LETTER II.
Worthy to Harrington.
“WISH you success”—In what? Who is this lady of whom you have been talking at such an inconsistent rate? But before you have leisure to reply to these inquiries you may have forgotten there is such a person, as she whom you call Harriot—I have seen many juvenile heroes, during my pilgrimage of two and twenty years, easily inflamed with new objects—agitated and hurried away by the impetuosity of new desires—and at the same time they were by no means famous for solidity of judgement, or remarkable for the permanency of their resolutions. There is such a tumult—such an ebullition of the brain in their paroxisms of passion, that this new object is very superficially examined. These, added to partiality and prepossession, never fail to blind the eyes of the lover. Instead of weighing matters maturely, and stating the evidence fairly on both sides, in order to form a right judgement, every circumstance not perfectly coincident with your particular bias, comes not under consideration, because it does not flatter your vanity. “Ponder and pause” just here, and tell me seriously whether you are in love, and whether you have sufficiently examined your heart to give a just answer.
DO you mean to insinuate that your declaration of love hath attracted the affection of the pensive Harriot? If this should be the case, I wish you would tell me what you design to do with her.