Elizabeth Robins Pennell

“ With ninety-nine men out of a hundred, a very sufficient dash of folly is necessary to render a woman piquante, a soft word for desirable; and, beyond these casual ebullitions of sympathy, few look for enjoyment by fostering a passion in their hearts. One reason, in short, why I wish my whole sex to become wiser, is, that the foolish ones may not, by their pretty folly, rob those whose sensibility keeps down their vanity, of the few roses that afford them some solace in the thorny road of life. ”

“ Society was necessary, and might have diverted me till I gained more strength; but I blush when I recollect how often I have teased you with childish complaints and the reveries of a disordered imagination. I even imagined that I intruded on you, because you never called on me though you perceived that I was not well. I have nourished a sickly kind of delicacy, which gave me as many unnecessary pangs. I acknowledge that life is but a jest, and often a frightful dream, yet catch myself every day searching for something serious, and feel real misery from the disappointment. ”

“ Love of humanity was an emotion which moved her quite as deeply as affection for individual friends. Burke, by his disregard for the sufferings of that portion of the human race which especially appealed to her, excited her wrath. Carried away by the intensity of her indignation, she at once set about proving to him and the world that the reasoning which led to such insensibility was, plausible as it might seem, wholly unsound. She never paused for reflection, but her chief arguments, the result of previous thought, being already prepared, she wrote before her excitement had time to cool. ”

“ Had I only poverty to fear, I should not shrink from life. Forgive me, then, if I say that I shall consider any direct or indirect attempt to supply my necessities as an insult which I have not merited, and as rather done out of tenderness for your own reputation than for me. Do not mistake me. I do not think that you value money; therefore I will not accept what you do not care for, though I do much less, because certain privations are not painful to me. When I am dead, respect for yourself will make you take care of the child. ”

“ You mourn for the empty pageant of a name, when slavery flaps her wing, and the sick heart retires to die in lonely wilds, far from the abodes of man. Did the pangs you felt for insulted nobility, the anguish which rent your heart when the gorgeous robes were torn off the idol human weakness had set up, deserve to be compared with the long-drawn sigh of melancholy reflection, when misery and vice thus seem to haunt our steps, and swim on the top of every cheering prospect? Why is our fancy to be appalled by terrific perspectives of a hell beyond the grave? ”

“ The face of things public and private vexes me. The ‘peace’ and clemency which seemed to be dawning a few days ago, disappear again. ‘I am fallen,’ as Milton said, ‘on evil days,’ for I really believe that Europe will be in a state of convulsion during half a century at least. Life is but a labor of patience; it is always rolling a great stone up a hill; for before a person can find a resting-place, imagining it is lodged, down it comes again, and all the work is to be done over anew! ”

“ Mary cries aloud in defence of men whose one inheritance is the deprivation of all rights. Burke is moved by the misery of a Marie Antoinette, shorn of her greatness; Mary, by the wretchedness of the poor peasant woman who has never possessed even its shadow. The former knows no birthright for individuals save that which results from the prescription of centuries; the latter contends that every man has a right, as a human being, to “such a degree of liberty, civil and religious, as is compatible with the liberty of the other individuals with whom he is united in social compact.” ”

“ Did she witness an act of injustice, she came boldly forward to point it out and induce its reparation; was there discord between friends or relatives, she stood by the weaker party, and by her earnest appeals and kindliness awoke latent affection, and healed all wounds. ‘Open as day to melting charity,’ with a heart brimful of generous affection, yearning for sympathy, she had fallen on evil days, and her life had been one course of hardship, poverty, lonely struggle, and bitter disappointment. ”

“ 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 an 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 ”

“ Still death and misery, in every shape of terror, haunt this devoted country. I certainly am glad that I came to France, because I never could have had a just opinion of the most extraordinary event that has ever been recorded, and I have met with some uncommon instances of friendship, which my heart will ever gratefully store up, and call to mind when the remembrance is keen of the anguish it has endured for its fellow-creatures at large, for the unfortunate beings cut off around me, and the still more unfortunate survivors. ”

“ The cow’s bell has ceased to tinkle the herd to rest; they have all paced across the heath. Is not this the witching time of night? The waters murmur, and fall with more than mortal music, and spirits of peace walk abroad to calm the agitated breast. Eternity is in these moments; worldly cares melt into the airy stuff that dreams are made of; and reveries, mild and enchanting as the first hopes of love, or the recollection of lost enjoyment, carry the hapless wight into futurity, who, in bustling life, has vainly strove to throw off the grief which lies heavy at the heart. ”

“ Down fell the temple of despotism; but—despotism has not been buried in its ruins! Unhappy country! when will thy children cease to tear thy bosom? When will a change of opinion, producing a change of morals, render thee truly free? When will truth give life to real magnanimity, and justice place equality on a stable seat? When will thy sons trust, because they deserve to be trusted; and private virtue become the guarantee of patriotism? Ah! when will thy government become the most perfect, because thy citizens are the most virtuous? ”

“ Raised to heroism by misfortunes, she represses the first faint dawning of a natural inclination before it ripens into love, and in the bloom of life forgets her sex, forgets the pleasure of an awakening passion, which might again have been inspired and returned. She no longer thinks of pleasing, and conscious dignity prevents her from priding herself on account of the praise which her conduct demands. Her children have her love, and her highest hopes are beyond the grave, where her imagination often strays. ”

“ They play before me like motes in a sunbeam, enjoying the passing ray; whilst an English head, searching for more solid happiness, loses in the analysis of pleasure the volatile sweets of the moment. Their chief enjoyment, it is true, rises from vanity; but it is not the vanity that engenders vexation of spirit: on the contrary, it lightens the heavy burden of life, which reason too often weighs, merely to shift from one shoulder to the other.... ”

“ All his mighty fears had no foundation, so that if he had had courage to brave the world’s opinion, he might have spared Fanny many griefs, the scars of which will never be obliterated. Nay, more, if she had gone a year or two ago, her health might have been perfectly restored, which I do not now think will ever be the case. Before true passion, I am convinced, everything but a sense of duty moves; true love is warmest when the object is absent. ”

“ I have not left the hue of love out of the picture—the rosy glow; and fancy has spread it over my own cheeks, I believe, for I feel them burning, whilst a delicious tear trembles in my eye, that would be all your own, if a grateful emotion, directed to the Father of nature, who has made me thus alive to happiness, did not give more warmth to the sentiment it divides. ”

“ She despised such false sentiments. The consequence is, that her letters contain the unreserved expression of her feelings. Those written before she had cause to doubt her lover are full of wifely devotion and tenderness; those written from the time she was forced to question his sincerity, through the gradual realization of his faithlessness, until the bitter end, are the most pathetic and heart-rending that have ever been given to the world. They are the cry of a human soul in its death-agony, and are the more tragic because they belong to real life and not to fiction. ”

“ 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. ”

“ It is true they could not then with equal propriety be termed the sweet flowers that smile in the walk of man; but they would be more respectable members of society, and discharge the important duties of life by the light of their own reasons. ‘Educate women like men,’ says Rousseau, ‘and the more they resemble our sex, the less power will they have over us.’ This is the very point I aim at. I do not wish them to have power over men, but over themselves. ”

“ To see a woman without any softness in her manners caressing animals, and using infantine expressions, is, you may conceive, very absurd and ludicrous, but a fine lady is a new species to me of animal. I am, however, treated like a gentlewoman by every part of the family, but the forms and parade of high life suit not my mind.... I hear a fiddle below, the servants are dancing, and the rest of the family are diverting themselves. I only am melancholy and alone. To tell the truth, I hope part of my misery arises from disordered nerves, for I would fain believe my mind is not so very weak. ”

“ It has been said to be a peculiar felicity for any one to be praised by a man who is himself eminently a subject of praise; how much happier to be prized and loved by a person worthy of love. A man may be prized and valued by his friend; but in how different a style of sentiment from the regard and attachment that may reign in the bosom of his mistress or his wife.... In every state we long for some fond bosom on which to rest our weary head; some speaking eye with which to exchange the glances of intelligence and affection. Then the soul warms and expands itself ”

“ And at the same time it showed her the noble unselfishness of the daughter, who not only took upon herself the burden so easily shifted by the parents, but who accepted her fate cheerfully. Cheerfulness is a virtue but too lightly prized. When maintained in the face of difficulties and unhappiness it becomes the finest heroism. The recognition of this heroic side of Fanny’s nature commanded the instant admiration and respect of her visitor. Mary then and there vowed in her heart eternal friendship for her new acquaintance, and the vow was never broken. ”

“ Accordingly, one day, Bishop well out of the way, the sisters left his house forever. There was a mad, breathless drive, Bess, with her insanity half returned, biting her wedding ring to pieces, a hurried exchange of coaches to further insure escape from detection, a joyful arrival at modest lodgings in Hackney, a giving in of false names, a hasty locking of doors, and then—the reaction. Eliza, whose excitement had exhausted itself on the way, became quiet and even ready for sleep. Mary, now that immediate necessity for calmness and courage was over, grew nervous and restless. ”

“ Disadvantages of education, etc., ought, in my opinion, never to be pleaded with the public in excuse for defects of any importance, because if the writer has not sufficient strength of mind to overcome the common difficulties that lie in his way, nature seems to command him, with a very audible voice, to leave the task of instructing others to those who can. This kind of vain humility has ever disgusted me; and I should say to an author, who humbly sued for forbearance, If you have not a tolerably good opinion of your own production, why intrude it on the public? ”

“ Indeed, there must have been beneath all his coldness a substratum of warm and strong feeling. He possessed to a rare degree the power of making friends and of giving sympathy to his fellow-beings. The man who can command the affection of others, and enter into their emotions, must know how to feel himself. It was for more than his intellect that he was loved by men like Holcroft and Josiah Wedgwood, like Coleridge and Lamb, and that he was sought after by beautiful and clever women. ”

“ I consider fidelity and constancy as two distinct things, yet the former is necessary to give life to the other; and such a degree of respect do I think due to myself, that if only probity, which is a good thing in its place, brings you back, never return! for if a wandering of the heart or even a caprice of the imagination detains you, there is an end of all my hopes of happiness. ”

“ According to Godwin, he had formed another connection with a young strolling actress. Life was thus even less bright in London than it had been in Paris. If hell is but the shadow of a soul on fire, she was now plunged into its deepest depths. Its tortures were more than she could endure. For her there were, indeed, worse things waiting at the gate of life than death, and she resolved by suicide to escape from them. ”

“ If he had not governed love in its growth, he at least ruled its expression. It was necessary to decide upon a course of conduct for the two lives now made one. At this juncture he was again the placid philosopher. It had occurred to him, probably in the days when Hannah Godwin was wife-hunting for him, or later, when Amelia Alderson met with his good-will, that if husband and wife live on too intimate and familiar terms, the chances are they will tire of each other very soon. When the charm of novelty and uncertainty is removed, there is danger of satiety. ”

“ I have been following you all along the road this comfortless weather; for when I am absent from those I love, my imagination is as lively as if my senses had never been gratified by their presence—I was going to say caresses, and why should I not? I have found out that I have more mind than you in one respect; because I can, without any violent effort of reason, find food for love in the same object much longer than you can. The way to my senses is through my heart ”

“ He was more awed by his passion than a more susceptible man would have been. It seemed to him too sacred to flaunt before the public. “Nothing can be so ridiculous upon the face of it,” he says in the story of their love, “or so contrary to the genuine march of sentiment, as to require the overflowing of the soul to wait upon a ceremony, and that which, wherever delicacy and imagination exist, is of all things most sacredly private, to blow a trumpet before it, and to record the moment when it has arrived at its climax.” Mary was anxious to conceal, at least for a time, their new relationship. ”