_Wednesday_.--The party was Mr. and Mrs. Vanbrugh--the former a good
sort of man--the latter, Captain Bouchier says, reckons herself a woman
of humour, but she kept it prodigious snug; Lord Huntingdon, a very deaf
old lord Sir Robert Pigot, a very thin old baronet; Mr. Tyson, a very
civil master of the ceremonies; Mr. and Mrs. White, a very insignificant
couple; Sir James C--, a bawling old man; two Misses C--, a pair of
tonish misses; Mrs. and Miss Byron; Miss W--, and certain others I knew
nothing of.
Augusta Byron, according to custom, had entered into conversation with
me, and we were talking about her sisters, and her affairs, when Mr.
E---(whose name I forgot to mention) came to inform me that Mrs. Lambart
begged to speak to me. She was upon a sofa with Miss W--, who, it
seemed, desired much to be introduced to me, and so I took a chair
facing them.
Miss W-- is young and pleasing in her appearance, not pretty, but
agreeable in her face, and soft, gentle, and well bred in her manners.
Our conversation, for some time, was upon the common Bath topics; but
when Mrs. Lambart left us--called to receive more company--we went
insensibly into graver matters.
As I soon found, by the looks and expressions of this young lady that
she was of a peculiar cast, I left all choice of subjects to herself,
determined quietly to follow as she led; and very soon, and I am sure I
know not how, we had for topics the follies and vices of mankind, and,
indeed, she spared not for lashing them. The women she rather
excused than defended, laying to the door of the men their faults and
imperfections; but the men, she said, were all bad--all, in one word,
and without exception, sensualists.
I stared much at a severity of speech for which her softness of manner
had so ill prepared me; and she, perceiving my surprise, said,
“I am sure I ought to apologise for speaking my opinion to you--you, who
have so just and so uncommon a knowledge of human nature. I have long
wished ardently to have the honour of conversing with you; but your
party has, altogether, been regarded as so formidable, that I have not
had courage to approach it.”
I made--as what could I do else?--disqualifying speeches, and she then
led to discoursing of happiness and misery: the latter she held to be
the invariable lot of us all; and “one word,” she added, “we have in
our language, and in all others, for which there is never any essential
necessity, and that is pleasure!” And her eyes filled with tears as she
spoke.
“How you amaze me!” cried I; “I have met with misanthropes before, but
never with so complete a one; and I can hardly think I hear right when I
see how young you are!”
She then, in rather indirect terms, gave me to understand that she
was miserable at home, and in very direct terms, that she was wretched
abroad; and openly said, that to affliction she was born, and in
affliction she must die, for that the world was so vilely formed as to
render happiness impossible for its inhabitants.
There was something in this freedom of repining that I could by no means
approve, and, as I found by all her manner that she had a disposition to
even respect whatever I said, I now grew very serious, and frankly told
her that I could not think it consistent with either truth or religion
to cherish such notions.
“One thing,” answered she, “there is, which I believe might make me
happy, but for that I have no inclination: it is an amorous disposition;
but that I do not possess. I can make myself no happiness by intrigue.”
“I hope not, indeed!” cried I, almost confounded by her extraordinary
notions and speeches; “but, surely, there are worthier objects of
happiness attainable!”
“No, I believe there are not, and the reason the men are happier than
us, is because they are more sensual!”
“I would not think such thoughts,” cried I, clasping my hands with an
involuntary vehemence, “for worlds!”
The Misses C-- then interrupted us, and seated themselves next to us;
but Miss W-- paid them little attention at first, and soon after none at
all; but, in a low voice, continued her discourse with me, recurring
to the same subject of happiness and misery, upon which, after again
asserting the folly of ever hoping for the former, she made this speech,
“There may be, indeed, one moment of happiness, which must be the
finding one worthy of exciting a passion which one should dare own to
himself. That would, indeed, be a moment worth living for! but that can
never happen--I am sure not to me--the men are so low, so vicious, so
worthless! No, there is not one such to be found!”
What a strange girl! I could do little more than listen to her, from
surprise at all she said.
“If, however,” she continued, “I had your talents I could, bad as this
world is, be happy in it. There is nothing, there is nobody I envy like
you. With such resources as yours there can never be ennui; the mind
may always be employed, and always be gay! Oh, if I could write as you
write!”
“Try,” cried I, “that is all that is wanting! try, and you will soon do
much better things!”
“O no! I have tried, but I cannot succeed.”
“Perhaps you are too diffident. But is it possible you can be serious in
so dreadful an assertion as that you are never happy? Are you sure that
some real misfortune would not show you that your present misery is
imaginary?”
“I don't know,” answered she, looking down, “perhaps it is so,--but in
that case 'tis a misery so much the harder to be cured.”
“You surprise me more and more,” cried I; “is it possible you can so
rationally see the disease of a disordered imagination, and yet allow it
such power over your mind?”
“Yes, for it is the only source from which I draw any shadow of
felicity. Sometimes when in the country, I give way to my imagination
for whole days, and then I forget the world and its cares, and feel some
enjoyment of existence.”
“Tell me what is then your notion of felicity? Whither does your
castle-building carry you?”
“O, quite out of the world--I know not where, but I am surrounded with
sylphs, and I forget everything besides.”
“Well, you are a most extraordinary character, indeed; I must confess I
have seen nothing like you!”
“I hope, however, I shall find something like myself, and, like the
magnet rolling in the dust, attract some metal as I go.”
“That you may attract what you please, is of all things the most likely;
but if you wait to be happy for a friend resembling yourself, I shall no
longer wonder at your despondency.”
“Oh!” cried she, raising her eyes in ecstasy, “could I find such a
one!--male or female--for sex would be indifferent to me. With such a
one I would go to live directly.”
I half laughed, but was perplexed in my own mind whether to be sad or
merry at such a speech.
“But then,” she continued, “after making, should I lose such a friend, I
would not survive.”
“Not survive?” repeated I, “what can you mean?”
She looked down, but said nothing.
“Surely you cannot mean,” said I, very gravely indeed, “to put a violent
end to your life.”
“I should not,” said she, again looking up, “hesitate a moment.”
I was quite thunderstruck, and for some time could not say a word;
but when I did speak, it was in a style of exhortation so serious and
earnest, I am ashamed to write it to you, lest you should think it too
much.
She gave me an attention that was even respectful, but when I urged her
to tell me by what right she thought herself entitled to rush unlicensed
on eternity, she said, “By the right of believing I shall be extinct.” I
really felt horror-struck.
“Where, for heaven's sake,” I cried, “where have you picked up such
dreadful reasoning?”
“In Hume,” said she; “I have read his Essays repeatedly.”
“I am sorry to find they have power to do so much mischief; you should
not have read them, at least till a man equal to Hume in abilities had
answered him. Have you read any more infidel writers?”
“Yes, Bolingbroke, the divinest of all writers.”
“And do you read nothing upon the right side?”
“Yes, the bible, till I was sick to death of it, every Sunday evening to
my mother.”