LETTER XLIV
Friday, June 12.
I have juſt received yours dated the 9th, which I ſuppoſe was a miſtake, for it could ſcarcely have loitered ſo long on the road. The general obſervations which apply to the ſtate of your own mind, appear to me juſt, as far as they go; and I ſhall always conſider it as one of the moſt ſerious miſfortunes of my life, that I did not meet you, before ſatiety had rendered your ſenſes ſo faſtidious, as almoſt to cloſe up every tender avenue of ſentiment and affection that leads to your ſympathetic heart. You have a heart, my friend, yet, hurried away by the impetuoſity of inferior feelings, you have ſought in vulgar exceſſes, for that gratification which only the heart can beſtow.
The common run of men, I know, with ſtrong health and groſs appetites, muſt have variety to baniſh ennui, becauſe the imagination never lends its magic wand, to convert appetite into love, cemented by according reaſon.—Ah! my friend, you know not the ineffable delight, the exquiſite pleaſure, which ariſes from a uniſon of affection and deſire, when the whole ſoul and ſenſes are abandoned to a lively imagination, that renders every emotion delicate and rapturous. Yes; theſe are emotions, over which ſatiety has no power, and the recollection of which, even diſappointment cannot diſenchant; but they do not exiſt without ſelf-denial. Theſe emotions, more or leſs ſtrong, appear to me to be the diſtinctive characteriſtic of genius, the foundation of taſte, and of that exquiſite reliſh for the beauties of nature, of which the common herd of eaters and drinkers and child-begeters, certainly have no idea. You will ſmile at an obſervation that has juſt occurred to me:—I conſider thoſe minds as the moſt ſtrong and original, whoſe imagination acts as the ſtimulus to their ſenſes.
Well! you will aſk, what is the reſult of all this reaſoning? Why I cannot help thinking that it is poſſible for you, having great ſtrength of mind, to return to nature, and regain a ſanity of conſtitution, and purity of feeling—which would open your heart to me.—I would fain reſt there!
Yet, convinced more than ever of the ſincerity and tenderneſs of my attachment to you, the involuntary hopes, which a determination to live has revived, are not ſufficiently ſtrong to diſſipate the cloud, that deſpair has ſpread over futurity. I have looked at the ſea, and at my child, hardly daring to own to myſelf the ſecret wiſh, that it might become our tomb; and that the heart, ſtill ſo alive to anguiſh, might there be quieted by death. At this moment ten thouſand complicated ſentiments preſs for utterance, weigh on my heart, and obſcure my ſight.
Are we ever to meet again? and will you endeavour to render that meeting happier than the laſt? Will you endeavour to reſtrain your caprices, in order to give vigour to affection, and to give play to the checked ſentiments that nature intended ſhould expand your heart? I cannot indeed, without agony, think of your boſom's being continually contaminated; and bitter are the tears which exhauſt my eyes, when I recollect why my child and I are forced to ſtray from the aſylum, in which, after ſo many ſtorms, I had hoped to reſt, ſmiling at angry fate.—Theſe are not common ſorrows; nor can you perhaps conceive, how much active fortitude it requires to labour perpetually to blunt the ſhafts of diſappointment.
Examine now yourſelf, and aſcertain whether you can live in ſomething-like a ſettled ſtile. Let our confidence in future be unbounded; conſider whether you find it neceſſary to ſacrifice me to what you term "the zeſt of life;" and, when you have once a clear view of your own motives, of your own incentive to action, do not deceive me!