A few readers perhaps, in looking over theſe hints, will wonder how it could have been practicable, without tediouſneſs, or remitting in any degree the intereſt of the ſtory, to have filled, from theſe ſlight ſketches, a number of pages, more conſiderable than thoſe which have been already preſented. But, in reality, theſe hints, ſimple as they are, are pregnant with paſſion and diſtreſs. It is the refuge of barren authors only, to crowd their fictions with ſo great a number of events, as to ſuffer no one of them to ſink into the reader's mind. It is the province of true genius to develop events, to diſcover their capabilities, to aſcertain the different paſſions and ſentiments with which they are fraught, and to diverſify them with incidents, that give reality to the picture, and take a hold upon the mind of a reader of taſte, from which they can never be looſened. It was particularly the deſign of the author, in the preſent inſtance, to make her ſtory ſubordinate to a great moral purpoſe, that "of exhibiting the miſery and oppreſſion, peculiar to women, that ariſe out of the partial laws and cuſtoms of ſociety.—This view reſtrained her fancy[166-A]." It was neceſſary for her, to place in a ſtriking point of view, evils that are too frequently overlooked, and to drag into light thoſe details of oppreſſion, of which the groſſer and more inſenſible part of mankind make little account.
THE END.
FOOTNOTES:
[159-A] To underſtand theſe minutes, it is neceſſary the reader ſhould conſider each of them as ſetting out from the ſame point in the ſtory, viz. the point to which it is brought down in the preceding chapter.
[166-A] See author's preface.
