You bid me not to be concerned at the bickerings between
your mother and you. Can I avoid concern, when
those bickerings are on my account? That they
are raised (instigated shall I say?) by my uncle, and
my other relations, surely must add to my concern.
But I must observe, perhaps too critically for the
state my mind is in at present, that the very sentences
you give from your mother, as in so many imperatives,
which you take amiss, are very severe reflections upon
yourself. For instance—You shall,
I tell you, Nancy, implies that you had disputed her
will—and so of the rest.
And further let me observe, with respect to what you
say, that there cannot be the same reason for a prohibition
of correspondence with me, as there was of mine with
Mr. Lovelace; that I thought as little of bad consequences
from my correspondence with him at the time, as you
can do from yours with me now. But, if obedience
be a duty, the breach of it is a fault, however circumstances
may differ. Surely there is no merit in setting
up our own judgment against the judgments of our parents.
And if it is punishable so to do, I have been severely
punished; and that is what I warned you of from my
own dear experience.
Yet, God forgive me! I advise thus against myself
with very great reluctance: and, to say truth,
have not strength of mind, at present, to decline
it myself. But, if my occasion go not off, I
will take it into further consideration.
You give me very good advice in relation to this man;
and I thank you for it. When you bid me be more
upon the reserve with him in expressing my displeasure,
perhaps I may try for it: but to palliate, as
you call it, that, my dearest Miss Howe, cannot be
done, by
Your own,
Clarissa Harlowe.
MISS CLARISSA HARLOWE, TO MISS HOWE
You may believe, my dear Miss Howe, that the circumstances
of the noise and outcry within the garden-door, on
Monday last, gave me no small uneasiness, to think
that I was in the hands of a man, who could, by such
vile premeditation, lay a snare to trick me out of
myself, as I have so frequently called it.
Whenever he came in my sight, the thought of this
gave me an indignation that made his presence disgustful
to me; and the more, as I fancied I beheld in his
face a triumph which reproached my weakness on that
account; although perhaps it was only the same vivacity
and placidness that generally sit upon his features.
I was resolved to task him upon this subject, the
first time I could have patience to enter upon it
with him. For, besides that it piqued me excessively
from the nature of the artifice, I expected shuffling
and evasion, if he were guilty, that would have incensed
me: and, if not confessedly guilty, such unsatisfactory
declarations as still would have kept my mind doubtful
and uneasy; and would, upon every new offence that
he might give me, sharpen my disgust to me.
