No great stress should be laid on this ebullition of mortified self-love; but it occurs oddly enough at the very time when, according to Lord Macaulay, she was labouring to produce the very feeling that irritated her.

“August 28th, 1782.—­He (Piozzi) thinks still more than he says, that I shall give him up; and if Queeney made herself more amiable to me, and took the proper methods—­I suppose I should.”

“20 September 1782, Streatham.—­And now I am going to leave Streatham (I have let the house and grounds to Lord Shelburne, the expence of it eat me up) for three years, where I lived—­never happily indeed, but always easily:  the more so perhaps from the total absence of love and ambition—­

  “’Else these two passions by the way
  Might chance to show us scurvy play.’”

Ten days later (October 1st) she thus argues out the question of marriage: 

“Now! that dear little discerning creature, Fanny Burney, says I’m in love with Piozzi:  very likely; he is so amiable, so honourable, so much above his situation by his abilities, that if

  “’Fate had not fast bound her
    With Styx nine times round her,
      Sure musick and love were victorious.’

But if he is ever so worthy, ever so lovely, he is below me forsooth!  In what is he below me?  In virtue?  I would I were above him.  In understanding?  I would mine were from this instant under the guardianship of his.  In birth?  To be sure he is below me in birth, and so is almost every man I know or have a chance to know.  But he is below me in fortune:  is mine sufficient for us both?—­more than amply so.  Does he deserve it by his conduct, in which he has always united warm notions of honour with cool attention to oeconomy, the spirit of a gentleman with the talents of a professor?  How shall any man deserve fortune, if he does not?  But I am the guardian of five daughters by Mr. Thrale, and must not disgrace their name and family.  Was then the man my mother chose for me of higher extraction than him I have chosen for myself?  No,—­but his fortune was higher....  I wanted fortune then, perhaps:  do I want it now?—­Not at all; but I am not to think about myself; I married the first time to please my mother, I must marry the second time to please my daughter.  I have always sacrificed my own choice to that of others, so I must sacrifice it again:  but why?  Oh, because I am a woman of superior understanding, and must not for the world degrade myself from my situation in life.  But if I have superior understanding, let me at least make use of it for once, and rise to the rank of a human being conscious of its own power to discern good from ill.  The person who has uniformly acted by the will of others has hardly that dignity to boast.