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'

He spoke this in so much more moving terms than it is possible
for me to express, and with so much greater force of argument
than I can repeat, that I only recommend it to those who read
the story, to suppose, that as he held me above an hour and a
half in that discourse, so he answered all my objections, and
fortified his discourse with all the arguments that human wit
and art could devise.

I cannot say, however, that anything he said made impression
enough upon me so as to give me any thought of the matter,
till he told me at last very plainly, that if I refused, he was
sorry to add that he could never go on with me in that station
as we stood before; that though he loved me as well as ever,
and that I was as agreeable to him as ever, yet sense of virtue
had not so far forsaken him as to suffer him to lie with a
woman that his brother courted to make his wife; and if he
took his leave of me, with a denial in this affair, whatever he
might do for me in the point of support, grounded on his first
engagement of maintaining me, yet he would not have me be
surprised that he was obliged to tell me he could not allow
himself to see me any more; and that, indeed, I could not
expect it of him.

I received this last part with some token of surprise and
disorder, and had much ado to avoid sinking down, for indeed
I loved him to an extravagance not easy to imagine; but he
perceived my disorder. He entreated me to consider seriously
of it; assured me that it was the only way to preserve our
mutual affection; that in this station we might love as friends,
with the utmost passion, and with a love of relation untainted,
free from our just reproaches, and free from other people's
suspicions; that he should ever acknowledge his happiness
owing to me; that he would be debtor to me as long as he
lived, and would be paying that debt as long as he had breath.
Thus he wrought me up, in short, to a kind of hesitation in the
matter; having the dangers on one side represented in lively
figures, and indeed, heightened by my imagination of being
turned out to the wide world a mere cast-off whore, for it was
no less, and perhaps exposed as such, with little to provide for
myself, with no friend, no acquaintance in the whole world,
out of that town, and there I could not pretend to stay. All
this terrified me to the last degree, and he took care upon all
occasions to lay it home to me in the worst colours that it could
be possible to be drawn in. On the other hand, he failed not to
set forth the easy, prosperous life which I was going to live.

He answered all that I could object from affection, and from

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