the anguish arising from the
conviction of his own errors in the education of his daughters was never
to be entirely done away.
Too late he became aware how unfavorable to the character of any young
people must be the totally opposite treatment which Maria and Julia had
been always experiencing at home, where the excessive indulgence and
flattery of their aunt had been continually contrasted with his own
severity. He saw how ill he had judged, in expecting to counteract what
was wrong in Mrs. Norris by its reverse in himself, clearly saw that he
had but increased the evil, by teaching them to repress their spirits
in his presence so as to make their real disposition unknown to him,
and sending them for all their indulgences to a person who had been able
to attach them only by the blindness of her affection and the excess of
her praise.
Here had been grievous mismanagement; but, bad as it was, he gradually
grew to feel that it had not been the most direful mistake in his plan
of education. Something must have been wanting _within_, or time would
have worn away much of its ill effect. He feared that principle, active
principle, had been wanting; that they had never been properly taught to
govern their inclinations and tempers, by that sense of duty which can
alone suffice. They had been instructed theoretically in their religion,
but never required to bring it into daily practice. To be distinguished
for elegance and accomplishments--the authorized object of their
youth--could have had no useful influence that way, no moral effect on
the mind. He had meant them to be good, but his cares had been directed
to the understanding and manners, not the disposition; and of the
necessity of self-denial and humility, he feared they had never heard
from any lips that could profit them.
Bitterly did he deplore a deficiency which now he could scarcely
comprehend to have been possible. Wretchedly did he feel, that with all
the cost and care of an anxious and expensive education, he had brought
up his daughters without their understanding their first duties, or his
being acquainted with their character and temper.
The high spirit and strong passions of Mrs. Rushworth especially were
made known to him only in their sad result. She was not to be prevailed
on to leave Mr. Crawford. She hoped to marry him, and they continued
together till she was obliged to be convinced that such hope was vain,
and till the disappointment and wretchedness arising from the conviction
rendered her temper so bad, and her feelings for him so like hatred, as
to make them for a while each other's punishment, and then induce a
voluntary separation.
She had lived with him to be reproached as the ruin of all his happiness
in Fanny, and carried away no better consolation in leaving him, than
that she _had_ divided them. What can exceed the misery of such a mind
in such a situation!
Mr. Rushworth had no difficulty in procuring a divorce; and so ended a
marriage contracted under such circumstances as to make any better end
the effect of good luck, not to be reckoned on. She had despised him,
and loved another--and he had been very much aware that it was so. The
indignities of stupidity, and the disappointments of selfish passion,
can excite little pity. His punishment followed his conduct, as did a
deeper punishment the deeper guilt of his wife. _He_ was released from
the engagement, to be mortified and unhappy till some other pretty girl
could attract him into matrimony again, and he might set forward on a
second, and it is to be hoped more prosperous trial of the state--if
duped, to be duped at least with good humor and good luck; while _she_
must withdraw with infinitely stronger feelings, to a retirement and
reproach which could allow no second spring of hope or character.
Where she could be placed, became a subject of most melancholy and
momentous consultation. Mrs. Norris, whose attachment seemed to augment
with the demerits of her niece, would have had her received at home and
countenanced by them all. Sir Thomas would not hear of it; and Mrs.
Norris's anger against Fanny was so much the greater, from considering
_her_ residence there as the motive. She persisted in placing his
scruples to _her_ account, though Sir Thomas very solemnly assured her
that had there been no young woman in question, had there been no young
person of either sex belonging to him, to be endangered by the society
or hurt by the character of Mrs. Rushworth, he would never have offered
so great an insult to the neighborhood as to expect it to notice her. As
a daughter--he hoped a penitent one--she should be protected by him, and
secured in every comfort and supported by every encouragement to do
right which their relative situations admitted; but farther than _that_
he would not go. Maria had destroyed her own character; and he would
not, by a vain attempt to restore what never could be restored, be
affording his sanction to vice, or, in seeking to lessen its disgrace,
be anywise accessory to introducing such misery in another man's family
as he had known himself....
Henry Crawford, ruined by early independence and bad domestic example,
indulged in the freaks of a cold-blooded vanity a little too long. Once
it had, by an opening undesigned and unmerited, led him into the way of
happiness. Could he have been satisfied with the conquest of one amiable
woman's affections, could he have found sufficient exultation in
overcoming the reluctance, in working himself into the esteem and
tenderness of Fanny Price, there would have been every probability of
success and felicity for him. His affection had already done something.
Her influence over him had already given him some influence over her.
Would he have deserved more, there can be no doubt that more would have
been obtained; especially when that marriage had taken place, which
would have given him the assistance of her conscience in subduing her
first inclination, and brought them very often together. Would he have
persevered, and uprightly, Fanny must have been his reward--and a reward
very voluntarily bestowed--within a reasonable period from Edmund's
marrying Mary. Had he done as he intended, and as he knew he ought, by
going down to Everingham after his return from Portsmouth, he might have
been deciding his own happy destiny. But he was pressed to stay for Mrs.
Fraser's party: his staying was made of flattering consequence, and he
was to meet Mrs. Rushworth there. Curiosity and vanity were both
engaged, and the temptation of immediate pleasure was too strong for a
mind unused to make any sacrifice to right; he resolved to defer his
Norfolk journey, resolved that writing should answer the purpose of it,
or that its purpose was unimportant--and staid. He saw Mrs. Rushworth,
was received by her with a coldness which ought to have been repulsive,
and have established apparent indifference between them for ever: but he
was mortified, he could not bear to be thrown off by the woman whose
smiles had been so wholly at his command; he must exert himself to
subdue so proud a display of resentment: it was anger on Fanny's
account; he must get the better of it, and make Mrs. Rushworth Maria
Bertram again in her treatment of himself.
In this spirit he began the attack; and by animated perseverance had
soon re-established the sort of familiar intercourse--of gallantry--of
flirtation--which bounded his views: but in triumphing over the
discretion, which, though beginning in anger, might have saved them
both, he had put himself in the power of feelings on her side more
strong than he had supposed. She loved him; there was no withdrawing
attentions avowedly dear to her. He was entangled by his own vanity,
with as little excuse of love as possible, and without the smallest
inconstancy of mind towards her cousin. To keep Fanny and the Bertrams
from a knowledge of what was passing became his first object. Secrecy
could not have been more desirable for Mrs. Rushworth's credit than he
felt it for his own. When he returned from Richmond, he would have been
glad to see Mrs. Rushworth no more. All that followed was the result of
her imprudence; and he went off with her at last because he could not
help it, regretting Fanny even at the moment, but regretting her
infinitely more when all the bustle of the intrigue was over, and a very
few months had taught him, by the force of contrast, to place a yet
higher value on the sweetness of her temper, the purity of her mind, and
the excellence of her principles.
That punishment, the public punishment of disgrace, should in a just
measure attend _his_ share of the offense, is, we know, not one of the
barriers which society gives to virtue. In this world, the penalty is
less equal than could be wished; but without presuming to look forward
to a juster appointment hereafter, we may fairly consider a man of
sense, like Henry Crawford, to be providing for himself no small portion
of vexation and regret--vexation that must rise sometimes to
self-reproach, and regret to wretchedness--in having so requited
hospitality, so injured family peace, so forfeited his best, most
estimable, and endeared acquaintance, and so lost the woman whom he had
rationally as well as passionately loved.