“Why will you talk thus, my beloved Miss Beverley? what have you done,—what, let me ask, have I done, that such infinite disgrace and depression should follow this little sensibility to a passion so fervent? Does it not render you more dear to me than ever? does it not add new life, new vigour, to the devotion by which I am bound to you?”
“No, no,” cried the mortified Cecilia, who from the moment she found herself betrayed, believed herself to be lost, “far other is the effect it will have! and the same mad folly by which I am ruined in my own esteem, will ruin me in yours!—I cannot endure to think of it!—why will you persist in detaining me?—You have filled me with anguish and mortification,—you have taught me the bitterest of lessons, that of hating and contemning myself!”
“Good heaven,” cried he, much hurt, “what strange apprehensions thus terrify you? are you with me less safe than with yourself? is it my honour you doubt? is it my integrity you fear? Surely I cannot be so little known to you; and to make protestations now, would but give a new alarm to a delicacy already too agitated.—Else would I tell you that more sacred than my life will I hold what I have heard, that the words just now graven on my heart, shall remain there to eternity unseen; and that higher than ever, not only in my love, but my esteem, is the beautiful speaker.”—
“Ah no!” cried Cecilia, with a sigh, “that, at least, is impossible, for lower than ever is she sunk from deserving it!”
“No,” cried he, with fervour, “she is raised, she is exalted! I find her more excellent and perfect than I had even dared believe her; I discover new virtues in the spring of every action; I see what I took for indifference, was dignity; I perceive what I imagined the most rigid insensibility, was nobleness, was propriety, was true greatness of mind!”
Cecilia was somewhat appeased by this speech; and, after a little hesitation, she said, with a half smile, “Must I thank you for this good-nature in seeking to reconcile me with myself?—or shall I quarrel with you for flattery, in giving me praise you can so little think I merit?”
“Ah!” cried he, “were I to praise as I think of you! were my language permitted to accord with my opinion of your worth, you would not then simply call me a flatterer, you would tell me I was an idolater, and fear at least for my principles, if not for my understanding.”
“I shall have but little right, however,” said Cecilia, again rising, “to arraign your understanding while I act as if bereft of my own. Now, at least, let me pass; indeed you will greatly displease me by any further opposition.”
“Will you suffer me, then, to see you early to-morrow morning?”
“No, Sir; nor the next morning, nor the morning after that! This meeting has been wrong, another would be worse; in this I have accusation enough for folly,—in another the charge would be far more heavy.”