If this confidence led us astray, nevertheless the principle on which it was founded, is alone capable of reclaiming us to virtue. Is it not unworthy of a man to be always at variance with himself, to have one rule for his actions, another for his opinions, to think as if he was abstracted from matter, to act as if he was devoid of soul, and never to be capable of appropriating a single action of his life to his own entire self? for my own part, I think the principles of the ancients are sufficient to fortify us, when they are not confined to mere speculation. Weakness is incident to human nature, and the merciful Being who made man frail, will no doubt pardon his frailty; but guilt is a quality which belongs only to the wicked, and will not remain unpunished by the author of all justice. An infidel, who is otherwise well inclined, praises those virtues he admires; he acts from taste, not from choice. If all his desires happen to be regular, he indulges them without reserve. He would gratify them in the same manner, if they were irregular; for what should restrain him? But he who acknowledges and worships the common father of mankind, perceives that he is destined for nobler purposes. An ardent wish to fulfil the end of his being, animates his zeal; he follows a more certain rule of action than appetite; he knows how to do what is right at the expense of his inclinations, and to sacrifice the desires of his heart to the call of duty. Such, my dear friend, is the heroic sacrifice required of us both. The love which attached us would have proved the delight of our lives; it survived hope, it bid defiance to time and absence, it endured every kind of proof. So sincere a passion ought not ever to have decayed of itself; it was worthy to be sacrificed to virtue alone.
I must observe farther. All circumstances are altered between us, and your heart must accommodate itself to the change. The wife of Mr. Wolmar is not your former Eloisa; your change of sentiment, with regard to her, is unavoidable; and it depends upon your own choice to make the alteration redound to your honour, according to the election you make of vice or virtue. I recollect a passage in an author, whose authority you will not controvert. Love, says he, is destitute of its greatest charm, when it is abandoned by honour. To be sensible of its true value, it must warm the heart, and exalt us by raising the object of our desires. Take away the idea of perfection, and you deprive love of all its enthusiasm; banish esteem, and love is no more. How can a woman honour the man whom she ought to despise? how can he himself honour her, who has not scrupled to abandon herself to a vile seducer? thus they will soon entertain a mutual contempt for each other. Love, that celestial principle, will be debased into a shameful commerce between them. They will have lost their honour without attaining felicity. [4] This, my dear friend, is our lesson, penned by your own hand! Never were our hearts more agreeably attached, and never was honour so dear to us as in those happy days when this letter was written. Reflect then, how we should be misled at this time by a guilty passion, nourished at the expense of the most agreeable transports which can inspire the soul! The horror of vice which is so natural to us both, would soon extend to the partner of our guilt; we should entertain mutual hatred, for having loved each other indiscreetly, and remorse would quickly extinguish affection. Is it not better to refine a generous sentiment, in order to render it permanent? is it not better at least to preserve what we may grant with innocence? is not this preserving what is more delightful than all other enjoyments? yes, my dear and worthy friend, to keep our love inviolable, we must renounce each other. Let us forget all that has passed, and continue the lover of my soul. This idea is so agreeable that it compensates for every thing.
Thus have I drawn a faithful picture of my life, and given you a genuine detail of every inward sentiment. Be assured that I love you still. I am still attached to you with such a tender and lively affection, that any other than myself would be alarmed: but I feel a principle of a different kind within me, which secures me against any apprehensions from my attachment. I perceive that the nature of my affection is entirely altered, and in this respect, my past failings are the grounds of my present security; I know that scrupulous decorum and the parade of virtue might require more of me, and not be satisfied unless I utterly forgot you. But I have a more certain rule of conduct, and I will abide by it. I attend to the secret dictates of conscience; I find nothing there which reproaches me, and it never deceives those who consult it with sincerity. If this is not sufficient to justify me before the world, it is enough to restore me to composure of mind. How has this happy change been produced? I know not how. All I know is, that I wished for it most ardently. God alone has accomplished the rest. I am convinced that a mind once corrupted, will ever remain so, and will never recover of itself, unless some sudden revolution, some unexpected change of fortune and condition, entirely alters its connections. When all its habits are destroyed, and all its passions modified, by that thorough revolution, it sometimes resumes its primitive characters, and becomes like a new being recently formed by the hands of nature. Then the recollection of its former unworthiness may serve as a preservative against relapse. Yesterday we were base and abject; to-day we are vigorous and magnanimous. By thus making a close compassion between the two different states, we become more sensible of the value of that which we have recovered, and more attentive to support it.
My marriage has made me experience something like the change I endeavour to explain to you. This tie, which I dreaded so much, has extricated me from a slavery much more dreadful; and my husband becomes dearer to me, for having restored me to myself.
You and I were, however, too closely attached, for a change of this kind to destroy the unison between us. If you lose an affectionate mistress, you gain a faithful friend; and whatever we may have imagined in our state of delusion, I cannot believe that the alteration is to your prejudice. Let it, I conjure you, encourage you to take the same resolution that I have formed, to become hereafter more wise and virtuous, and to refine the lessons of philosophy, by the precepts of Christian morality. I shall never be thoroughly happy, unless you likewise enjoy happiness, and I am more convinced than ever, that there is no real felicity without virtue. If you sincerely love me, afford me the agreeable consolation to find that our hearts correspond in their return to virtue, as they unhappily agreed in their deviation from it.
I need not make any apology for the length of my epistle. Were you less dear to me, I should have shortened it. Before I conclude, I have one favour to request of you. M. Wolmar is a stranger to my past conduct; but a frank sincerity is part of the duty I owe to him; I should have made the confession a hundred times; you alone have restrained me. Though I am acquainted with M. Wolmar’s discretion and moderation, yet to mention your name, is always to bring you in competition, and I would not do it without your consent. Can this request be disagreeable to you, and when I flatter myself to obtain your leave, do I depend too much on you or on myself? consider, I beseech you, that this reserve is inconsistent with innocence, that it grows every day more insupportable, and that I shall not enjoy a moment’s rest till I receive your answer.
Letter CXII. To Eloisa.
And will you no longer be my Eloisa? ah! do not tell me so, thou most worthy of all thy sex! Thou art more mine than ever. Thy merit claims homage from the whole world. It was thee whom I adored, when I first became susceptible of the impressions of beauty: and I shall never cease to adore thee, even after death, if my soul still retains any recollection of those truly celestial charms, which were my sole delight when living. The courageous effort by which you have recovered all your virtue, renders you more equal to your lovely self. No, whatever torment the sensation and the confession give me, yet I must declare that you never were my Eloisa more perfectly, than at this moment in which you renounce me. Alas! I regain my Eloisa, by losing her for ever. But I, whose heart shudders even at an attempt to imitate your virtue, I, who am tormented with a criminal passion which I can neither support nor subdue, am I the man whom I vainly imagined myself to be? was I worthy of your esteem? what right had I to importune you with my complaints and my despair? did it become me, to presume so high for you? Ah! what was I, that I should dare to love Eloisa?
Fool that I am! as tho’ I did not feel myself sufficiently humbled, without taking pains to seek fresh circumstances of humiliation! why should I increase my mortification by enumerating distinctions unknown to love? It was that which exalted me; and which made me your equal. Our hearts were blended, we shared our sentiments in common, and mine partook of the elevation of yours. Behold me now sunk into my pristine baseness! thou gentle hope, which didst so long feed my soul to deceive me, art thou then extinguished without a prospect of return? will she not be mine? must I lose her for ever? does she make another happy?——O rage! O torments of hell!——O faithless! ought you ever——pardon me, pardon me! dearest madam! have pity on my distraction. O! you had too much reason when you told me, she is no more——She is indeed no more than affectionate Eloisa, to whom I could disclose every emotion of my heart. How could I complain when I found myself unhappy? could she listen to my complaints? was I unhappy?——what then am I now? No, I will not make you blush for yourself or me. Hope is no more, we must renounce each other; we must part. Virtue herself has pronounced the decree; and your hand has been capable of transcribing it. Let us forget each other——Forget me, at least. I am determined, I swear, that I will never speak to you of myself again.
May I yet venture to talk of you, and to interest myself in what is now the only object of my concern; I mean your happiness? In describing to me the state of your mind, you say nothing of your present situation. As a reward of the sacrifice I have made, of which you ought to be sensible, at least deign to deliver me from this insupportable doubt. Eloisa, are you happy? if you are, give me the only comfort of which my despair is susceptible; if you are not, be compassionate enough to tell me so; my misery then will be less durable.
The more I reflect on the confession you propose to make, the less I am inclined to consent to it, and the same motive which always deprived me of resolution to deny your requests, renders me inexorable in this particular. It is a subject of the last importance, and I conjure you to weigh my reasons with attention. First, your excessive delicacy seems to lead you into a mistake, and I do not see on what foundation the most rigid virtue can exact such a confession from you. No engagement whatever can have any retro-active effect. We cannot bind ourselves with respect to time past, nor promise what is not in our power to perform! how can you be obliged to give your husband an account of the use you formerly made of your liberty, or how can you be responsible to him for a fidelity which you never promised to him? Do not deceive yourself, Eloisa; it is not to your husband, it is to your friend, that you have violated your engagement. Before we were separated by your father’s tyranny, heaven and nature had formed us for each other. By entering into other connections, you have been guilty of a crime, which love and honour can never forgive; and it is I who have a right to reclaim the prize, which M. Wolmar has ravished from my arms.
If, under any circumstances, duty can exact such a confession, it is when the danger of a relapse obliges a prudent woman to take precautions for her security. But your letter has given me more light into your real sentiments than you imagine. In reading it, I felt in my own heart, how much yours, upon a near approach, nay even in the bosom of love, would have abhorred a criminal connection, the horror of which was only diminished by its distance.
As duty and honour do not require such confidence, prudence and reason forbid it; for it is running a needless risk of forfeiting every thing that is dear in wedlock, the attachment of a husband, mutual confidence, and the peace of the family. Have you thoroughly weighed the consequences of such a step? are you sufficiently acquainted with your husband, to be certain of the effect it will produce in his disposition? do you know how many men there are, who, from such a confession, would conceive an immoderate jealousy, and an invincible contempt, and would probably be provoked, even to attempt your life? in such a nice examination, we ought to attend to time, place, and the difference of characters. In the country where I reside at present, such a confidence would be attended with no danger; and they who make so light of conjugal fidelity, are not people to be violently affected by any frailty of conduct prior to the engagement. Not to mention reasons which sometimes render those confessions indispensable, and which cannot be applied to your case, I knew some women of tolerable estimation, who, with very little risk, have made a merit of that kind of sincerity, in order perhaps by that sacrifice, to obtain a confidence which they might afterwards abuse at will. But in those countries where the sanctity of marriage is more respected, in those countries where that sacred tie forms a solid union, and where husbands have a real attachment to their wives, they require a more severe account of their conduct; they expect that their hearts should never have felt any tender affections but for themselves; usurping a right which they have not, they unreasonably expect their wives to have been theirs, even before they belonged to them, and they are as unwilling to excuse an abuse of liberty, as a real infidelity.
Believe me, virtuous Eloisa, and distrust this fruitless and unnecessary zeal. Keep this dangerous secret, which nothing can oblige you to reveal; the discovery of which might utterly ruin you, without being of any advantage to your husband. If he is worthy of such a confession, it will disturb his peace of mind; and you will have the mortification of having afflicted him without reason; if he is unworthy, why will you give him a pretence for using you ill? How do you know whether your virtue, which has defended you from the assaults of your heart, will likewise support you against the influence of domestic troubles daily reviving? Do not voluntarily increase your misfortunes, lest they become too powerful for your resistance, and you should at length relapse by means of your scruples into a worse condition, than that from which you have with so much difficulty disengaged yourself. Prudence is the basis of every virtue; consult that, I intreat you, in this most important crisis of your life; and if the fatal secret oppresses you so violently, wait at least, before you unbosom yourself, till time and a length of years, shall have made you more perfectly acquainted with your husband: stay till his heart, now affected by the power of your beauty, shall be susceptible of those more lasting impressions, which the charms of your disposition cannot fail to make, and till he is become habitually sensible of your perfections. After all, if these reasons, powerful as they are, should not convince you, yet do not refuse to listen to the voice which utters them. O Eloisa, hearken to a man who is yet, in some degree, susceptible of virtue, and who has a right to expect some concession from you at least, in return for the sacrifice he has made to you to-day.
I must conclude this letter. I find that I cannot forbear resuming a strain, to which you must no longer give ear. Eloisa, I must part with you! young as I am, am I already destined to renounce felicity? O time, never to be recalled! time irrevocably past, source of ever-lasting sorrows! pleasures, transports, delightful ecstasies, delicious moments, celestial raptures! my love, my only love, the honour and delight of my soul! Farewell for ever.
Letter CXIII. From Eloisa.
You ask me, whether I am happy? The question affects me, and by your manner of asking it, you facilitate my answer; for so far from wishing to banish you from my memory as you desire me, I confess that I should not be happy was your affection for me to cease: yet at present I am happy in most respects, and nothing but your felicity is wanting to compleat mine. If, in my last, I avoided making any mention of Mr. Wolmar, it was out of tenderness to you. I was too well acquainted with your sensibility of temper, not to be under apprehensions of irritating your pain; but your solicitude with regard to my felicity, obliging me to mention him on whom it depends, I cannot speak of him without doing justice to his worth, as becomes his wife, and a friend to truth.
Mr. Wolmar is near fifty years of age; but by means of an uniform regular course of life, and a serenity not ruffled by any violent passions, he has preserved such a healthy constitution, and such a florid complexion, that he scarce appears to be forty, and he bears no symptoms of age, but prudence and experience. His countenance is noble and engaging, his address open and unaffected, his manner rather sincere than courteous, he speaks little and with great judgment, but without any affectation of being concise and sententious. His behaviour is the same to every one, he neither courts nor shuns any individual, and he never gives any preference but what reason justifies.
In spite of his natural indifference, his heart, seconding my father’s inclinations, entertained a liking for me, and for the first time formed a tender attachment. This moderate and lasting affection has been governed by such strict rules of decorum, and observed such a constant uniformity, that he was under no necessity of altering his manners on changing his condition, and, without violating conjugal decorum, his behaviour to me now is the time as it was before marriage. I never saw him either gay or melancholy, but always contented; he never talks to me of himself, and seldom of me; he is not in continual search after me, but he does not seem displeased that I should seek his company, and he seems to part from me unwillingly. He is serious without disposing others to be grave; on the contrary, his serenity of manners seems an invitation to me to be sprightly; and as the pleasures I relish are the only pleasures of which he is susceptible, an endeavour to amuse myself is among the duties I owe to him. In one word, he wishes to see me happy; he has not told me so, but his conduct declares it; and to wish the happiness of a wife, is to make her really happy.
With all the attention with which I have been able to observe him, I cannot discover any particular passion to which he is attached, except his affection for me; it is however so even and temperate, that one would conclude he had power to limit the degree of his passion, and that he had determined not to love beyond the bounds of discretion. He is in reality what Lord B—— is in his own imagination; in this respect I find him greatly preferable to those passionate lovers, of whom we are so fond; for the heart deceives us a thousand ways, and acts from a suspicious principle; but reason always proposes a just end; the rules of duty which it enjoins are sure, evident and practicable; and whenever our reason is led astray we enter into idle speculations, which were never intended to be objects of her examination.
Mr. Wolmar’s chief delight is observation. He loves to judge of men’s characters and actions. He generally forms his judgment with perfect impartiality and profound penetration. If an enemy was to do him an injury, he would discuss every motive and expedient with as much composure, as if he was transacting any indifferent concern. I do not know by what means he has heard of you, but he has often spoken of you, with great esteem, to me; and I am sure he is incapable of disguise. I have imagined sometimes that he took particular notice of me during these conversations; but in all probability, the observation I apprehended, was nothing but the secret reproach of an alarmed conscience. However it be, in this respect I did my duty; neither fear nor shame occasioned me to shew an unjust reserve; and I did you justice before him, as I now do him justice before you.
I forgot to tell you concerning our income, and the management of it. The wreck of Mr. Wolmar’s inheritance, with the addition from my father, who has only reserved a pension for himself, makes up a handsome and moderate fortune, which Mr. Wolmar uses with generosity and discretion, by maintaining in his family, not an inconvenient and vain display of luxury, [46] but plenty, with the real conveniences of life; and by distributing necessaries among his indigent neighbours. The economy he has established in his houshold, is the image of that order which reigns in his own breast; and his little family seems to be a model of that regularity, which is observable in the government of the world. You neither discover that inflexible formality which is rather inconvenient than useful, and which no one but he who exerts it can endure; nor do you perceive that mistaken confusion, which, by being encumbered with superfluities, renders every thing useless. The master’s hand is seen throughout, without being felt, and he made his first arrangement with so much discretion, that every thing now goes on by itself; and regularity is preserved, without any abridgment of liberty.
This, my worthy friend, is a succinct but faithful account of Mr. Wolmar’s character, as far as I have been able to discover it since I lived with him. Such as he appeared to me the first day, such he seemed the last, without any alteration; which induces me to hope that I know him thoroughly, and that I have no farther discoveries to make; for I cannot conceive any change in his behaviour which will not be to his disadvantage.
From this account, you may anticipate the answer to your question, and you must think despicably of me not to suppose me happy, when I have so much reason to be so. What led me into a mistake, and what perhaps still misleads you, is the opinion, that love is necessary to make the married state happy. My good friend, this is a vulgar error; honour, virtue a certain conformity, not so much of age and condition as of temper and inclination, are the requisites in the conjugal state: nevertheless it must not be inferred from hence that this union does not produce an affectionate attachment, which, though it does not amount to love, is not less agreeable, and is much more permanent. Love is attended with a continual inquietude of jealousy, or the dread of separation, by no means suitable with a married life, which should be a state of peace and tranquillity. The intent of matrimony is not for man and wife to be always taken up with each other, but jointly to discharge the duties of civil society, to govern their family with prudence, and educate their children with discretion. Lovers attend to nothing but each other, they are incessantly engaged with each other; and all that they regard, is how to shew their mutual affection. But this is not enough for a married pair, who have so many other objects to engage their attention. There is no passion whatever which exposes us to such delusion, as that of love. We take its violence for a symptom of its duration; the heart over-burthened with such an agreeable sensation, extends itself to futurity; and while the heat of love continues, we flatter ourselves that it will never cool. But, on the contrary, it is consumed by its own ardour; it glows in youth, it grows faint with decaying beauty, it is utterly extinguished by the frost of age; and since the beginning of the world, there never was an instance of two lovers who sighed for each other, when they became grey-headed. We may be assured that, sooner or later, adoration will cease; then the idol which we worshipped being demolished, we reciprocally see each other in a true light. We look with surprise, for the object on which we doated; not being able to discover it more. We are displeased with that which remains in its stead, and which our imagination often disfigures, as much as it embellished it before; there are few people, says Rochefoucauld, who are not ashamed of having loved each other, when their affection is extinguished. How much is it to be dreaded therefore, lest these two lively sensations should be succeeded by an irksome state of mind, lest their decline instead of stopping at indifference, should even reach absolute disgust; lest, in short, being entirely satiated, they, who were too passionately fond of each other as lovers, should come to hate each other as husband and wife! My dear friend, you always appeared amiable in my eyes, too fatally so for my innocence and repose, but I never yet saw you but in the character of a lover, and how do I know in what light you would have appeared, when your passion was no more? I must confess, that when love expired, it would still have left you in possession of virtue; but is that alone sufficient to make an union happy, which the heart ought to cement? and how many virtuous men have made intolerable husbands? In all these respects, you may say the same of me.
As to Mr. Wolmar, no delusion is the foundation of our mutual liking; we see each other in a true light; the sentiment which unites us is not the blind transport of passionate desire; but a constant and invariable attachment between two rational people, who being destined to pass the remainder of their lives together, are content with their lot, and endeavour to make themselves mutually agreeable. It seems as if we could not have suited each other better, had we been formed on purpose for our union. Had his heart been as tender as mine, it is impossible but so much sensibility on each side must sometimes have clashed, and occasioned disagreements. If I was as composed as he, there would be too much indifference between us, and our union would be less pleasing and agreeable. If he did not love me, we should be uneasy together; if his love for me was too passionate, he would be troublesome to me. We are each of us exactly made for the other; he instructs me, I enliven him; the value of both is increased by our union, and we seem destined to form but one soul between us; to which he gives intelligence, and I direct the will. Even his advanced age redounds to our common advantage; for with the passion which agitated me, it is certain that had he been younger, I should have married him with more unwillingness, and my extreme reluctance would probably have prevented the happy revolution I have experienced.
My worthy friend, heaven directs the good intention of parents, and rewards the docility of children. God forbid that I should wish to insult your affliction. Nothing but a strong desire of giving you the firmest assurance with respect to my present condition, could induce me to add what I am going to mention. If, with the sentiments I formerly entertained for you, with the knowledge I have since acquired, I was once more my own mistress, and at liberty to chuse a husband, I call that Being, who has vouchsafed to enlighten me, and who reads the bottom of my heart, to witness my sincerity when I declare that I should make choice, not of you, but Mr. Wolmar.
Perhaps it may be necessary, to compleat your cure, that I should inform you of what farther remains in my mind. Mr. Wolmar is much older than me. If, to punish my failings, heaven should deprive me of a worthy husband, whom I so little deserved, it is my firm resolution never to espouse another. If he has not had the good fortune to meet with a chaste virgin, at least he will leave behind him a continent widow. You know me too well, to imagine that, after I have made this declaration, I shall ever recede from it.
What I have said to remove your doubts, may, in some measure, serve to resolve your objections against the confession which I think it my duty to make to my husband. He is too discreet to punish me for a mortifying step which repentance alone may atone for, and I am not more incapable of the artifice common to the women you speak of, than he is of harbouring such a suspicion. With respect to the reason you assign why such a confession is needless, it is certainly sophistical; for, though we can be under no obligation to a husband, as such, before marriage, yet that does not authorise one to pass upon him, for what one really is not. I perceived this before I married him, and tho’ the oath which my father extorted from me prevented me from discharging my duty in this respect, I am not the less blameable, since it is a crime to take an unjust oath, and a farther crime to keep it. But I had another reason, which my heart dared not avow, and which made my guilt greater still. Thank heaven, that reason subsists no longer.
A consideration more just, and of greater weight with me, is the danger of unnecessarily disturbing the peace of a worthy man, who derives his happiness from the esteem he bears to his wife. It certainly is not now in his power to break the tie which binds us together, nor in mine to have been more worthy of his choice. Therefore, by an indiscreet confidence, I run the risk of afflicting him without any advantage, and without reaping any other benefit from my sincerity, than that of discharging my mind of a cruel secret which oppresses me heavily. I am sensible that I shall be more composed when I have made the discovery; but perhaps he would be less happy, and to prefer my own peace to his, would be a bad method of making reparation for my faults.
What then shall I do in this dilemma? Till heaven shall better instruct me in my duty, I will follow your friendly advice; I will be silent; conceal my failings from my husband, and endeavour to repair them by a conduct, which may hereafter secure me a pardon.
To begin this necessary reformation, you must consent, my dear friend, that from this time, all correspondence between us shall cease. If Mr. Wolmar had received my confession, he might have determined how far we ought to gratify the sensations of friendship, and give innocent proofs of our mutual attachment; but since I dare not consult him in this particular, I have learned to my cost, how far habits the most justifiable in appearance, are capable of leading us astray. It is time to grow discreet. Notwithstanding I think my heart securely fortified, yet I will no longer venture to be judge in my own cause, nor now am I a wife, will I gave way to the same presumption which betrayed me when I was a maid. This is the last letter you will ever receive from me. I intreat you never to write to me again. Nevertheless, as I shall always continue to interest myself with the most tender concern for your welfare, and as my sentiment in this respect is as pure as the light, I shall be glad to hear of you occasionally, and to find you in possession of that happiness you deserve. You may write to Mr. Orbe from time to time when you have any thing interesting to communicate. I hope that the integrity of your soul will be expressed in your letters. Besides, my cousin is too virtuous and discreet, to shew me any part which is not fit for my perusal, and would not fail to suppress the correspondence, if you were capable of abusing it.
Farewell, my dear and worthy friend; if I thought that fortune could make you happy, I should desire you to go in pursuit of her; but perhaps you have reason to despise her, being master of such accomplishments as will enable you to thrive without her assistance. I would rather desire you to seek happiness, which is the fortune of the wise; we have ever experienced that there is no felicity without virtue but examine carefully whether the word virtue, taken in too abstracted a sense, has not more pomp than solidity in it, and whether it is not a term of parade, more calculated to dazzle others, than to satisfy ourselves. I shudder when I reflect that they who secretly meditated adultery, should dare to talk of virtue! do you know in what sense we understood this respectable epithet, which we abused while we were engaged in a criminal commerce? it was the impetuous passion with which we were mutually inflamed, that disguised its transports under this sacred enthusiasm, in order to render them more dear to us, and to hold us longer in delusion. We were formed, I dare believe, to practise and cherish real virtue, but we were misguided in our pursuit it, and we pursued a vain phantom. It is time to recover from this delusion; it is time to return from a deviation which has carried us too far astray. My dear friend, your return to wisdom will not be so difficult as you conceive. You have a guide within yourself, whose directions you have disregarded, but never entirely rejected. Your mind is sound, it is attached to what is right, and if just principles sometimes forsake you, it is because you do not use your utmost efforts to maintain them. Examine your conscience thoroughly, see whether you will not discover some neglected principle, which might have served to put your actions under better regulations, to have made them more consistent with each other, and with one common object. Believe me, it is not sufficient that virtue is the basis of your conduct, unless that basis itself is fixed on a firm foundation. Call to your mind those Indians, who imagine the world is supported by a great elephant, that elephant by a tortoise, and when you ask them on what the tortoise rests, they can answer you no farther.
I conjure you to regard the remonstrances of friendship, and to chuse a more certain road to happiness than that which has so long misguided us. I shall incessantly pray to heaven to grant us pure felicity, and I shall never be satisfied till we both enjoy it. And, if our hearts, spite of our endeavours, recall the errors of our youth, let the reformation they produced at least warrant the recollection, that we may say, with the ancient philosopher——Alas! we should have perished, if we had not been undone.
Here ends the tedious sermon I have preached to you. I shall have enough to do hereafter to preach to myself. Farewell, my amiable friend, farewell for ever! so inflexible duty decrees: but be assured that the heart of Eloisa can never forget what was so dear to her——my God! what am I doing? the condition of the paper will tell you. Ah! is it not excusable to dissolve in tenderness, when we take the last farewell of a friend?
Letter CXIV. To Lord B——.
Yes, my Lord, I confess it; the weight of life is too heavy for my soul. I have long endured it as a burthen; I have lost every thing which could make it dear to me, and nothing remains but irksomeness and vexation. I am told however, that I am not at liberty to dispose of my life, without the permission of that Being from whom I received it. I am sensible likewise, that you have a right over it by more titles than one. Your care has twice preserved it, and your goodness is its constant security. I will never dispose of it, till I am certain that I may do it without a crime, and till I have not the least hope of employing it for your service.
You told me that I should be of use to you; why did you deceive me? Since we have been in London, so far from thinking of employing me in your concerns, you have been kind enough to make me your only concern. How superfluous is your obliging solicitude! My lord, you know I abhor a crime, even worse than I detest life; I adore the supreme Being.——I owe every thing to you. I have an affection for you, you are the only person on earth to whom I am attached. Friendship and duty may chain a wretch to this earth: sophistry and vain pretences will never detain him. Enlighten my understanding, speak to my heart; I am ready to hear you, but remember, that despair is not to be imposed upon.
You would have me apply to the test of reason: I will; let us reason. You desire me to deliberate in proportion to the importance of the question in debate; I agree to it. Let us investigate truth with temper and moderation. Let us discuss this general proposition with the same indifference we would treat any other. Robeck wrote an apology for suicide before he put an end to his life. I will not, after his example, write a book on the subject, neither am I well satisfied with that which he has penned, but I hope in this discussion, at least to imitate his moderation.
I have for a long time meditated on this awful subject. You must be sensible that I have; for you know my destiny, and yet I am alive. The more I reflect, the more I am convinced that the question may be reduced to this fundamental proposition. Every man has a right by nature, to pursue what he thinks good, and avoid what he thinks evil, in all respects which are not injurious to others. When our life therefore becomes a misery to ourselves, and is of advantage to no one, we are at liberty to put an end to our being. If there is any such thing as a clear and self-evident principle, certainly this is one, and if this is subverted, there is scarce an action in life, which may not be made criminal.
Let us hear what the philosophers say on this subject. First, they consider life as something which is not our own, because we hold it as a gift; but because it has been given to us, it is for that reason our own. Has not God given these sophists two arms? nevertheless when they are under apprehensions of a mortification, they do not scruple to amputate one, or both if there is occasion. By a parity of reasoning, we may convince those who believe in the immortality of the soul; for if I sacrifice my arm to the preservation of something more precious, which is my body, I have the same right to sacrifice my body to the preservation of something more valuable, which is the happiness of my existence. If all the gifts which heaven has bestowed, are naturally designed for our good, they are certainly too apt to change their nature; and Providence has endowed us with reason, that we may discern the difference. If this rule did not authorize us to chuse the one and reject the other, to what use would it serve among mankind?
But they turn this weak objection into a thousand shapes. They consider a man living upon earth, as a soldier placed on duty. God, say they, has fixed you in this world, why do you quit your station without his leave. But you, who argue thus, has he not stationed you in the town where you was born, why therefore do you quit it without his leave? is not misery, of itself, a sufficient permission? whatever station Providence has assigned me, whether it be in a regiment, or on the earth at large, he intended me to stay there while I found my situation agreeable, and to leave it when it became intolerable. This is the voice of nature, and the voice of God. I agree that we must wait for an order; but when I die a natural death, God does not order me to quit life, he takes it from me: it is by rendering life insupportable, that he orders me to quit it. In the first case, I resist with all my force; in the second, I have the merit of obedience.
Can you conceive that there are some people so absurd as to arraign suicide as a kind of rebellion against Providence, by an attempt to fly from his laws? but we do not put an end to our being, in order to withdraw ourselves from his commands, but to execute them. What! does the power of God extend no farther than my body? is there a spot in the universe, is there any being in the universe which is not subject to his power, and will that power have less immediate influence over me, when my being is refined and thereby becomes less compound, and of nearer resemblance to the divine essence? no, his justice and goodness are the foundation of my hopes, and if I thought that death would withdraw me from his power I would give up my resolution to die.
This is one of the quibbles of the Phaedo, which, in other respects, abounds with sublime truths. If your slave destroys himself says Socrates to Cebes, would you not punish him, for having unjustly deprived you of your property: prithee, good Socrates, do we not belong to God after we are dead? The case you put, is not applicable; you ought to argue thus: if you incumber your slave with a habit which confines him from discharging his duty properly, will you punish him for quitting it in order to render you better service? the grand error lies in making life of too much importance; as if our existence depended upon it, and that death was a total annihilation. Our life is of no consequence in the sight of God; it is of no importance in the eyes of reason, neither ought to be of any in our sight, and when we quit our body, we only lay aside an inconvenient habit. Is this circumstance so painful, to be the occasion of so much disturbance? my lord, these declaimers are not in earnest. Their arguments are absurd and cruel, for they aggravate the supposed crime, as if it put a period to existence, and they punish it, as if that existence was eternal.
With respect to Plato’s Phaedo, which has furnished them with the only specious argument that has ever been advanced, the question is discussed there in a very light and desultory manner. Socrates being condemned, by an unjust judgement, to lose his life in a few hours, had no occasion to enter into an accurate inquiry whether he was at liberty to dispose of it himself. Supposing him really to have been the author of those discourses which Plato ascribes to him, yet believe me, my lord, he would have meditated with more attention on the subject, had he been in circumstances which required him to reduce his speculations to practice;——and a strong proof that no objection can be drawn from that immortal work against the right of disposing of our own lives is, that Cato read it twice through the very night that he destroyed himself.
The same sophisters make it a question whether life can ever be an evil? but when we consider the multitude of errors, torments and vices with which it abounds, one would rather be inclined to doubt whether it can ever be a blessing. Guilt incessantly besieges the most virtuous of mankind. Every moment he lives, he is in danger of falling a prey to the wicked, or of being wicked himself. To struggle, and to endure, is his lot in this world; that of the dishonest man is to do evil, and to suffer. In every other particular they differ, and only agree in sharing the miseries of life in common. If you required authorities and facts, I could cite you the oracles of old, the answers of the sages; and produce instances where acts of virtue have been recompensed with death. But let us leave these considerations, my lord; it is to you whom I address myself, and I ask you what is the chief attention of a wise man in this life, but, if I may be allowed the expression, to collect himself inwardly, and endeavour, even while he lives, to be dead to every object of sense? The only way by which wisdom directs us to avoid the miseries of human nature, is it not to detach ourselves from all earthly objects, from every thing that is gross in our composition, to retire within ourselves, and to raise our thoughts to sublime contemplations? If therefore our misfortunes are derived from our passions and our errors, with what eagerness should we wish for a state which will deliver us both from the one and the other? what is the fate of those sons of sensuality, who indiscreetly multiply their torments by their pleasures? they in fact destroy their existence, by extending their connections in this life; they increase the weight of their crimes by their numerous attachments; they relish no enjoyments but what are succeeded by a thousand bitter wants; the more lively their sensibility, the more acute their sufferings; the stronger they are attached to life, the more wretched they become.
But admitting it, in general, a benefit to mankind to crawl upon the earth with gloomy sadness; I do not mean to intimate that the human race ought with one common consent to destroy themselves, and make the world one immense grave. But there are miserable beings, who are too much exalted to be governed by vulgar opinion; to them, despair and grievous torments are the passports of nature. It would be as ridiculous to suppose that life can be a blessing to such men, as it was absurd in the sophister Posidonius to deny that it was an evil, at the same time that he endured all the torments of the gout. While life is agreeable to us, we earnestly wish to prolong it, and nothing but a sense of extreme misery can extinguish the desire of existence; for we naturally conceive a violent dread of death, and this dread conceals the miseries of human nature from our sight. We drag a painful and melancholy life, for a long time before we can resolve to quit it; but when once life becomes so insupportable as to overcome the horror of death, then existence is evidently a great evil, and we cannot disengage ourselves from it too soon. Therefore, though we cannot exactly ascertain the point at which it ceases to be a blessing, yet at least we are certain that it is an evil long before it appears to be such, and with every sensible man the right of quitting life, is by a great deal precedent to the temptation.
This is not all. After they have denied that life can be an evil, in order to bar our right of making away with ourselves; they confess immediately afterwards that it is an evil, by reproaching us with want of courage to support it. According to them, it is cowardice to withdraw ourselves from pain and trouble, and there are none but dastards who destroy themselves. O Rome, thou victrix of the world, what a race of cowards did thy empire produce! let Arria, Eponina, Lucretia, be of the number; they were women. But Brutus, but Cassius, and thou great and divine Cato, who didst share with the gods the adoration of an astonished world, thou whose sacred and august presence animated the Romans with holy zeal, and made tyrants tremble, little did thy proud admirers imagine that paltry rhetoricians immured in the dusty corner of a college, would ever attempt to prove that thou wert a coward, for having preferred death to a shameful existence.
O the dignity and energy of your modern writers! how sublime, how intrepid you are with your pens? but tell me thou great and valiant hero, who dost so courageously decline the battle, in order to endure the pain of living somewhat longer; when a spark of fire lights upon your hand, why do you withdraw it in such haste? how! are you such a coward that you dare not bear the scorching of fire? nothing, you say, can oblige you to endure the burning spark; and what obliges me to endure life? was the creation of a man of more difficulty to Providence, than that of a straw, and is not both one and the other equally the work of his hands?
Without doubt, it is an evidence of great fortitude to bear with firmness the misery which we cannot shun; none but a fool however, will voluntarily endure evils which he can avoid without a crime, and it is very often a great crime to suffer pain unnecessarily. He who has not resolution to deliver himself from a miserable being by a speedy death, is like one who would rather suffer a wound to mortify, than trust to the surgeon’s knife for his cure. Come, thou worthy——cut off this leg, which endangers my life. I will see it done without shrinking, and will give that hero leave to call me coward, who suffers his leg to mortify, because he does not dare to undergo the same operation.
I acknowledge that there are duties owing to others, the nature of which will not allow every man to dispose of his life; but in return, how many are there which give him a right to dispose of it? let a magistrate on whom the welfare of a nation depends, let a father of a family who is bound to procure subsistence for his children, let a debtor who might ruin his creditors, let these at all events discharge their duty; admitting a thousand other civil and domestic relations to oblige an honest and unfortunate man to support the misery of life, to avoid the greater evil of doing injustice, is it therefore, under circumstances totally different, incumbent on us to preserve a life oppressed with a swarm of miseries, when it can be of no service but to him who has not courage to die? “Kill me, my child, says the decrepit savage to his son who carries him on his shoulders, and bends under his weight; the enemy is at hand; go to battle with thy brethren, go and preserve thy children, and do not suffer thy helpless father to fall alive into the hands of those whose relations he has mangled.” Though hunger, sickness and poverty, those domestic plagues, more dreadful than savage enemies, may allow a wretched cripple to confuse, in a sick bed, the provisions of a family which can scarce subsist itself; yet he who has no connections, whom heaven has reduced to the necessity of living alone, whose wretched existence can produce no good, why should not he, at least, have the right of quitting a station where his complaints are troublesome, and his sufferings of no benefit.
Weigh these considerations, my lord; collect these arguments, and you will find that they may be reduced to the most simple of nature’s rights, of which no man of sense yet ever entertained a doubt. In fact, why should we be allowed to cure ourselves of the gout, and not to get rid of the misery of life? do not both evils proceed from the same hand? to what purpose is it to say, that death is painful? are drugs agreeable to be taken? no, nature revolts against both. Let them prove therefore that it is more justifiable to cure a transient disorder by the application of remedies, than to free ourselves from an incurable evil by putting an end to life; and let them shew how it can be less criminal to use the bark for a fever, than to take opium for the stone. If we consider the object in view, it is in both cases to free ourselves from painful sensations; if we regard the means, both one and the other are equally natural; if we consider the repugnance of our nature, it operates equally on both sides; if we attend to the will of Providence, can we struggle against any evil, of which he is not the author? can we deliver ourselves from any torment which his hand has not inflicted? what are the bounds which limit his power, and when is resistance lawful? are we then to make no alteration in the condition of things, because every thing is in the state he appointed? must we do nothing in this life, for fear of infringing his laws, or is it in our power to break them if we would? no, my lord, the occupation of man is more great and noble. God did not give him life, that he should remain supinely in a state of constant inactivity. But he gave him freedom to act, conscience to will, and reason to chuse what is good. He has constituted him sole judge of all his actions. He has engraved this precept in his heart, do whatever you conceive to be for your own good, provided you thereby do injury to no one. If my sensations tell me that death is eligible, I resist his orders by an obstinate resolution to live, for by making death desirable, he directs me to put an end to my being.
My lord, I appeal to your wisdom and candour; what more infallible maxims can reason deduce from religion, with respect to suicide. If Christians have adopted contrary tenets, they are neither drawn from the principles of religion, nor from the only sure guide, the scriptures, but borrowed from the pagan philosophers. Lactantius and Augustine, the first who propagated this new doctrine, of which Jesus Christ and his apostles take no notice, ground their arguments entirely on the reasoning of Phaedo, which I have already contraverted; so that the believers, who, in this respect, think they are supported by the authority of the gospel, are in fact only countenanced by the authority of Plato. In truth, where do we find throughout the whole bible any law against suicide, or so much as a bare disapprobation of it; and is it not very unaccountable, that among the instances produced of persons who devoted themselves to death, we do not find the least word of improbation against examples of this kind? nay, what is more; the instance of Samson’s voluntary death is authorized by a miracle, by which he revenges himself of his enemies. Would this miracle have been displayed to justify a crime, and would this man who lost his strength; by suffering himself to be seduced by the allurements of a woman, have recovered it to commit an authorized crime, as if God himself would practise deceit on men?
Thou shalt do no murder, says the decalogue? what are we to infer from this? if this commandment is to be taken literally, we must not destroy malefactors, nor our enemies: and Moses, who put so many people to death, was a bad interpreter of his own precept. If there are any exceptions, certainly the first must be in favour of suicide, because it is exempt from any degree of violence and injustice; the two only circumstances which can make homicide criminal; and because nature, moreover, has in this respect, thrown sufficient obstacles in the way.
But still, they tell us, we must patiently endure the evils which God inflicts; and make a merit of our sufferings. This application however of the maxims of Christianity is very ill calculated to satisfy our judgment. Man is subject to a thousand troubles, his life is a complication of evils, and he seems to have been born only to suffer. Reason directs him to shun as many of these evils as he can avoid; and religion, which is never in contradiction to reason, approves of his endeavours. But how inconsiderable is the account of these evils, in comparison with those he is obliged to endure against his will? It is with respect to these, that a merciful God allows man to claim the merit of resistance; he receives the tribute he has been pleased to impose, as a voluntary homage, and he places our resignation in this life to our profit in the next. True repentance is derived from nature; if man endures patiently whatever he is obliged to suffer, he does, in this respect, all that God requires of him; and if any one is so inflated with pride, as to attempt more, he is a madman, who ought to be confined, or an impostor, who ought to be punished. Let us therefore, without scruple, fly from all the evils we can avoid; there will still be too many left for us to endure. Let us, without remorse, quit life itself when it becomes a torment to us, since it is in our own power to do it; and that in so doing, we neither offend God nor man. If we would offer a sacrifice to the supreme Being, is it nothing to undergo death? let us devote to God that which he demands by the voice of reason, and into his hands let us peaceably surrender our souls.
Such are the liberal precepts which good sense dictates to every man, and which religion authorises. [47] Let us apply these precepts to ourselves. You have condescended to disclose your mind to me; I am acquainted with your uneasiness; you do not endure less than myself; your troubles, like mine, are incurable; and they are the more remediless, as the laws of honour are more immutable than those of fortune. You bear them, I must confess, with fortitude. Virtue supports you; advance but one step farther, and she disengages you. You intreat me to suffer; my lord! I dare importune you to put an end to your sufferings; and I leave you to judge which of us is most dear to the other.
Why should we delay doing that, which we must do at last? shall we wait till old age and decrepit baseness attach us to life, after they have robbed it of its charms, and till we are doomed to drag an infirm and decrepit body with labour, ignominy, and pain. We are at an age when the soul has vigour to disengage itself with ease from its shackles, and when a man knows how to die as he ought; when farther advanced in years, he suffers himself to be torn from life, which he quits with groans. Let us take advantage of this time when the tedium of life makes death desirable; and let us tremble for fear it should come in all its horrors, at the moment when we could wish to avoid it. I remember the time, when I prayed to heaven only for a single hour of life, and when I should have died in despair, if it had not been granted. Ah! what a pain it is to burst asunder the ties which attach our hearts to this world, and how advisable it is to quit life the moment the connection is broken! I am sensible, my lord, that we are both worthy of a purer mansion; virtue points it out, and destiny invites us to seek it. May the friendship which unites us, preserve our union to the latest hour. O what a pleasure for two sincere friends voluntarily to end their days in each other’s arms, to intermingle their latest breath, and at the same instant to give up the soul which they shared in common! What pain, what regret can infect their last moments? what do they quit by taking leave of the world? They go together; they quit nothing.
Letter CXV. Answer.
Thou art distracted, my friend, by a blind passion; be more discreet; do not give council, while you stand in need of advice. I have known greater evils than yours. I am armed with fortitude of mind; I am an English man, and not afraid to die; for I know how to live and suffer, as becomes a man. I have seen death near at hand, and have viewed it with too much indifference to go in search of it.
It is true, I thought you might be of use to me; my affection stood in need of yours: your endeavours might have been serviceable to me; your understanding might have enlightened me in the most important concern of my life; if I do not avail myself of it, who are you to impute it to? where is it? what is become of it? what are you capable of? of what use can you be in the condition you are in? what service can I expect from you? a senseless grief renders you stupid and unconcerned. Thou art no man; thou art nothing; and if I did not consider you might be, in your present state I cannot conceive any being more abject.
There is need of no other proof than your letter itself. Formerly I could discover in you good sense and truth. Your sentiments were just, your reflections proper, and I liked you not only from judgment but choice; for I considered your influence as an additional motive to excite me to study of wisdom. But what do I perceive now in the arguments of your letter, with which you appear to be to highly satisfied? A wretched and perpetual sophistry, which, in the erroneous deviations of your reason, shew the disorder of your mind; and which I would not stoop to refute, if I did not commiserate your delirium.
To subvert all your reasoning with one word, I would only ask you a single question. You who believe in the existence of a God, in the immortality of the soul, and in the free-will of man; you surely cannot suppose that an intelligent being is embodied, and stationed on the earth by accident only, to exist, to suffer, and to die. It is certainly most probable that the life of man is not without some design, some end, some moral object. I intreat you to give me a direct answer to this point; after which we will deliberately examine your letter, and you will blush to have written it.
But let us wave all general maxims, about which we often hold violent disputes, without adopting any of them in practice; for in their application, we always find some particular circumstances, which make such an alteration in the state of things, that every one thinks himself dispensed from submitting to the rules, which he prescribes to others; and it is well known, that every man who establishes general principles, deems them obligatory on all the world, himself excepted. Once more let us speak to you in particular.
You believe that you have a right to put an end to your being. Your proof is of a very singular nature; “because I am disposed to die, say you, I have a right to destroy myself.” This is certainly a very convenient argument for villains of all kinds: they ought to be very thankful to you, for the arms with which you have furnished them; there can be no crimes, which, according to your arguments, may not be justified by the temptation to perpetrate them, and as soon as the impetuosity of passion shall prevail over the horror of guilt, their disposition to do evil will be considered as a right to commit it.
Is it lawful for you therefore to quit life? I should be glad to know whether you have yet begun to live? what! was you placed here on earth to do nothing in this world? did not heaven when it gave you existence, give you some task or employment? If you have accomplished your day’s work before evening, rest yourself for the remainder of the day, you have a right to do it; but let us see your work. What answer are you prepared to make the supreme judge, when he demands an account of your time? Tell me, what can you say to him——I have seduced a virtuous girl: I have forsaken a friend in his distress. Thou unhappy wretch! point out to me that just man who can boast that he has lived long enough; let me learn from him in what manner I ought to have spent my days, to be at liberty to quit life.
You enumerate the evils of human nature. You are not ashamed to exhaust common place topics, which have been hackney’d over a hundred times; and you conclude that life is an evil. But search, examine into the order of things; and see whether you can find any good which is not intermingled with evil. Does it therefore follow that there is no good in the universe, and can you confound what is in its own nature evil, with that which is only an evil accidentally? You have confessed yourself, that the transitory and passive life of man is of no consequence, and only bears respect to matter, from which he will soon be disencumbered; but his active and moral life, which ought to have most influence over his nature, consists in the exercise of free-will. Life is an evil to a wicked man in prosperity, and a blessing to an honest man in distress: for it is not its casual modification, but its relation to some final object, which makes it either good or bad. After all, what are these cruel torments which force you to abandon life? do you imagine that under your affected impartiality in the enumeration of the evils of this life, I did not discover that you was ashamed to speak of your own? Trust me, and do not at once abandon every virtue. Preserve at least your wonted sincerity, and speak thus openly to your friend; I have lost all hope of seducing a modest woman, I am obliged therefore to be a man of virtue; I had much rather die.”
You are weary of living; and you tell me, that life is an evil. Sooner or later you will receive consolation, and then you will say life is a blessing. You will speak with more truth, though not with better reason; for nothing will have altered but yourself. Begin the alteration then from this day, and since all the evil you lament is in the disposition of your own mind, correct your irregular appetites, and do not set your house on fire, to avoid the trouble of putting it in order.
I endure misery, say you; is it in my power to avoid suffering? But this is changing the state of the question for the subject of enquiry is, not whether you suffer, but whether your life is an evil? Let us proceed. You are wretched, you naturally endeavour to extricate yourself from misery. Let us see whether, for that purpose, it is necessary to die.
Let us for a moment examine the natural tendency of the afflictions of the mind, as in direct opposition to the evils of the body, the two substances being of contrary natures. The latter become worse and more inveterate the longer they continue, and at length utterly destroy this mortal machine. The former, on the contrary, being only external and transitory modifications of an immortal and uncompounded essence, are insensibly effaced, and leave the mind in its original form, which is not susceptible of alteration. Grief, disquietude, regret, and despair, are evils of short duration which never take root in the mind, and experience always falsifies that bitter reflection, which makes us imagine our misery will have no end. I will go farther; I cannot imagine that the vices which contaminate us, are more inherent in our nature, than the troubles we endure; I not only believe that they perish with the body which gives them birth, but I think, beyond all doubt, that a longer life would be sufficient to reform mankind, and that many ages of youth would teach us that nothing is preferable to virtue.
However this may be, as the greatest part of our physical evils are incessantly increasing, the acute pains of the body, when they are incurable, may justify a man’s destroying himself; for all his faculties being distracted with pain, and the evil being without remedy, he has no longer any use either of his will or of his reason; he ceases to be a man before he is dead, and does nothing more in taking away his life, than quit a body which incumbers him, and in which his soul is no longer resident.
But it is otherwise with the afflictions of the mind; which, let them be ever so acute, always carry their remedy with them. In fact, what is it that makes any evil intolerable? nothing but its duration. The operations of surgery are generally much more painful, than the disorders they cure; but the pain occasioned by the latter is lasting, that of the operation is momentary, and therefore preferable. What occasion is there therefore for any operation to remove troubles which die of course by their duration, the only circumstance which could render them insupportable? Is it reasonable to apply such desperate remedies to evils which expire of themselves? To a man who values himself on his fortitude, and who estimates years at their real value, of two ways by which he may extricate himself from the same troubles, which will appear preferable, death or time? Have patience, and you will be cured. What would you desire more?
Oh! you will say, it doubles my afflictions, to reflect that they will cease at last! this is the vain sophistry of grief! an apothegm void of reason, of propriety, and perhaps of sincerity. What an absurd motive of despair is the hope of terminating misery! [48] Even allowing this fantastical reflection, who would not chuse to increase the present pain for a moment, under the assurance of putting an end to it, as we scarify a wound in order to heal it? and admitting any charm in grief, to make us in love with suffering, when we release ourselves from it by putting an end to our being, do we not at that instant incur all that we apprehend hereafter?
Reflect thoroughly, young man; what are ten, twenty, thirty years, in competition with immorality? pain and pleasure pass like a shadow; life slides away in an instant; it is nothing of itself; its value depends on the use we make of it. The good that we have done is all that remains, and it is that alone which marks its importance.
Therefore do not say any more that your existence is an evil, since it depends upon yourself to make it a blessing; and if it is an evil to have lived, this is an additional reason for prolonging life. Do not pretend neither to say any more that you are at liberty to die; for it is as much as to say that you have power to alter your nature, that you have a right to revolt against the Author of your being, and to frustrate the end of your existence. But when you add, that your death does injury to no one, do you recollect that you make this declaration to your friend?
Your death does injury to no one? I understand you! You think the loss I shall sustain by your death of no importance, you deem my affliction of no consequence. I will urge to you no more the rights of friendship which you despise, but are there not obligations still more dear, [49] which ought to induce you to preserve your life? If there is a person in the world who loved you to that degree as to be unwilling to survive you, and whose happiness depends on yours, do you think that you have no obligations to her? will not the execution of your wicked design disturb the peace of a mind, which has been, with such difficulty, restored to its former innocence? are not you afraid to add fresh torments to a heart of such sensibility? are not you apprehensive lest your death should be attended with a loss more fatal, which would deprive the world and virtue itself of its brightest ornament? and if she should survive you, are not you afraid to rouse up remorse in her bosom, which is more grievous to support than life itself? Thou ungrateful friend, thou indelicate lover! wilt thou always be taken up wholly with thyself? wilt thou always think on thy own troubles alone? hast thou no regard for the happiness of one who was so dear to thee? and cannot you resolve to live for her, who was willing to die with you?
You talk of the duties of a magistrate, and of a father of a family; and because you are not under those circumstances, you think yourself absolutely free. And are you then under no obligations to society, to whom you are indebted for your preservation, your talents, your understanding: do you owe nothing to your native country, and to those wretches who may need your assistance? O what an accurate calculation you make! among the obligations you have enumerated, you have only omitted those of a man and of a citizen. Where is the virtuous patriot, who refused to enlist under a foreign prince, because his blood ought not to be spilt but in the service of his country; and who now, in a fit of despair, is ready to shed it against the express prohibition of the laws? The laws, the laws, young man! did any wise man ever despise them? Socrates, though innocent, out of regard to them, refused to quit his prison. You do not scruple to violate them by quitting life unjustly; and you ask, what injury do I?
You endeavour to justify yourself by example. You presume to mention the Romans: you talk of the Romans! it becomes you indeed to cite those illustrious names. Tell me, did Brutus die a lover in despair, and did Cato tear out his entrails for his mistress? Thou weak and abject man, what resemblance is there between Cato and thee? shew me the common standard between that sublime soul and thine. Ah vain wretch, hold thy peace! I am afraid to profane his name by a vindication of his conduct. At that august and sacred name, every friend to virtue should bow to the ground, and honour the memory of the greatest hero in silence.
How ill you have selected your examples, and how meanly you judge of the Romans, if you imagine that they thought themselves at liberty to quit life so soon as it become a burthen to them. Recur to the excellent days of that republic, and see whether you will find a single citizen of virtue, who thus freed himself from the discharge of his duty, even after the most cruel misfortunes. When Regulus was on his return to Carthage, did he prevent the torments which he knew were preparing for him, by destroying himself? What would not Posthumius have given, when obliged to pass under the yoke at Caudium, had this resource been justifiable? how much did even the senate admire that effort of courage, which enabled the consul Varro to survive his defeat? For what reason did so many generals voluntarily surrender themselves to their enemies, they to whom ignominy was so dreadful, and who were so little afraid of dying? It was because they considered their blood, their life, and their latest breath, as devoted to their country; and neither shame nor misfortune could dissuade them from this sacred duty. But when the laws were subverted, and the state became a prey to tyranny, the citizens resumed their natural liberty, and the right they had over their own lives. When Rome was no more, it was lawful for the Romans to give up their lives; they had discharged their duties on earth, they had no longer any country to defend, they were therefore at liberty to dispose of their lives, and to obtain that freedom for themselves, which they could not recover for their country. After having spent their days in the service of expiring Rome, and in fighting for the defence of its laws, they died great and virtuous as they had lived, and their death was an additional tribute to the glory of the Roman name, since none of them beheld a sight above all others most dishonourable, that of a true citizen stooping to an usurper.
But thou, what art thou? what has thou done? dost thou think to excuse thyself on account of thy obscurity? does thy weakness exempt thee from thy duty, and because thou hast neither rank nor distinction in thy country, art thou less subject to the laws? It becomes you vastly to presume to talk of dying, while you owe the service of your life to your equals? Know that a death such as you meditate, is shameful and surreptitious. It is a theft committed on mankind in general. Before you quit life, return the benefits you have received from every individual. But, say you, I have no attachments. I am useless in the world. O thou young philosopher! art thou ignorant that thou canst not move a single step without finding some duty to fulfil; and that every man is useful to society, even by means of his existence alone.
Hear me, thou rash young man! thou art dear to me. I commiserate thy errors. If the least sense of virtue still remains in thy breast, attend, and let me teach thee to be reconciled to life. Whenever thou art tempted to quit it, say to thyself——“Let me at least do one good action before I die.” Then go in search for one in a state of indigence whom thou may’st relieve; for one under misfortunes, whom thou may’st comfort; for one under oppression, whom thou may’st defend. Introduce to me those unhappy wretches whom my rank keeps at a distance. Do not be afraid of misusing my purse, or my credit: make free with them; distribute my fortune, make me rich. If this consideration restrains you to day, it will restrain you to-morrow; if to-morrow, it will restrain you all your life. If it has no power to restrain you, die! you are below my care.