Clarissa, Volume 2 | Page 4

and to give him her reason for revoking.--The
hour of meeting now at hand, she is apprehensive of the contest she
shall have with him, as he will come with a different expectation.
LETTER XLVIII. From the same.-- Dated from St. Alban's. Writes in
the utmost anguish of mind for the little parcel of linen she had sent to
her with better hopes. Condemns her own rashness in meeting Lovelace.
Begs her pity and her prayers.

THE HISTORY
OF
CLARISSA HARLOWE

LETTER I
MISS CLARISSA HARLOWE, TO MISS HOWE
My heart fluttered with the hope and the fear of seeing my mother, and
with the shame and grief of having given her so much uneasiness. But
it needed not: she was not permitted to come. But my aunt was so good
as to return, yet not without my sister; and, taking my hand, made me
sit down by her.
She came, she must own, officiously, she said, this once more, though
against the opinion of my father: but knowing and dreading the
consequence of my opposition, she could not but come.
She then set forth to my friends' expectation from me; Mr. Solmes's
riches (three times as rich he came out to be, as any body had thought
him); the settlements proposed; Mr. Lovelace's bad character; their
aversions to him; all in a very strong light; not in a stronger than my
mother had before placed them in. My mother, surely, could not have
given the particulars of what had passed between herself and me: if she
had, my aunt would not have repeated many of the same sentiments, as
you will find she did, that had been still more strongly urged, without
effect by her venerable sister.
She said it would break the heart of my father to have it imagined that
he had not a power over his own child; and that, as he thought, for my
own good: a child too, whom they had always doated upon!-- Dearest,

dearest Miss, concluded she, clasping her fingers, with the most
condescending earnestness, let me beg of you, for my sake, for your
own sake, for a hundred sakes, to get over this averseness, to give up
your prejudices, and make every one happy and easy once more. --I
would kneel to you, my dearest Niece--nay, I will kneel to you!--
And down she dropt, and I with her, kneeling to her, and beseeching
her not to kneel; clasping my arms about her, and bathing her worthy
bosom with my tears.
O rise! rise! my beloved Aunt, said I: you cut me to the heart with this
condescending goodness.
Say then, my dearest Niece, say then, that you will oblige all your
friends!--If you love us, I beseech you do--
How can I perform what I can sooner choose to die than to perform!--
Say then, my dear, that you will consider of it. Say you will but reason
with yourself. Give us but hopes. Don't let me entreat, and thus entreat,
in vain--[for still she kneeled, and I by her].
What a hard case is mine!--Could I but doubt, I know I could conquer.
--That which is an inducement to my friends, is none at all to me--How
often, my dearest Aunt, must I repeat the same thing?--Let me but be
single--Cannot I live single? Let me be sent, as I have proposed, to
Scotland, to Florence, any where: let me be sent a slave to the Indies,
any where--any of these I will consent to. But I cannot, cannot think of
giving my vows to man I cannot endure!
Well then, rising, (Bella silently, with uplifted hands, reproaching my
supposed perverseness,) I see nothing can prevail with you to oblige us.
What can I do, my dearest Aunt Hervey? What can I do? Were I
capable of giving a hope I meant not to enlarge, then could I say, I
would consider of your kind advice. But I would rather be thought
perverse than insincere. Is there, however, no medium? Can nothing be
thought of? Will nothing do, but to have a man who is the more
disgustful to me, because he is unjust in the very articles he offers?
Whom now, Clary, said my sister, do you reflect upon? Consider that.
Make not invidious applications of what I say, Bella. It may not be
looked upon in the same light by every one. The giver and the accepter
are principally answerable in an unjust donation. While I think of it in
this light, I should be inexcusable to be the latter. But why do I enter
upon a supposition of this nature?--My heart, as I have often, often said,

recoils, at the thought of the man, in every light.--Whose father, but
mine, agrees upon articles where there