Clarissa Harlowe; or the history of a young lady — Volume 8

by Samuel Richardson

  LETTER LVIII

  DR. H. TO JAMES HARLOWE, SENIOR, ESQ.LONDON, SEPT. 4.

  SIR,

  If I may judge of the hearts of other parents by my own, I cannot doubtbut you will take it well to be informed that you have yet an opportunityto save yourself and family great future regret, by dispatching hithersome one of it with your last blessing, and your lady's, to the mostexcellent of her sex.

  I have some reason to believe, Sir, that she has been represented to youin a very different light from the true one. And this it is that inducesme to acquaint you, that I think her, on the best grounds, absolutelyirreproachable in all her conduct which has passed under my eye, or cometo my ear; and that her very misfortunes are made glorious to her, andhonourable to all that are related to her, by the use she has made ofthem; and by the patience and resignation with which she supports herselfin a painful, lingering, and dispiriting decay! and by the greatness ofmind with which she views her approaching dissolution. And all this fromproper motives; from motives in which a dying saint might glory.

  She knows not that I write. I must indeed acknowledge, that I offered todo so some days ago, and that very pressingly: nor did she refuse me fromobstinacy--she seemed not to know what that is--but desired me to forbearfor two days only, in hopes that her newly-arrived cousin, who, as sheheard, was soliciting for her, would be able to succeed in her favour.

  I hope I shall not be thought an officious man on this occasion; but, ifI am, I cannot help it, being driven to write, by a kind of parental andirresistible impulse.

  But, Sir, whatever you think fit to do, or permit to be done, must bespeedily done; for she cannot, I verily think, live a week: and how longof that short space she may enjoy her admirable intellects to takecomfort in the favours you may think proper to confer upon her cannot besaid. I am, Sir,

  Your most humble servant,

  R.H.