nsion, fraught with the sublimities of rectitude and the
illuminations of genius. Deceit has some bounds. Your education could
not be without influence. A vigorous understanding cannot be utterly
devoid of virtue; but you could not counterfeit the powers of invention
and reasoning. I was rash in my invectives. I will not, but with life,
relinquish all hopes of you. I will shut out every proof that would tell
me that your heart is incurably diseased.

"You come to restore me once more to happiness; to convince me that you
have torn her mask from vice, and feel nothing but abhorrence for the
part you have hitherto acted."

At these words my equanimity forsook me. For a moment I forgot the
evidence from which Pleyel's opinions were derived, the benevolence of
his remonstrances, and the grief which his accents bespoke; I was filled
with indignation and horror at charges so black; I shrunk back and
darted at him a look of disdain and anger. My passion supplied me with
words.

"What detestable infatuation was it that led me hither! Why do I
patiently endure these horrible insults! My offences exist only in
your own distempered imagination: you are leagued with the traitor who
assailed my life: you have vowed the destruction of my peace and honor.
I deserve infamy for listening to calumnies so base!"

These words were heard by Pleyel without visible resentment. His
countenance relapsed into its former gloom; but he did not even look at
me. The ideas which had given place to my angry emotions returned, and
once more melted me into tears. "O!" I exclaimed, in a voice broken by
sobs, "what a task is mine! Compelled to hearken to charges which I feel
to be false, but which I know to be believed by him that utters them;
believed too not without evidence, which, though fallacious, is not
unplausible.

"I came hither not to confess, but to vindicate. I know the source
of your opinions. Wieland has informed me on what your suspicions are
built. These suspicions are fostered by you as certainties; the tenor
of my life, of all my conversations and letters, affords me no security;
every sentiment that my tongue and my pen have uttered, bear testimony
to the rectitude of my mind; but this testimony is rejected. I am
condemned as brutally profligate: I am classed with the stupidly and
sordidly wicked.

"And where are the proofs that must justify so foul and so improbable
an accusation? You have overheard a midnight conference. Voice