LETTER XLI
MR. BELFORD, TO ROBERT LOVELACE, ESQ.LONDON, JUNE 27. TUESDAY.
You must excuse me, Lovelace, from engaging in the office you would haveme undertake, till I can be better assured you really intend honourablyat last by this much-injured lady.
I believe you know your friend Belford too well to think he would be easywith you, or with any man alive, who should seek to make him promise forhim what he never intended to perform. And let me tell thee, that I havenot much confidence in the honour of a man, why by imitation of hands (Iwill only call it) has shown so little regard to the honour of his ownrelations.
Only that thou hast such jesuitical qualifyings, or I should think theeat last touched with remorse, and brought within view of being ashamedof thy cursed inventions by the ill success of thy last: which I heartilycongratulate thee upon.
O the divine lady!--But I will not aggravate!
Nevertheless, when thou writest that, in thy present mood, thou thinkestof marrying, and yet canst so easily change thy mood; when I know thyheart is against the state: that the four words thou courtest from thelady are as much to thy purpose, as if she wrote forty; since it willshow she can forgive the highest injury that can be offered to woman; andwhen I recollect how easily thou canst find excuses to postpone; thoumust be more explicit a good deal, as to thy real intentions, and futurehonour, than thou art: for I cannot trust to temporary remorse; whichbrought on by disappointment too, and not by principle, and the like ofwhich thou hast so often got over.
If thou canst convince me time enough for the day, that thou meanest todo honourably by her, in her own sense of the word; or, if not timeenough, wilt fix some other day, (which thou oughtest to leave to heroption, and not bind her down for the Thursday; and the rather, as thypretence for so doing is founded on an absolute fiction;) I will thenmost cheerfully undertake thy cause; by person, if she will admit me toher presence; if she will not, by pen. But, in this case, thou mustallow me to be guarantee for thy family. And, if so, so much as I valuethee, and respect thy skill in all the qualifications of a gentleman,thou mayest depend upon it, that I will act up to the character of aguarantee, with more honour than the princes of our day usually do----totheir shame be it spoken.
Mean time let me tell thee, that my heart bleeds for the wrong thisangelic lady has received: and if thou dost not marry her, if she willhave thee, and, when married, make her the best and tenderest ofhusbands, I would rather be a dog, a monkey, a bear, a viper, or a toad,than thee.
Command me with honour, and thou shalt find none readier to oblige theethan
Thy sincere friend,JOHN BELFORD.