See Letter 317. ↩
Her letter, containing the reasons she refers to, was not asked for; and Dr. Lewen’s death, which fell out soon after he had received it, was the reason that it was not communicated to the family, till it was too late to do the service that might have been hoped for from it. ↩
See Letter 409. ↩
See Letter 429. ↩
The former housekeeper at Harlowe-place. ↩
See Letter 405. ↩
Mr. Belford has not yet sent him his last-written letter. His reason for which see Letter 426. ↩
See Letter 426. ↩
See Letter 173. ↩
See Otway’s Orphan. ↩
See Letter 282. ↩
See Letter 384. ↩
See Letter 397. ↩
See Letter 397. ↩
See Letter 399. ↩
See Letter 399. ↩
The Windmill, near Slough. ↩
See Letter 423. ↩
See Letter 443. ↩
See Letter 399. ↩
See Letter 440. ↩
It may not be amiss to observe, that Mr. Belford’s solicitude to get back his letters was owing to his desire of fulfilling the lady’s wishes that he would furnish Miss Howe with materials to vindicate her memory. ↩
See Letter 435. ↩
See Letter 426. ↩
See Letter 177. ↩
See Letter 397. ↩
See Letter 401. ↩
These are the lines the lady refers to:
From death we rose to life: ’tis but the same,
Through life to pass again from whence we came.
With shame we see our passions can prevail,
Where reason, certainty, and virtue fail.
Honour, that empty name, can death despise;
Scorn’d Love to death, as to a refuge, flies;
And Sorrow waits for death with longing eyes.
Hope triumphs o’er the thoughts of death; and Fate
Cheats fools, and flatters the unfortunate.
We fear to lose, what a small time must waste,
Till life itself grows the disease at last.
Begging for life, we beg for more decay,
And to be long a dying only pray.
Meaning his meditated second violence (See Letter 281) and his succeeding letters to her, supplicating for her pardon. ↩
See Letter 397. ↩
See Letter 401. ↩
See Letter 426. ↩
See Letter 436. ↩
See Letter 448. ↩
Begun on Monday , and by piecemeal finished on Tuesday; but not sent till the Thursday following. ↩
I.e. At the time this Letter was written. ↩
Joy, let me here observe, my dear Sir, by way of note, is not absolutely inconsistent with melancholy; a soft gentle joy, not a rapid, not a rampant joy, however; but such a joy, as shall lift her temporarily out of her soothing melancholy, and then let her down gently into it again; for melancholy, to be sure, her reflection will generally make to be her state. ↩
And here, by way of note, permit me to say, that no sermon I ever composed cost me half the pains that this letter hath done—but I knew your great appetite after, as well as admiration of, the ancient wisdom, which you so justly prefer to the modern—and indeed I join with you to think, that the modern is only borrowed, (as the moon doth its light from the sun), at least, that we excel them in nothing; and that our best cogitations may be found, generally speaking, more elegantly dressed and expressed by them. ↩
See Letter 475. ↩
See Letter 465. ↩
See Letter 460. ↩
See the beginning of Letter 476. ↩
The words thus enclosed [ ] were omitted in the transcript to Mr. Lovelace. ↩
Whoever has seen Dean Swift’s Lady’s Dressing Room, will think this description of Mr. Belford’s not only more natural, but more decent painting, as well as better justified by the design, and by the use that may be made of it. ↩
See Judges 12:6. ↩
See Letter 486. ↩
This letter contains in substance—her thanks to the good woman for her care of her in her infancy; for her good instructions, and the excellent example she had set her; with self-accusations of a vanity and presumption, which lay lurking in her heart unknown to herself, till her calamities (obliging her to look into herself) brought them to light.
She comforts her on her early death; having finished, as she says, her probatory course, at so early a time of life, when many are not ripened by the sunshine of Divine Grace for a better, till they are fifty, sixty, or seventy years of age.
I hope, she says, that my father will grant the request I have made to him in my last will, to let you pass the remainder of your days at my Dairy-house, as it used to be called, where once I promised myself to be happy in you. Your discretion, prudence, and economy, my dear, good woman, proceeds she, will male your presiding over the
