A Simple Story | Page 7

to be in the power of the person to whom I confided this
secret, to send NECESSITY once more. Once more, then, bowing to its
empire, I submit to the task it enjoins.
This case has something similar to a theatrical anecdote told (I think)
by Colly Cibber:
"A performer of a very mean salary, played the Apothecary in Romeo
and Juliet so exactly to the satisfaction of the audience, that this little
part, independent of the other characters, drew immense houses
whenever the play was performed. The manager in consequence,
thought it but justice to advance the actor's salary; on which the poor
man (who, like the character he represented, had been half starved
before) began to live so comfortably, he became too plump for the part;
and being of no importance in any thing else, the manager of course
now wholly discharged him--and thus, actually reducing him to the
want of a piece of bread, in a short time he became a proper figure for
the part again."
Welcome, then, thou all-powerful principle, NECESSITY! THOU,
who art the instigator of so many bad authors and actors--THOU, who
from my infancy seldom hast forsaken me, still abide with me. I will
not complain of any hardship thy commands require, so thou dost not

urge my pen to prostitution. In all thy rigour, oh! do not force my toil to
libels--or what is equally pernicious--panegyric on the unworthy!

A SIMPLE STORY.
CHAPTER I.
Dorriforth, bred at St. Omer's in all the scholastic rigour of that college,
was, by education, and the solemn vows of his order, a Roman Catholic
priest--but nicely discriminating between the philosophical and the
superstitious part of that character, and adopting the former only, he
possessed qualities not unworthy the first professors of Christianity.
Every virtue which it was his vocation to preach, it was his care to
practise; nor was he in the class of those of the religious, who, by
secluding themselves from the world, fly the merit they might have in
reforming mankind. He refused to shelter himself from the temptations
of the layman by the walls of a cloister, but sought for, and found that
shelter in the centre of London, where he dwelt, in his own prudence,
justice, fortitude, and temperance.
He was about thirty, and had lived in the metropolis near five years,
when a gentleman above his own age, but with whom he had from his
youth contracted a most sincere friendship, died, and left him the sole
guardian of his daughter, who was then eighteen.
The deceased Mr. Milner, on his approaching dissolution, perfectly
sensible of his state, thus reasoned with himself before he made the
nomination:--"I have formed no intimate friendship during my whole
life, except one--I can be said to know the heart of no man, except the
heart of Dorriforth. After knowing his, I never sought acquaintance
with another--I did not wish to lessen the exalted estimation of human
nature which he had inspired. In this moment of trembling
apprehension for every thought which darts across my mind, and more
for every action which I must soon be called to answer for; all worldly
views here thrown aside, I act as if that tribunal, before which I every
moment expect to appear, were now sitting in judgment upon my

purpose. The care of an only child is the great charge that in this
tremendous crisis I have to execute. These earthly affections that bind
me to her by custom, sympathy, or what I fondly call parental love,
would direct me to study her present happiness, and leave her to the
care of those whom she thinks her dearest friends; but they are friends
only in the sunshine of fortune; in the cold nipping frost of
disappointment, sickness, or connubial strife, they will forsake the
house of care, although the very house which they may have
themselves built."
Here the excruciating anguish of the father, overcame that of the dying
man.
"In the moment of desertion," continued he, "which I now picture to
myself, where will my child find comfort? That heavenly aid which
religion gives, and which now, amidst these agonizing tortures, cheers
with humbler hope my afflicted soul; that, she will be denied."
It is in this place proper to remark, that Mr. Milner was a member of
the church of Rome, but on his marriage with a lady of Protestant tenets,
they mutually agreed their sons should be educated in the religious
opinion of their father, and their daughters in that of their mother. One
child only was the result of their union, the child whose future welfare
now occupied the anxious thoughts of her expiring father. From him
the care of her education had been with-held, as he kept inviolate his
promise to her