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Jane Talbot, a novel by Charles Brockden Brown |
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Letter 53 - To James Montford |
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_ Letter LIII - To James Montford To James Montford Philadelphia, December 17. I sought relief a second time to my drooping heart, by a walk in the fields. Returning, I met Harriet Thomson in the street. The meeting was somewhat unexpected. Since we parted at Baltimore, I imagined she had returned to her old habitation in Jersey. I knew she was pretty much a stranger in this city. Night had already come on, and she was alone. She greeted me with visible satisfaction; and, though I was very little fit for society, especially of those who loved me not, I thought common civility required me to attend her home. I never saw this woman till I met her lately at her brother's bedside. Her opinions of me were all derived from unfavourable sources, and I knew, from good authority, that she regarded me as a dangerous and hateful character. I had even, accidentally, heard her opinion of the affair between Jane and me. Jane was severely censured for credulity and indiscretion, but some excuse was allowed to her on the score of the greater guilt that was placed to my account. Her behaviour, when we first met, was somewhat conformable to these impressions. A good deal of coldness and reserve in her deportment, which I was sometimes sorry for, as she seems an estimable creature; meek, affectionate, tender, passionately loving her brother; convinced, from the hour of her first arrival, that his disease was a hopeless one, yet exerting a surprising command over her feelings, and performing every office of a nurse with skill and firmness. Insensibly the distance between us grew less. A participation in the same calamity, and the counsel and aid which her situation demanded, forced her to lay aside some of her reserve. Still, however, it seemed but a submission to necessity; and all advances were made with an ill grace. She was often present when her brother turned the discourse upon religious subjects. I have long since abjured the vanity of disputation. There is no road to truth but by meditation,-severe, intense, candid, and dispassionate. What others say on doubtful subjects, I shall henceforth lay up as materials for meditation. I listened to my dying friend's arguments and admonitions, I think I may venture to say, with a suitable spirit. The arrogant or disputatious passions could not possibly find place in a scene like this. Even if I thought him in the wrong, what but brutal depravity could lead me to endeavour to shake his belief at a time when sickness had made his judgment infirm, and when his opinion supplied his sinking heart with confidence and joy? But, in truth, I was far from thinking him in the wrong. At any time I should have allowed infinite, plausibility and subtlety to his reasonings, and at this time I confessed them to be weighty. Whether they were most weighty in the scale could be only known by a more ample and deliberate view and comparison than it was possible, with the spectacle of a dying friend before me, and with so many solicitudes and suspenses about me respecting Jane, to bestow on them. Meanwhile, I treasured them up, and determined, as I told him, that his generous efforts for my good should not be thrown away. At first, his sister was very uneasy when her brother entered on the theme nearest to his friendly heart. She seemed apprehensive of dispute and contradiction. This apprehension was quickly removed, and she thenceforth encouraged the discourse. She listened with delight and eagerness, and her eye, frequently, when my friend's eloquence was most affecting, appealed to me. It sometimes conveyed a meaning far more powerful than her brother's lips, and expressed at once the strongest conviction of the truth of his words, and the most fervent desire that they might convince me. Her natural modesty, joined, no doubt, to her disesteem of my character, prevented her from mixing in discourse. She greeted me at this meeting with a frankness which I did not expect. A disposition to converse, and attentiveness to the few words that I had occasion to say, were very evident. I was just then in the most dejected and forlorn state imaginable. My heart panted for some friendly bosom, into which I might pour my cares. I had reason to esteem the purity, sweetness, and amiable qualities of this good girl. Her aversion to me naturally flowed from these qualities, while an abatement of that aversion was flattering to me, as the triumph of feeling over judgment. I should have left her at the door of her lodgings, but she besought me to go in so earnestly, that my facility, rather than my inclination, complied. She saw that I was absent and disturbed. I never read compassion and (shall I say?) good-will in any eye more distinctly than in hers. The conversation for a time was vague and trite. Insensibly, the scenes lately witnessed were recalled, not without many a half-stifled sigh and ill-disguised tear on her part. Some arrangements as to the letters and papers of her brother were suggested. I expressed a wish to have my letters restored to me; I alluded to those letters, written in the sanguine insolence of youth and with the dogmatic rage upon me, that have done me so much mischief with Mrs. Fielder. I had not thought of them before; but now it occurred to me that they might as well be destroyed. This insensibly led the conversation into more interesting topics. I could not suppress my regret that I had ever written some things in those letters, and informed her that my view in taking them back was to doom them to that oblivion from which it would have been happy for me if they never had been called. After many tacit intimations, much reluctance and timidity to inquire and communicate, I was greatly surprised to discover that these letters had been seen by her; that Mrs. Fielder's character was not unknown to her; that she was no stranger to her brother's disclosures to that lady. Without directly expressing her thoughts, it was easy to perceive that her mind was full of ideas produced by these letters, by her brother's discourse, and by curiosity as to my present opinions. Her modesty laid restraint on her lips. She was fearful, I supposed, of being thought forward and impertinent. I endeavoured to dissipate these apprehensions. All about this girl was, on this occasion, remarkably attractive. I loved her brother, and his features still survive in her. The only relation she has left is a distant one, on whose regard and protection she has therefore but slender claims. Her mind is rich in all the graces of ingenuousness and modesty. The curiosity she felt respecting me made me grateful as for a token of regard. I was therefore not backward to unfold the true state of my mind. Now and then she made seasonable and judicious comments on what I said. Was there any subject of inquiry more momentous than the truth of religion? If my doubts and heresies had involved me in difficulties, was not the remedy obvious and easy? Why not enter on regular discussions, and, having candidly and deliberately formed my creed, adhere to it frankly, firmly, and consistently? A state of doubt and indecision was, in every view, hurtful, criminal, and ignominious. Conviction, if it were in favour of religion, would insure me every kind of happiness. It would forward even those schemes of temporal advantage on which I might be intent. It would reconcile those whose aversion arose from difference of opinion; and in cases where it failed to benefit my worldly views, it would console me for my disappointment. If my inquiries should establish an irreligious conviction, still, any form of certainty was better than doubt. The love of truth and the consciousness of that certainty would raise me above hatred and slander. I should then have some kind of principle by which to regulate my conduct; I should then know on what foundation to build. To fluctuate, to waver, to postpone inquiry, was more criminal than any kind of opinion candidly investigated and firmly adopted, and would more effectually debar me from happiness. At my age, with my talents and inducements, it was sordid, it was ignoble, it was culpable, to allow indifference or indolence to slacken my zeal. These sentiments were conveyed in various broken hints and modest interrogatories. While they mortified, they charmed me; they enlightened me while they perplexed. I came away with my soul roused by a new impulse. I have emerged from a dreary torpor, not indeed to tranquillity or happiness, but to something less fatal, less dreadful. Would you think that a ray of hope has broken in upon me? Am I not still, in some degree, the maker of my fortune? Why mournfully ruminate on the past, instead of looking to the future? How wretched, how criminal, how infamous, are my doubts! Alas! and is this the first time that I have been visited by such thoughts? How often has this transient hope, this momentary zeal, started into being, hovered in my fancy, and vanished! Thus will it ever be. Need I mention--but I will not look back. To what end? Shall I grieve or rejoice at that power of now and then escaping from the past? Could it operate to my amendment, memory should be ever busy; but I fear that it would only drive me to desperation or madness. H. C. _ |
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