Pamela

by Samuel Richardson

  ‘O sir,’ said I, ‘it would be too presuming in me to offer (so much overwhelmed as I am with your goodness) to defend any body you are angry with; yet, so far as any one has incurred your displeasure for my sake, and for no other want of duty or respect, I could wish – But I dare not say more.’

  ‘But,’ said he, ‘as to the letter, and the information it contains: let me know, Pamela, when you received this.’ ‘On the Friday, sir, that you were gone to the wedding at Stamford.’ ‘How could it be conveyed to you,’ said he, ‘unknown to Mrs Jewkes, when I gave her such a strict charge to attend you, and you had promised me, that you would not throw yourself in the way of such intelligence? For, when I went to Stamford, I knew (from a private intimation given me) that there would be an attempt made to see you, or give you a letter, by somebody, if not to get you away; but I was not certain whether from Lady Davers, Mrs Jervis, Mr Longman, or John Arnold, or your father; and as I was then but struggling with myself, whether to give way to my honourable inclinations, or to free you, and let you go to your father, that I might avoid my own danger; (for I had absolutely resolved never again to wound your ears with any proposals of a contrary nature.) Hence it was, that I desired you to permit Mrs Jewkes to be on her guard till I returned, by which time I thought I should have decided this disputed point within myself between my pride and my inclinations.’

  ‘This, sir,’ said I, ‘accounts well to me for your conduct in that case, and for what you said to me and to Mrs Jewkes on that occasion; and I see more and more how much I may depend upon your honour and goodness. But I will tell you all the truth.’

  And then I recounted to him the whole affair of the gypsey, and how the letter was put among the loose grass, &c. And he said, ‘The man who thinks a thousand dragons sufficient to watch a woman, when her inclination takes a contrary bent to his wishes, will find all too little; since she will engage the stones in the street, and the grass in the field, to act for her, and help on her correspondence, if she has no other way.’ ‘You are not angry, sir, I hope.’ ‘I am not,’ said he. ‘But I cannot help observing, that if the mind be not engaged, there is hardly any confinement sufficient to restrain the person. You have told me, Pamela, a very pretty story; and as you never, even in your severest trials, gave me reason to question your veracity, I make no doubt of the truth of what you have now mentioned: and I will, in my turn, give you a proof of my sincerity, that shall carry conviction with it.

  ‘You must know then, my Pamela, that I had actually formed such a project, as is mentioned in this letter; so well informed was this officious Somebody; and the time was fixed, for the very person described in this letter, to be here. I had intended that he should have read some part of the ceremony (as little as was possible, to deceive you) in my chamber; and so I hoped to have you mine upon terms that then would have been much more agreeable to me than matrimony. Nor did I intend that you should soon be undeceived: so that we might have lived for years, perhaps, very agreeably together; while it would have been in my power to confirm or abrogate the marriage, as I pleased.’

  ‘O sir,’ said I, ‘I am out of breath with the thoughts of my danger. But what good angel prevented the execution of this deep-laid design?’

  ‘Why, your good angel, Pamela: for when I began to consider that it would have made you miserable, and me not happy; that if I should have a child by you, it would be out of my power to legitimate it, if I should wish it to inherit my estate; and that, being the last of my family, most of what I possess must descend to a new line, and to disagreeable and unworthy persons: when I further considered your unsullied virtue, and reflected upon the trials you had undergone, and the troubles I had involved you in, I was resolved, though I doubted not succeeding in this last plot, to overcome myself; and to part with you, rather than betray you under so black a veil. Besides, I remembered how much I had exclaimed against, and censured an action of this kind, that had been attributed to one of the first men of the law, and of the kingdom, as he afterwards became. And when I reflected, that if I were to proceed in this scheme, I should do no more than tread in a path that another had marked out for me; and, as I was assured, with no great satisfaction to himself, when he came to reflect; my pride was a little piqued; for, if I went at any time out of the way, I loved to be thought an original. All these considerations, put together, induced me to reject this project, and I sent word to the person, that I had better considered of the matter, and would not have him come, till he heard farther from me: and, in the interim, I suppose, some of your confederates, Pamela, (for we have been a couple of plotters, though your virtue and merit have procured you more faithful friends than my money and promises have made me) one way or other got knowledge of it, and gave you this notice. But perhaps it would have come too late, had not your white angel got the better of my black one. Upon the whole, I must needs own, that, from these appearances, you were but too well justified in your fears; and I have only one thing to blame you for; which is, that you, who have such a command of your pen, did not clear up this matter by a few lines to me: the rather, as you had reason then to have a better opinion of me than you had at any time before; and, as I see, you could so easily have done it. This would have saved us both much fatigue; you of person, me of mind; since, had I known what seeming good grounds you had for pouring cold water on a young flame, that was just then rising to an honourable expansion, I should not have ascribed your doubts, and desire of leaving me, as I thought I had reason to do, either to perverse nicety; or, which most alarmed me, to a prepossession in some other person’s favour.’

  ‘I wish, sir,’ said I, ‘I had taken that liberty. I am sure I should have saved myself, had such been the happy effect of my writing, as much fatigue of mind as of person: and I could not better manifest the truth of this, than by the chearfulness with which I obeyed you, on your recalling me to your presence.’

  ‘Ay, that, my dear Pamela,’ said he, ‘was the kind, the inexpressibly kind compliance, that has rivetted my affections to you, and induced me to open to you, in this free and unreserved manner, my whole heart.’

  ‘Indeed, sir,’ said I, ‘I had the less merit in my return (you are too generous to think hardly of me for the confession) because I was driven by an irresistible impulse to it, and could not help it if I would.’

  ‘This,’ said he (and honoured me by kissing my hand) ‘is engaging indeed. And may I hope, that my Pamela’s gentle inclination for her persecutor was the strongest motive to her return?’

  I was silent. I felt myself blush. I looked down. I was afraid I had said too much; not for my heart, but for my interest in his heart. Men complain, I have heard, of women’s reserves; yet slight them, if they are not reserved. But this now wholly good gentleman did not do so by me. On the contrary, he encouraged my frankness. ‘Why blushes my girl?’ said he. ‘Why looks she down? Fear not to trust the tenderest secrets of your heart with me, if favourable to me. I do assure you, that I so much value a fervent and unquestionable love in the person I would wish for my wife, that even in the days of courtship, I would not have the least shadow of reserve, where there is no room for doubt, have place on her lips, when she inclines to favour me by a declaration of reciprocal love. And can you return me sincerely the honest compliment I now will make you? In the choice I have made, it is impossible I should have any view to my interest. Love, true love, is my only motive. And were I not what I am, as to fortune, could you give me the preference to any other person you know in the world, notwithstanding what has passed between us?’

  ‘Why,’ said I, ‘should your so much obliged Pamela decline an answer to this kind question? Cruel as I have thought you, and truly shocking and detestable as your attempts ever were to me, you, sir, are the only man living, my father excepted, who ever was more than indifferent to me. Yet allow me to add, that not having the presumption to raise my eyes to you, I knew not myself the state of my own heart, till your kindness to me melted away, as I may say, the chilling frost that prudenc
e and love of virtue had cast about the buds of – What shall I say? Excuse, sir–’233

  ‘My dearest Pamela,’ clasping me to his bosom, ‘I do excuse, and will spare your sweet confusion. I am fully satisfied. Nor am I now so solicitous as I was, about the papers that you have kindly written for to your father: and yet I still wish to see them, for the sake of the sweet manner in which you relate what has passed; and to have before me the whole series of your sufferings, in order to recompence you for them.’

  In this manner, my dear father and mother, did your happy daughter find herself blessed by her generous master! An ample recompence for all her sufferings, did she think this sweet conversation only. A hundred tender things he expressed besides, which, though they never can escape my memory, yet would be too tedious to write down. What a happy change is this! And who knows but my kind, my generous master, may put in my power, when he shall see me not quite unworthy of it, to be a means, without injuring him, to dispense, to many persons, the happy influences of the condition, to which I shall be, by his kind favour, exalted? Doubly blessed shall I be, in particular, if I can return the hundredth part of the obligations I owe to such honest good parents, to whose pious instructions and examples, under God, I owe all my present happiness, and future prospects.

  I must sit down to ponder all these things, and to admire and bless the goodness of that Providence, which has, through so many intricate mazes, made me tread the paths of innocence, and so amply rewarded me, for what it has itself enabled me to do!

  I will now continue my pleasing relation.

  As the chariot was returning home from this sweet airing, he said, ‘From all that has passed between us, in this more than agreeable excursion, my Pamela will see, and will believe, that the trials of her virtue are all over from me: but perhaps there will be some few yet to come of her patience and humility. For I have, at the earnest importunity of Lady Darnford, and her daughters, promised them a sight of my girl: I intend therefore to have that whole family, and Mrs Jones, and Mrs Peters’s family, to dine with me in a few days. And although I believe you would hardly choose to grace my table, till you can do it in your own right, I should be glad you would not refuse coming down to us, if I should desire it; for I would preface our nuptials,’ said the dear gentleman! [What a sweet word was that!] ‘with their opinion of your merits (and to see you, will be enough for that purpose) and so, by degrees, prepare my neighbours to expect what is to follow. They already have your character from me, and are disposed to admire you.’

  ‘I am afraid, sir,’ said I, ‘that weighed down as I am with the sense of my obligations to your goodness, on one hand, and of my own unworthiness on the other, I shall behave very aukwardly on such an occasion: but your will in every thing I can obey you in, shall me mine.’

  ‘I am obliged to you, my Pamela,’ said he; ‘and pray be then dressed just as you are; for since they know your condition, and I have told them the story of your present dress, and how you came by it, one of the young ladies begs it as a favour, that they may see you in it: and the rather as I have boasted, that you owe nothing to dress, but make a much better figure with your own native stock of loveliness, than the greatest ladies they have seen, arrayed in the most splendid attire, and adorned with jewels.’

  ‘Your goodness, sir,’ said I, ‘makes you behold your poor servant in a light greatly beyond her merit! But it must not be expected, that others, ladies especially, will look upon me with your favourable eyes: but as to dress, as well now, as at all times, it will be a pleasure to me to shew every one, that, with respect to my happiness in this life, I am entirely the work of your bounty.’

  ‘Admirable Pamela! Excellent girl!’ said he. ‘I might have addressed a hundred fine ladies; but never could have had reason to admire one as I do you.’

  I hope, my dear father, you will think, that I repeat these generous expressions rather to set forth my master’s goodness to me, than that I have the vanity to think I deserve one of them. It shall be always my endeavour, I do assure you, to be more and more humble, as I am either complimented or obliged; for were I even to deserve the compliments that shall happen to be made me for any talents that may be imputed to me, to whom am I indebted for these talents but to God? Be His all the glory, therefore. And to whom but to you, my father, and to you, my mother, and to my dear departed lady, do I owe the cultivation of those talents? What a poor patched-up merit, therefore, is all the merit I have to boast of! And shall I be vain of it? And it is with very great pleasure, that I look forward on the high benefits my master seems determined to confer upon his poor servant, because I think I shall not be puffed up with my high condition; since thus I argue with myself: it is always the sign of a dependent condition to be forced to lie under obligations one cannot repay; as it is of a rich mind, when it can confer favours, without expecting or needing a return. It is, on one side, the state of the human creature, compared, on the other, to that of the Great Creator; and so, with due deference, may my master’s beneficence be said to be God-like.

  The chariot brought us home at near the hour of two; and, as my master is pure well, and chearful, I hope he does not repent of his generous treatment of me. He handed me out of the chariot, and to the parlour, with the same goodness, that he shewed, when he put me into it, before several of the servants. Mrs Jewkes came to enquire how he did. ‘Quite well, Mrs Jewkes,’ said he, ‘quite well; I thank God, and this good girl, for it!’ ‘I am glad of it,’ said she; ‘but I hope you are not the worse for my care, and for my doctoring!’ He told her he was not, and thanked her both for her care and skill.

  Then he said, ‘Mrs Jewkes, you and I have used this good girl very hardly.’ ‘I was afraid, sir,’ said she, ‘I should be the subject of her complaints.’ ‘I assure you,’ replied he, ‘she has not opened her lips about you. We have had quite a different subject to talk of. I hope she will forgive us both: you especially she must; because you have done nothing but by my orders. But I only mean, that the necessary consequence of those orders has been very grievous to my Pamela: and now comes our part to make her amends, if we can.’

  ‘Sir,’ said she, ‘I always said to madam, that you was very good, and very forgiving.’ ‘No,’ said he, ‘I have been very wicked, and she, I hope, will be very forgiving. But all this preamble is to tell you, Mrs Jewkes, that now I desire you will study to oblige her, as much as you were forced, in obedience to me, to disoblige her before. And you will remember, that in every thing she is to be her own mistress.’

  ‘Yes,’ said -she, ‘and mine too, I suppose, sir?’ ‘Ay,’ said the generous man, ‘I believe it will be so in a little time.’ ‘Then,’ said she, ‘I know how it will go with me!’ And put her handkerchief to her eyes. ‘Pamela,’ said my master, ‘comfort Mrs Jewkes.’

  This was very generous, already to seem to put her in my power; and I took her hand, and said, ‘I shall never take upon me, Mrs Jewkes, to make a bad use of any opportunities that may be put into my hands, by my generous master; nor shall I ever wish to do you disservice: for I shall consider, that what you have done, was in obedience to a will, which it will become me also, for the future, to submit to.’

  ‘See there, Mrs Jewkes,’ said my master, ‘we are both in generous hands; and, indeed, if Pamela did not pardon you, I should think she but half forgave me, because you acted by my instructions.’ ‘Well,’ said she, ‘God bless you both together, since it must be so; and I will double my diligence to oblige my lady, as I find she will soon be.’

  Do you, my dear father and mother, join in prayer with me, that God would remove from me all the delightful prospects before me, if, when I come to be what I am encouraged to look up to, my new condition should so far corrupt my mind, as to make me proud, and vain, and forget to acknowledge, with thankful humility, the blessed Providence, which has so visibly conducted me through the dangerous paths I have trodden to this happy moment.

  My master was pleased to say, that he thought I might as well dine with him, sin
ce he was alone. But I begged he would excuse me, for fear, as I said, such excess of goodness and condescension, all at once, should turn my head; and that he would by slower degrees bring on my happiness, lest I should not know how to bear it.

  ‘Persons who doubt themselves,’ replied he, ‘seldom do amiss. And if there was any fear of what you say, you could not have had it in your thoughts: for none but the presumptuous, the conceited, and the thoughtless, fell into great errors. But nevertheless,’ added he, ‘I have such an opinion of your prudence, that I shall generally think what you do, or wish to do right’

  ‘sir,’ said I, ‘your kind expressions shall but task me with the care of endeavouring to deserve your good opinion.’ And being then about to go upstairs, and nobody near, ‘Permit me, sir,’ said I, with some confusion, ‘thus on my knees, to thank you, as I often wanted to do in the chariot, for all your goodness to me.’ And I had the boldness to touch his hand with my lips.

  I wonder since, how I could be so bold. But how could I help it? My heart was like a too full river, which overflows its banks. My gratitude, at the moment, got the better of my fear, and carried my shamefacedness away before it, as the river does every thing that opposes it.

  He clasped me in his arms, and kissing me, said, ‘You are a dear obliging girl: and here, on my knees, as you on yours, I vow to you everlasting truth and fidelity; and may God but bless us both with half the pleasures that seem to lie before us, and we shall have no reason to envy the felicity of the greatest princes!’ ‘O sir,’ said I, ‘how shall I support so much goodness!’ I could say no more, at the time, but by my tears; for I wept with joy: yet my heart was full of grateful meaning, and wanted to relieve itself by words.