Part 9 (1/2)
In this case, I am prepared to hear and weigh, and be convinced by, any thing you think proper to urge.
I ask not pardon for my faults, nor compa.s.sion on my frailty. That I love Colden I will not deny, but I love his worth; his merits, real or imaginary, enrapture my soul. Ideal his virtues may be, but to me they are real, and the moment they cease to be so, that the illusion disappears, I cease to love him, or, at least, I will do all that is in my power to do.
I will forbear all intercourse or correspondence with him,--for his as well as my own sake.
Tell me then, my mother, what you know of him. What heinous offence has he committed, that makes him unworthy of my regard?
You have raised, without knowing it perhaps, or designing to effect it in this way, a bar to this detested alliance. While you declare that Colden has been guilty of base actions, it is impossible to grant him my esteem as fully as a husband should claim. Till I know what the actions are which you impute to him, I never will bind myself to him by indissoluble bands.
I have told him this, and he joins with me to entreat you to communicate your charges to me. He believes that you are misled by some misapprehension,--some slander. He is conscious that many of his actions have been, in some respects, ambiguous, capable of being mistaken by careless, or distant, or prejudiced observers. He believes that you have been betrayed into some fatal error in relation to _one_ action of his life.
If this be so, he wishes only to be told his fault, and will spare no time and no pains to remove your mistake, if you should appear to be mistaken.
How easily, my good mamma, may the most discerning and impartial be misled! The ignorant and envious have no choice between truth and error.
Their tale must want something to complete it, or must possess more than the truth demands. Something you have heard of my friend injurious to his good name, and you condemn him unheard.
Yet this displeases me not. I am not anxious for his justification, but only to know so much as will authorize me to conform to your wishes.
You warn me against this marriage for my own sake. You think it will be disastrous to me.--The reasons of this apprehension would, you think, appear just in my eyes should they be disclosed, yet you will not disclose them. Without disclosure I cannot--as a rational creature, I _cannot_--change my resolution. If then I marry and the evil come that is threatened, whom have I to blame? at whose door must my misfortunes be laid if not at hers who had it in her power to prevent the evil and would not?
Your treatment of me can proceed only from your love; and yet all the fruits of the direst enmity may grow out of it. By untimely concealments may my peace be forfeited forever. Judge then between your obligations to me, and those of secrecy, into which you seem to have entered with another.
My happiness, my future conduct, are in your hand. Mould them, govern them, as you think proper. I have pointed out the means, and once more conjure you, by the love which you once bore, which you still bear, to me, to use them.
JANE TALBOT.
Letter XV
_To Jane Talbot_
New York, October 27.
Insolent creature that thou art, Jane, and cunning as insolent! To elude my just determination by such an artifice! To counterfeit a strange hand in the direction of thy letter, that I might thereby be induced to open it!
Thou wilt not rest, I see, till thou hast torn from my heart every root, every fibre of my once-cherished tenderness; till thou hast laid my head low in the grave. To number the tears and the pangs which thy depravity has already cost me----but thy last act is destined to surpa.s.s all former ones.
Thy perseverance in wickedness, thy inflexible imposture, amazes me beyond all utterance. Thy effrontery in boasting of thy innocence, in calling this wretch thy _friend_, thy _soul's_ friend, the means of securing the favour of a pure and all-seeing Judge, exceeds all that I supposed possible in human nature. And that thou, Jane, the darling of my heart, and the object of all my care and my pride, should be this profligate, this obdurate creature!
When very young, you were ill of a fever. The physician gave up, for some hours, all hope of your life. I shall never forget the grief which his gloomy silence gave me. All that I held dear in the world, I then thought, I would cheerfully surrender to save your life.
Poor, short-sighted wretch that I was! That event which, had it then happened, would perhaps have bereaved me of reason, would have saved me from a portion far more bitter. I should have never lived to witness the depravity of one whom my whole life had been employed in training to virtue.
Having opened your letter, and somewhat debated with myself, I consented to read. I will do more than read; I will answer it minutely. I will unfold that secret by which, you truly think, my aversion to your present scheme has been chiefly caused.
I have hitherto been silent through compa.s.sion to you; through the hope that all might yet be well; that you might be influenced by my persuasions to forbear an action that will insure forever your ruin. I now perceive the folly of this compa.s.sion and these hopes. I need not be a.s.siduous to spare you the shame and mortification of hearing the truth. Shame is as much a stranger to your heart as remorse. Say what I will, disclose what I will, your conduct will be just the same. A show of much reluctance and humility will, no doubt, be made, and the tongue will be busy in imploring favour which the heart disdains.
In the foresight of this, I was going to forbid your writing; but you care not for my forbidding. As long as you think it possible to reconcile me to your views and make me a partaker in your infamy, you will hara.s.s me with importunity, with feigned penitence and preposterous arguments. But one thing at least is in my power. I can shun you, and I can throw your unopened letters into the fire; and that, believe me, Jane, I shall do.
But I am wasting time. My indignation carries me away from my purpose.