But is it not the divine CLARISSA [Harlowe let me not say; my soul
spurns them all but her] whom I am thus by application threatening?--If
virtue be the true nobility, how is she ennobled, and how shall an
alliance with her ennoble, were not contempt due to the family from whom
she sprang and prefers to me!
But again, let me stop.--Is there not something wrong, has there
not been something wrong, in this divine creature? And will not the
reflections upon that wrong (what though it may be construed in my
favour?*) make me unhappy, when novelty has lost its charms, and when,
mind and person, she is all my own? Libertines are nicer, if at all
nice, than other men. They seldom meet with the stand of virtue in
the women whom they attempt. And, by the frailty of those they have
triumphed over, they judge of all the rest. 'Importunity and opportunity
no woman is proof against, especially from the persevering lover, who
knows how to suit temptations to inclinations:' This, thou knowest, is a
prime article of the rake's creed.
* The particular attention of such of the fair sex, as are more apt to
read for the same of amusement than instruction, is requested to this
letter of Mr. Lovelace.
And what! (methinks thou askest with surprise) Dost thou question this
most admirable of women?--The virtue of a CLARISSA dost thou question?
I do not, I dare not question it. My reverence for her will not let me
directly question it. But let me, in my turn, ask thee--Is not, may not
her virtue be founded rather in pride than in principle? Whose daughter
is she?--And is she not a daughter? If impeccable, how came she by her
impeccability? The pride of setting an example to her sex has run away
with her hitherto, and may have made her till now invincible. But is not
that pride abated? What may not both men and women be brought to do in a
mortified state? What mind is superior to calamity? Pride is perhaps the
principal bulwark of female virtue. Humble a woman, and may she not be
effectually humbled?
Then who says Miss Clarissa Harlowe is the paragon of virtue?--Is virtue
itself?
All who know her, and have heard of her, it will be answered.
Common bruit!--Is virtue to be established by common bruit only?--Has
her virtue ever been proved?--Who has dared to try her virtue?
I told thee, I would sit down to argue with myself; and I have drawn
myself into argumentation before I was aware.
Let me enter into a strict discussion of this subject.
I know how ungenerous an appearance what I have said, and what I have
further to say, on this topic, will have from me: But am I not bringing
virtue to the touchstone, with a view to exalt it, if it come out to be
proof?--'Avaunt then, for one moment, all consideration that may arise
from a weakness which some would miscall gratitude; and is oftentimes
the corrupter of a heart most ignoble!'
To the test then--and I will bring this charming creature to the
strictest test, 'that all the sex, who may be shewn any passages in my
letters,' [and I know thou cheerest the hearts of all thy acquaintance
with such detached parts of mine as tend not to dishonour characters
or reveal names: and this gives me an appetite to oblige thee by
interlardment,] 'that all the sex, I say, may see what they ought to be;
what is expected from them; and if they have to deal with a person of
reflection and punctilio, [of pride, if thou wilt,] how careful they
ought to be, by a regular and uniform conduct, not to give him cause to
think lightly of them for favours granted, which may be interpreted into
natural weakness. For is not a wife the keeper of a man's honour? And
do not her faults bring more disgrace upon a husband than even upon
herself?'
It is not for nothing, Jack, that I have disliked the life of shackles.
To the test then, as I said, since now I have the question brought home
to me, Whether I am to have a wife? And whether she be to be a wife at
the first or at the second hand?
I will proceed fairly. I do the dear creature not only strict but
generous justice; for I will try her by her own judgment, as well as by
our principles.
She blames herself for having corresponded with me, a man of free
character; and one indeed whose first view it was to draw her into this
correspondence; and who succeeded in it by means unknown to herself.
'Now, what were her inducements to this correspondence?' If not what her
niceness makes her think blameworthy, why does she blame herself?
Has she been capable of error? Of persisting in that error?
Whoever was the tempter, that is not the thing; nor what the temptation.
The fact, the error, is now before us.
Did she persist in it against parental prohibition?
She owns she did.
Was a daughter ever known who had higher notions of the filial duty, of
the parental authority?
Never.
'What must be the inducements, how strong, that were too strong for
duty, in a daughter so dutiful?--What must my thoughts have been of
these inducements, what my hopes built upon them at the time, taken in
this light?'
Well, but it will be said, That her principal view was to prevent
mischief between her brother and her other friends, and the man vilely
insulted by them all.
But why should she be more concerned for the safety of others than they
were for their own? And had not the rencounter then happened? 'Was a
person of virtue to be prevailed upon to break through her apparent, her
acknowledged duty, upon any consideration?' And, if not, was she to be
so prevailed upon to prevent an apprehended evil only?
Thou, Lovelace, the tempter (thou wilt again break out and say) to be
the accuser!
But I am not the accuser. I am the arguer only, and, in my heart,
all the time acquit and worship the divine creature. 'But let me,
nevertheless, examine, whether the acquital be owing to her merit, or to
my weakness--Weakness the true name of love!'
But shall we suppose another motive?--And that is LOVE; a motive which
all the world will excuse her for. 'But let me tell all the world that
do, not because they ought, but because all the world is apt to be
misled by it.'
Let LOVE then be the motive:--Love of whom?
A Lovelace, is the answer.
'Is there but one Lovelace in the world? May not more Lovelaces be
attracted by so fine a figure? By such exalted qualities? It was her
character that drew me to her: and it was her beauty and good sense that
rivetted my chains: and now all together make me think her a subject
worthy of my attempts, worthy of my ambition.'
But has she had the candour, the openness, to acknowledge that love?
She has not.
'Well then, if love be at the bottom, is there not another fault lurking
beneath the shadow of that love?--Has she not affectation?--Or is it
pride of heart?'
And what results?--'Is then the divine Clarissa capable of loving a man
whom she ought not to love? And is she capable of affectation? And is
her virtue founded in pride?--And, if the answer to these questions be
affirmative, must she not then be a woman?'
And can she keep this love at bay? Can she make him, who has been
accustomed to triumph over other women, tremble? Can she conduct
herself, as to make him, at times, question whether she loves him or
any man; 'yet not have the requisite command over the passion itself in
steps of the highest consequence to her honour, as she thinks,' [I
am trying her, Jack, by her own thoughts,] 'but suffer herself to be
provoked to promise to abandon her father's house, and go off with
him, knowing his character; and even conditioning not to marry till
improbably and remote contingencies were to come to pass? What though
the provocations were such as would justify any other woman; yet was
a CLARISSA to be susceptible to provocations which she thinks herself
highly censurable for being so much moved by?'
But let us see the dear creature resolved to revoke her promise, yet
meeting her lover; a bold and intrepid man, who was more than once
before disappointed by her; and who comes, as she knows, prepared to
expect the fruits of her appointment, and resolved to carry her off.
And let us see him actually carrying her off, and having her at
his mercy--'May there not be, I repeat, other Lovelaces; other like
intrepid, persevering enterprizers; although they may not go to work in
the same way?
'And has then a CLARISSA (herself her judge) failed?--In such great
points failed?--And may she not further fail?--Fail in the greatest
point, to which all the other points, in which she has failed, have but
a natural tendency?'
Nor say thou, that virtue, in the eye of Heaven, is as much a manly as
a womanly grace. By virtue in this place I mean chastity, and to be
superior to temptation; my Clarissa out of the question. Nor ask thou,
shall the man be guilty, yet expect the woman to be guiltless, and even
unsuspectible? Urge thou not these arguments, I say, since the wife, by
a failure, may do much more injury to the husband, than the husband can
do to the wife, and not only to her husband, but to all his family, by
obtruding another man's children into his possessions, perhaps to the
exclusion of (at least to a participation with) his own; he believing
them all the time to be his. In the eye of Heaven, therefore, the sin
cannot be equal. Besides I have read in some places that the woman was
made for the man, not the man for the woman. Virtue then is less to be
dispensed with in the woman than in the man.
Thou, Lovelace, (methinks some better man than thyself will say,) to
expect such perfection in a woman!
Yes, I, may I answer. Was not the great Caesar a great rake as to
women? Was he not called, by his very soldiers, on one of his triumphant
entries into Rome, the bald-pated lecher? and warning given of him to
the wives, as well as to the daughter of his fellow-citizens? Yet did
not Caesar repudiate his wife for being only in company with Clodius, or
rather because Clodius, though by surprise upon her, was found in hers?
And what was the reason he gave for it?--It was this, (though a rake
himself, as I have said,) and only this--The wife of Caesar must not be
suspected!--
Caesar was not a prouder man than Lovelace.
Go to then, Jack; nor say, nor let any body say, in thy hearing, that
Lovelace, a man valuing himself upon his ancestry, is singular in his
expectations of a wife's purity, though not pure himself.
As to my CLARISSA, I own that I hardly think there ever was such an
angel of a woman. But has she not, as above, already taken steps, which
she herself condemns? Steps, which the world and her own family did
not think her capable of taking? And for which her own family will not
forgive her?
Nor think it strange, that I refuse to hear any thing pleaded in behalf
of a standard virtue from high provocations. 'Are not provocations and
temptations the tests of virtue? A standard virtue must not be allowed
to be provoked to destroy or annihilate itself.
'May not then the success of him, who could carry her thus far, be
allowed to be an encouragement for him to try to carry her farther?'
'Tis but to try. Who will be afraid of a trail for this divine creature?
'Thou knowest, that I have more than once, twice, or thrice, put to the
fiery trial young women of name and character; and never yet met
with one who held out a month; nor indeed so long as could puzzle my
invention. I have concluded against the whole sex upon it.' And now, if
I have not found a virtue that cannot be corrupted, I will swear that
there is not one such in the whole sex. Is not then the whole sex
concerned that this trial should be made? And who is it that knows this
lady, that would not stake upon her head the honour of the whole?--Let
her who would refuse it come forth, and desire to stand in her place.
I must assure thee, that I have a prodigious high opinion of virtue; as
I have of all those graces and excellencies which I have not been
able to attain myself. Every free-liver would not say this, nor think
thus--every argument he uses, condemnatory of his own actions, as some
would think. But ingenuousness was ever a signal part of my character.
Satan, whom thou mayest, if thou wilt, in this case, call my instigator,
put the good man of old upon the severest trial. 'To his behaviour under
these trials that good man owed his honour and his future rewards.'
An innocent person, if doubted, must wish to be brought to a fair and
candid trial.
Rinaldo, indeed, in Ariosto, put the Mantua Knight's cup of trial from
him, which was to be the proof of his wife's chastity*--This was his
argument for forbearing the experiment: 'Why should I seek a think I
should be loth to find? My wife is a woman. The sex is frail. I cannot
believe better of her than I do. It will be to my own loss, if I find
reason to think worse.' But Rinaldo would not have refused the trial of
the lady, before she became his wife, and when he might have found his
account in detecting her.
* The story tells us, that whoever drank of this cup, if his wife were
chaste, could drink without spilling; if otherwise, the contrary.
For my part, I would not have put the cup from me, though married, had
it been but in hope of finding reason to confirm my good opinion of my
wife's honour; and that I might know whether I had a snake or a dove in
my bosom.
To my point--'What must that virtue be which will not stand a
trial?--What that woman who would wish to shun it?'
Well, then, a trial seems necessary for the furthest establishment of
the honour of so excellent a creature.
And who shall put her to this trial? Who, but the man who has, as she
thinks, already induced her in lesser points to swerve?--And this for
her own sake in a double sense--not only, as he has been able to make
some impression, but as she regrets the impression made; and so may be
presumed to be guarded against his further attempts.
The situation she is at present in, it must be confessed is a
disadvantageous one to her: but, if she overcome, that will redound to
her honour.
Shun not, therefore, my dear soul, further trials, nor hate me for
making them.--'For what woman can be said to be virtuous till she has
been tried?
'Nor is one effort, one trial, to be sufficient. Why? Because a woman's
heart may at one time be adamant, at another wax'--as I have often
experienced. And so, no doubt, hast thou.
A fine time of it, methinks, thou sayest, would the woman have, if they
were all to be tried--!
But, Jack, I am not for that neither. Though I am a rake, I am not a
rake's friend; except thine and company's.
And be this one of the morals of my tedious discussion--'Let the little
rogues who would not be put to the question, as I may call it, choose
accordingly. Let them prefer to their favour good honest sober fellows,
who have not been used to play dog's tricks: who will be willing to
take them as they offer; and, who being tolerable themselves, are not
suspicious of others.'
But what, methinks thou askest, is to become of the lady if she fail?
What?--Why will she not, 'if once subdued, be always subdued?'
Another of our libertine maxims. And what an immense pleasure to a
marriage-hater, what rapture to thought, to be able to prevail upon such
a woman as Miss Clarissa Harlowe to live with him, without real change
of name!