LETTER LXII
MISS CLARISSA HARLOWE, TO MRS. NORTONSUNDAY EVENING, JULY 2.
How kindly, my beloved Mrs. Norton, do you soothe the anguish of ableeding heart! Surely you are mine own mother; and, by someunaccountable mistake, I must have been laid to a family that, havingnewly found out, or at least suspected, the imposture, cast me from theirhearts, with the indignation that such a discovery will warrant.
Oh! that I had been indeed your own child, born to partake of your humblefortunes, an heiress only to that content in which you are so happy! thenshould I have had a truly gentle spirit to have guided my ductile heart,which force and ungenerous usage sit so ill upon: and nothing of what hashappened would have been.
But let me take heed that I enlarge not, by impatience, the breachalready made in my duty by my rashness! since, had I not erred, mymother, at least, could never have been thought hard-hearted andunforgiving. Am I not then answerable, not only for my own faults, butfor the consequences of them; which tend to depreciate and bring disgraceupon a maternal character never before called in question?
It is kind, however, in you to endeavour to extenuate the faults of oneso greatly sensible of it: and could it be wiped off entirely, it wouldrender me more worthy of the pains you have taken in my education: for itmust add to your grief, as it does to my confusion, that, after suchpromising beginnings, I should have so behaved as to be a disgraceinstead of a credit to you and my other friends.
But that I may not make you think me more guilty than I am, give me leavebriefly to assure you, that, when my story is known, I shall beto more compassion than blame, even on the score of going away with Mr.Lovelace.
As to all that happened afterwards, let me only say, that although I mustcall myself a lost creature as to this world, yet have I this consolationleft me, that I have not suffered either for want of circumspection, orthrough careful credulity or weakness. Not one moment was I off myguard, or unmindful of your early precepts. But (having been enabled tobaffle many base contrivances) I was at last ruined by arts the mostinhuman. But had I not been rejected by every friend, this low-heartedman had not dared, nor would have had opportunity, to treat me as he hastreated me.
More I cannot, at this time, nor need I say: and this I desire you tokeep to yourself, lest resentments should be taken up when I am gone,that may spread the evil which I hope will end with me.
I have been misinformed, you say, as to my principal relations being atmy uncle Harlowe's. The day, you say, was not kept. Nor have my brotherand Mr. Solmes--Astonishing!--What complicated wickedness has thiswretched man to answer for!--Were I to tell you, you would hardly believethat there could have been such a heart in man.--
But one day you may know the whole story!--At present I have neitherinclination nor words--O my bursting heart!--Yet a happy, a wishedrelief!--Were you present my tears would supply the rest!
***
I resume my pen!
And so you fear no letter will be received from me. But DON'T grieve totell me so! I expect every thing bad--and such is my distress, that hadyou not bid me hope for mercy from the throne of mercy, I should havebeen afraid that my father's dreadful curse would be completed withregard to both worlds.
For here, an additional misfortune!--In a fit of phrensical heedlessness,I sent a letter to my beloved Miss Howe, without recollecting her privateaddress; and it has fallen into her angry mother's hands: and so thatdear friend perhaps has anew incurred displeasure on my account. Andhere too your worthy son is ill; and my poor Hannah, you think, cannotcome to me--O my dear Mrs. Norton, will you, can you censure those whoseresentments against me Heaven seems to approve of? and will you acquither whom that condemns?
Yet you bid me not despond.--I will not, if I can help it. And, indeed,most seasonable consolation has your kind letter afforded me.--Yet to GodAlmighty do I appeal, to avenge my wrongs, and vindicate my inno----
But hushed be my stormy passions!--Have I not but this moment said thatyour letter gave me consolation?--May those be forgiven who hinder myfather from forgiving me!--and this, as to them, shall be the harshestthing that shall drop from my pen.
But although your son should recover, I charge you, my dear Mrs. Norton,that you do not think of coming to me. I don't know still but yourmediation with my mother (although at present your interposition would beso little attended to) may be of use to procure me the revocation of thatmost dreadful part of my father's curse, which only remains to befulfilled. The voice of Nature must at last be heard in my favour,surely. It will only plead at first to my friends in the still consciousplaintiveness of a young and unhardened beggar. But it will grow moreclamorous when I have the courage to be so, and shall demand, perhaps,the paternal protection from farther ruin; and that forgiveness, whichthose will be little entitled to expect, for their own faults, who shallinterpose to have it refused to me, for an accidental, not a premeditatederror: and which, but for them, I had never fallen into.
But again, impatiency, founded perhaps on self-partiality, that strangemisleader! prevails.
Let me briefly say, that it is necessary to my present and future hopesthat you keep well with my family. And moreover, should you come, I maybe traced out by that means by the most abandoned of men. Say not thenthat you think you ought to come up to me, let it be taken as it will:--For my sake, let me repeat, (were my foster-brother recovered, as I hopehe is,) you must not come. Nor can I want your advice, while I canwrite, and you can answer me. And write I will as often as I stand inneed of your counsel.
Then the people I am now with seem to be both honest and humane: andthere is in the same house a widow-lodger, of low fortunes, but of greatmerit:--almost such another serious and good woman as the dear one towhom I am now writing; who has, as she says, given over all otherthoughts of the world but such as should assist her to leave it happily.--How suitable to my own views!--There seems to be a comfortableprovidence in this at least--so that at present there is nothing ofexigence; nothing that can require, or even excuse, your coming, when somany better ends may be answered by your staying where you are. A timemay come, when I shall want your last and best assistance: and then, mydear Mrs. Norton--and then, I will speak it, and embrace it with all mywhole heart--and then, will it not be denied me by any body.
You are very obliging in your offer of money. But although I was forcedto leave my clothes behind me, yet I took several things of value withme, which will keep me from present want. You'll say, I have made amiserable hand of it--so indeed I have--and, to look backwards, in a verylittle while too.
But what shall I do, if my father cannot be prevailed upon to recall hismalediction? O my dear Mrs. Norton, what a weight must a father's cursehave upon a heart so appreciative as mine!--Did I think I should everhave a father's curse to deprecate? And yet, only that the temporarypart of it is so terribly fulfilled, or I should be as earnest for itsrecall, for my father's sake, as for my own!
You must not be angry with me that I wrote not to you before. You arevery right and very kind to say you are sure I love you. Indeed I do.And what a generosity, [so like yourself!] is there in your praise, toattribute to me more than I merit, in order to raise an emulation to meto deserve your praises!--you tell me what you expect from me in thecalamities I am called upon to bear. May I behave answerably!
I can a little account to myself for my silence to you, my kind, my dearmaternal friend! How equally sweetly and politely do you expressyourself on this occasion! I was very desirous, for your sake, as wellas for my own, that you should have it to say that we did not correspond:had they thought we did, every word you could have dropt in my favourwould have been rejected; and my mother would have been forbid to seeyou, or pay any regard to what you should say.
Then I had sometimes better and sometimes worse prospects before me. Myworst would only have troubled you to know: my better made me frequentlyhope, that, by the next post, or the next, and so on for weeks, I shouldhave the best news to impart to you that
then could happen: cold as thewretch had made my heart to that best.--For how could I think to write toyou, with a confession that I was not married, yet lived in the house(for I could not help it) with such a man?--Who likewise had given it outto several, that we were actually married, although with restrictionsthat depended on the reconciliation with my friends? And to disguise thetruth, or be guilty of a falsehood, either direct or equivocal, that waswhat you had never taught me.
But I might have written to you for advice, in my precarious situation,perhaps you will think. But, indeed, my dear Mrs. Norton, I was not lostfor want of advice. And this will appear clear to you from what I havealready hinted, were I to explain myself no further:--For what need hadthe cruel spoiler to have recourse to unprecedented arts--I will speakout plainer still, (but you must not at present report it,) to stupifyingpotions, and to the most brutal and outrageous force, had I been wantingin my duty?
A few words more upon this grievous subject--
When I reflect upon all that has happened to me, it is apparent, thatthis generally-supposed thoughtless seducer has acted by me upon aregular and preconcerted plan of villany.
In order to set all his vile plots in motion, nothing was wanting, fromthe first, but to prevail upon me, either by force or fraud, to throwmyself into his power: and when this was effected, nothing less than theintervention of the paternal authority, (which I had not deserved to beexerted in my behalf,) could have saved me from the effect of his deepmachinations. Opposition from any other quarter would but too probablyhave precipitated his barbarous and ungrateful violence: and had youyourself been with me, I have reason now to think, that somehow or otheryou would have suffered in endeavouring to save me: for never was there,as now I see, a plan of wickedness more steadily and uniformly pursuedthan his has been, against an unhappy creature who merited better of him:but the Almighty has thought fit, according to the general course of Hisprovidence, to make the fault bring on its own punishment: but surely notin consequence of my father's dreadful imprecation, 'That I might bepunished here,' [O my mamma Norton, pray with me, if so, that here itstop!] 'by the very wretch in whom I had placed my wicked confidence!'
I am sorry, for your sake, to leave off so heavily. Yet the rest must bebrief.
Let me desire you to be secret in what I have communicated to you; atleast till you have my consent to divulge it.
God preserve to you your more faultless child!
I will hope for His mercy, although I should not obtain that of anyearthly person.
And I repeat my prohibition:--You must not think of coming up to
Your ever dutifulCL. HARLOWE.
The obliging person, who left your's for me this day, promised to call to-morrow, to see if I should have any thing to return. I would not lose so good an opportunity.