Frank Henley to Oliver Trenchard

Chateau de Villebrun

All is over!—My hopes are at an end!—I am awakened from a dream, in which pain and pleasure were mingled to such excess as to render its continuance impossible.

Nor is this all. This trial, severe as it was, did not suffice. To the destruction of hope has been added the assault of insolence, accompanied with a portion of obloquy which heart scarcely can sustain—Oh, this Clifton!—But—Patience!

Yet let me do her justice. Mistaken though I am sure she is, the motives of her conduct are so pure that even mistake itself is lovely in her; and assumes all the energy, all the dignity of virtue. Oh what a soul is hers! Her own passions, the passions of others, when she acts and speaks, are all in subjection to principle. Yes, Oliver, of one thing at least she has convinced me: she has taught me, or rather made me feel, how poor a thing it is to be the slave of desire.

Not that I do not still adore her!—Ay, more than ever adore! But from henceforth my adoration shall be worthy of herself, and not degrading to me. From her I have learned what true love is; and the lesson is engraven on my heart. She can consider personal gratification with apathy, yet burn with a martyr's zeal for the promotion of universal good.

And shall I not rise equal to the bright example which she has set me?
Shall I admire yet not imitate?

Did she despise me? Did she reject me for my own sake?—No!—All the affection which mind can feel for mind she has avowed for me! And shall I grieve because another may be more happy?—And why more?—In what?—Is not the union of souls the first the most permanent of all alliances? That union is mine! No power can shake it. She openly acknowledges it; and has done, daily, hourly, in every word, in every action. Whither then would my wishes wander?

Oliver, I am a man, and subject to the shakes and agues of his fragile nature!—Yet it is a poor, a wretched plea; a foolish, and a false plea. Man is weak because he is willing to be weak. He crouches to the whip, and like a coward pities while he lashes himself.

His wilful phrensy he calls irresistible, and weeps for the torments which he himself inflicts.

But once again this Clifton!—Read and tell me how I ought to act—I have received a blow from him, Oliver!—Yes, have tamely submitted to receive a blow!—

What intolerable prejudices are these! Why does my heart rebel so sternly, at what virtue so positively approves?

I had just left her; had that instant been rejected by her for his sake; had been summoned to aid her, in weeding out error from his mind. She shewed me it was a noble task, and communicated to me her own divine ardour. Yes, Oliver; I came from her, with a warmed and animated heart; participating all her zeal. The most rigid, the most painful of all abstinence was demanded from me; but should I shrink from a duty because I pity or because I love myself? No. Such pusillanimity were death to virtue. I left her, while my thoughts glowed with the ardour of emulating her heroism; and burned to do him all the good which she had projected.

He was at the end of the corridor, and saw me quit her apartment. His hot spirit caught the alarm instantaneously, and blazed in his countenance. He accosted me—

So, sir! You are very familiar with that lady! What right have you to intrude into her apartments?

When she herself desires me, sir, I have a right.

She desire you! 'Tis false!

Sir?

'Tis false, sir!

False?

Yes, sir. And falsehood deserves to be chastised!

Chastised? [It is in vain, Oliver, to endeavour to conceal the truth from myself; my folly incurred its own punishment—I repeat] Chastised? [I was lunatic enough to walk up to him, with a ridiculous and despicable air of defiance. He re-echoed my words, and instantly in contempt struck me on the cheek with the back of his hand.]

Yes, sir; chastised!

His rashness restored me to some sense of the farcical heroism which I had been aping. I hurried from him, without another word.

Oliver, I can conceive nothing more painful than this wresting, this tearing of passion from its purpose.

I walked a few minutes to calm my thoughts, and wrote him the following note.

Sir,

'I feel at present the humility of my situation: but not from your blow; for that has brought me to myself, not humbled me. No man can be degraded by another; it must be his own act: and you have degraded yourself, not me. My error is in having, for a moment, yielded to the impulse of passion. If you think I fear you, continue to think so; till I can shew my forbearance is from a better motive. Cowardice might make me kill you; but true courage will teach me calmly to hear the world call me coward, rather than commit an act so wicked, so abhorred, as that of taking or throwing away life. I wished to seek your friendship; and even now I will not shun you. Make the world imagine me a coward; imagine me one yourself, if you can. I will live under the supposed obloquy; and leave the tenor of my life to shew whether living be the act of fear, or of reason. I pardon you, sir, and leave you to pardon yourself.

F. HENLEY

My forbearance and this letter mitigated my sense of pain. Yet I am very ill satisfied with myself. Am I so easily to be moved? 'Tis true the scene I had just quitted was fermenting, as it were, in my veins, and shaking my whole system.

What is worse, I am child enough to be tormented, in my own despite, by the recollection of having received a blow! And why? In many countries, and even in my own, among the class in which I was born, the stigma is none, or trifling—Stigma? Absurd!—Cowardice!—Murder!—If vanity were ever becoming, I have perhaps more reason to be vain, considering the danger to which I had exposed myself, of this than of any act of my life.

Well, well, Oliver—I hope these agitations are over; and that from this time thou wilt begin to think better of me.

I communicate my whole thoughts to thee. If the experiments made upon my mind can be of any use to thine, my letters will then answer the best of the purposes for which they are written.

F. HENLEY