The Suspicious Lovers

THE Suspicious Lovers: A NOVEL. In THREE VOLUMES. By the Author of WOODBURY. VOL. I. Virtue itself ’scapes not calumnious strokes; The canker galls the infants of the Spring, Too oft before their buttons be disclos’d; And in the morn and liquid dew of youth Contagious blastments are most imminent. SHAKESPEARE. LONDON: Printed for J. WILKIE, St. Paul’s Church-Yard; and E. and C. DILLY, in the Poultry. MD CC LXXVII LETTER I. Miss MELVERN to Miss AIRSBY. Broomhill. TOO scrupulous a care, my dear Sophia, in our matrimonial concerns, proceeds as often from avarice, as from discretion; and those whom the world extols as very prudent girls indeed, more frequently marry with a view to what is called making their fortune, than from any striking merit in the man, who addresses them, or any particular preference or attachment of their own hearts. The woman who grasps at a large settlement without weighing the merits of him who offers it, has no occasion to complain if she should be unhappy; she has what she wanted, she condition’d for wealth, but forgot to take the heart into the bargain. Esteem and reason are so Clairvoyant that with a glance they can discover numberless imperfections, which the softer passion would overlook.— Reason is seldom elated by hope, or depressed with fear;—Love is all hope, or fear, its pleasures momentary, its anxieties, the alternate inhabitants of the same breast. Be satisfied then my heart, with pleasures less refined, since thou wilt feel pains less acute; and embrace the sober maxims of reason. I have already known too many strange reverses, have seen too much of that fallacious happiness dissolve which wealth and grandeur give, ever to form a wish to be exalted to any state, higher than that which now courts my acceptance. From my unhappy mother’s indiscretions, I hope I shall learn to avoid those errors which have proved fatal to so many of my sex; who intoxicated with pleasures, have gratified the most unworthy inclinations; and then what ensues, but reproach and shame!— My misfortunes you well know commenc’d almost with my existence; beneficial misfortunes let me call them, which as I grew up, plucked the seeds of vanity from my bosom, ere they had time to take root there. Perseverance is the soul of virtue, it will safely pilot us through a life full of temptations and trials. My father, fatal recollection! married for love: Had reason directed his choice, notwithstanding what I have said above in the playfulness of my heart, he might still have been living and happy: Nor was he convinced of his error, ’till ruin came upon him; nor did he ever feel a gleam of comfort, ’till just before his own death, his brother, who dy’d abroad, left me so nobly independent: The only joy I felt at it was occasioned by the wish that he might long survive to share it with me. The absence of my poor brother, who, my father pretended was banished to a foreign clime by his extravagancies, continually preyed upon his mind.—When they parted, I remember he took the amiable youth in his arms—weep not for me, said my Harry to him, your tears affect me more than any thing you ever did, you have not deprived me of all; I have a heart form’d to virtue by the best of friends, our dear Mr. Airsby; I have received such an education through his means, as will support me in almost any country—integrity of heart, and a conscience void of offence, will in absence prove such a consolation to me, as not all your fortune could have yielded without it.— All happiness does not centre in the possession of riches.—Here my father unable longer to sustain the torrent of affection, broke from him—they parted—never to meet again.— Had my mother spent as much time in cultivating her mind, as in embellishing her person, which is by nature lovely, she would at the close of life, have tasted that internal source of comfort, piety only can yield upon a dying bed. If misery it to mark my future days, I hope it will not be effected by a rash marriage; at least as far as human prudence can judge. What I am going to communicate must surprize you—Should the youth yclep’d Leland re-urge his suit, I may not prove inflexible. My poor father married for love, and was undone; now you shall see what a hand I shall make of it, upon the sober principles of reason, and prudence.—Had I ever seen the man I preferred to Leland, I would not do him the injustice to marry him. He possesses many requisites to make a good husband, his character is moral, his person pleasing, his understanding, if not of the very first order, is tolerably well cultivated; and the greatest error of which his judgment can be accused, is his kind partiality for your Harriot. Were my fortune smaller, I believe Sir Thomas would be less anxious to promote a match between his son and me, as he has so many children;—for my own part, I am neither mercenary nor ambitious; were Mr. Leland’s fortune less than it is, it would not weigh with me. I have heard the melting mood is catching; now should the sighs of the gentle swain awaken pity, and pity grow into downright love—why who knows?—Adieu, make haste home—hundredth cousins can have no claim upon you—come then to your HARRIOT MELVERN. LETTER II. JAMES LELAND, Esq; to Mr. DANVERS, Leland Park. A Fine moralist that Confucius, Dick, when he said—“He that in the morning, hath heard the voice of virtue, may die at night, this man will not repent living, and death will not be a pain unto him.”——Death I hope is far off, nor did I ever so much wish for life as at present, one of the blessed consequences of having listen’d “in the morning to the voice of virtue.”— With some reluctance I had engaged to accompany Sir Harry Foxmore on a mischievous occasion—some conversations I have lately had with my amiable Miss Melvern, on the beauty of virtue, and the depravity of vice, the pleasures resulting from the one, and the shame and remorse attendant on the other, have enabled me to make a few serious reflections, not mal-a-propos; and the result was, that the destruction of innocence, was not so great a victory as the maxims of a libertine would suggest to him— my rhetoric had its desired effect on Foxmore—we parted—I turn’d my horse’s head towards Broomhill, where my morality was rewarded with the sight of Miss Melvern, with not “a prying shepherd near.” Her looks indicated a mind too serene in itself to give another pain—Her amiable behaviour made me unguarded in my joy—a gentle reproof recalled me to order.—I seiz’d a lucky moment to push my fortune—I pleased my passion again—with diffidence I urged my moderate fortunes, as being a younger brother—it was touching on a tender string. Now Mr. Leland, interrupted she with ineffable sweetness, you are growing serious—this subject has been so often discussed between us, that I am come to a determination, and if you are not endow’d with uncommon fortitude, you will shudder at its consequences—your own merits, Sir, will hold the place of every other consideration in my heart, your’s will be severely proved, when in possession of so faulty a creature as her, you are pleased to distinguish; I have already received too many proofs of your regard, to doubt the sincer ity of it—If then you can resolve to take me with all my errors, this hand is your’s, and I hope time will convince you, it is not unaccompanied by my heart.— I was all joy, all gratitude at a declaration so unexpected, she all confusion at the testimonies I gave her of it—For continued I— “Bliss goes but to a certain bound, “Beyond tis agony.” True love, my dearest friend, moves not by the calm impulses of reason:—Do you really think so Mr. Leland? If reason be not united with love, you will live to repent: For if reason had not pleaded powerfully in your favour, you would not so easily have gained your point—my disposition is naturally placid; its hopes and fears nearly on a counterpoise: I do not approve precipitately, but am persevering in my attachments. The most violent passions soonest subside—tho’ my feelings are less lively than those of many others, yet I am not capricious—in the most perfect friendships much must be mutually forgiven—Doubt not, Danvers, but that I assented to the truth of all she said, and that I am your’s, LELAND LETTER III. Mr. DANVERS, in Answer. Chester. BEAUTY is the last thing one of us homme du tems should seek for in a wife; glowing cheeks—ruby lips—and sparkling eyes, have nothing to do in the affair. Dost think that a wife’s eyes are to shine for the sole purposes of pleasing her husband?—’Sdeath, man, thou wilt be no sooner noosed, than thou wilt be the only person they will never dart a single beam upon.—Every worthless gallant, every despicable petit maitre will be preferred to the honest dupe of a husband. How many noble fellows have been ruined by gambolling after blue, and black eyes.—If a man will marry, let him; but what a plague has love to do with the matter?— Let gold gild the pill a husband will never be at a loss for a toy hors de son domestique, for every petty country assembly can furnish him with amusement—maids, wives, and widows, are kindly condescending—all such adepts in the science of dissimulation, that even grandmothers will presume to pass themselves upon us for Flora’s and Hebe’s: I lately saw one tripping in a minuet, upon a pair of high heels, with as much celerity as a goose hobbling before her young ones to a pond; a little reeling now and then, when an unstrung nerve disconcerted the equilibrium.

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