man, she would have made me a happy one! That she even
loved me! At such a moment to own that she once loved me! Never before
loved any man! That she prays for me! That her last tear should be shed
for me, could she by it save a soul, doomed, without her, to perdition!--
O Belford! Belford! I cannot bear it!--What a dog, what a devil have I
been to a goodness so superlative!--Why does she not inveigh against me?
--Why does she not execrate me?--O the triumphant subduer! Ever above
me!--And now to leave me so infinitely below her!

Marry and repair, at any time; this, wretch that I was, was my plea to
myself. To give her a lowering sensibility; to bring her down from among
the stars which her beamy head was surrounded by, that my wife, so
greatly above me, might not despise me; this was one of my reptile
motives, owing to my more reptile envy, and to my consciousness of
inferiority to her!--Yet she, from step to step, from distress to
distress, to maintain her superiority; and, like the sun, to break out
upon me with the greater refulgence for the clouds that I had contrived
to cast about her!--And now to escape me thus!--No power left me to
repair her wrongs!--No alleviation to my self-reproach!--No dividing of
blame with her!--

Tell her, O tell her, Belford, that her prayers and wishes, her
superlatively-generous prayers and wishes, shall not be vain: that I can,
and do repent--and long have repented.--Tell her of my frequent deep
remorses--it was impossible that such remorses should not at last produce
effectual remorse--yet she must not leave me--she must live, if she would
wish to have my contrition perfect--For what can despair produce?

***

I will do every thing you would have me do, in the return of your
letters. You have infinitely obliged me by this last, and by pressing
for an admission for me, though it succeeded not.

Once more, how could I be such a villain to so divine a creature! Yet
love her all the time, as never man loved woman!--Curse upon my
contriving genius!--Curse upon my intriguing head, and upon my seconding
heart!--To sport with the fame, with the honour, with the life, of such
an angel of a woman!--O my d----d incredulity! That, believing her to be
a woman, I must hope to find her a woman! On my incredulity, that there
could be such virtue (virtue for virtue's sake) in the sex, founded I my
hope of succeeding with her.

But say not, Jack, that she must leave us yet. If