That is his
reasoning. Nature! Nature! I have to hear of Nature! We must be above
Nature, I tell him, or, we shall be very much below. He is ranked among
our clever young men; and he can be amusing. So far he passes muster;
and he has a pleasant voice. I dare say he is an uncle Homeware's good
sort of boy. Girls like him. Why does he not fix his attention upon one
of them; Why upon me? We waste our time in talking of him . . . .
The secret of it is, that he has no reverence. The marriage he vaunts is
a mere convenient arrangement for two to live together under command of
nature. Reverence for the state of marriage is unknown to him. How
explain my feeling? I am driven into silence. Cease to speak of him
. . . . He is the dupe of his eloquence--his passion, he calls it.
I have only to trust myself to him, and--I shall be one of the world's
married women! Words are useless. How am I to make him see that it is
I who respect the state of marriage by refusing; not he by perpetually
soliciting. Once married, married for ever. Widow is but a term. When
women hold their own against him, as I have done, they will be more
esteemed.
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