Chapter XV: Letter XV: TO Lady STANLEY

Good heavens! what a variety of emotions has your last letter excited in my breast! Surely, my Julia did not give it a second perusal! I can make allowance for the expressions of gratitude which you (in a manner lavish, not) bestow on the Baron. But oh! beware, my beloved sister, that your gratitude becomes not too warm; that sentiment, so laudable when properly placed, should it be an introduction to what my fears and tenderness apprehend, would change to the most impious.--You already perceive a visible difference between him and your husband--I assert, no woman ought to make a comparison,--'tis dangerous, 'tis fatal. Sir William was the man of your choice;--it is true you were young; but still you ought to respect your choice as sacred.--You are still young; and although you may have seen more of the world, I doubt your sentiments are little mended by your experience. The knowledge of the world--at least so it appears to me--is of no further use than to bring one acquainted with vice, and to be less shocked at the idea of it. Is this then a knowledge to which we should wish to attain?--Ah! believe me, it had been better for you to have blushed unseen, and lost your sweetness in the desart air, than to have, in _the busy haunts of men_, hazarded the privation of _that peace which goodness bosoms ever_. Think what I suffer; and, constrained to treasure up my anxious fears in my own bosom, I have no one to whom I can vent my griefs: and indeed to whom could I impart the terrors which fill my soul, when I reflect on the dangers by which my sister, the darling of my affections, is surrounded? Oh, Julia! you know how fatally I have experienced the interest a beloved object has in the breast of a tender woman; how ought we then to guard against the admission of a passion destructive to our repose, even in its most innocent and harmless state, while we are single!--But how much more should _you_ keep a strict watch over every outlet of the heart, lest it should fall a prey to the insidious enemy;--you respect his silence;--you pity his sufferings.--Reprobate respect!--abjure pity!--they are both in your circumstances dangerous; and a well-experienced writer has observed, more women have been ruined by pity, than have fallen a sacrifice to appetite and passion. Pity is a kindred virtue, and from the innocence and complacency of her appearance, we suspect no ill; but dangers inexplicable lurk beneath the tear that trembles in her eye; and, without even knowing that we do so, we make a fatal transfer to our utter and inevitable disadvantage. From having the power of bestowing compassion, we become objects of it from others, though too frequently, instead of receiving it, we find ourselves loaded with the censure of the world. We look into our own bosoms for consolation: alas! it is flown with our innocence; and in its room we feel the sharpest stings of self-reproof. My Julia, my tears obliterate each mournful passage of my pen.

LOUISA GRENVILLE.