The Love Letters of Dorothy Osborne to Sir William Temple, 1652-54 eBook

Dorothy Osborne
This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 319 pages of information about The Love Letters of Dorothy Osborne to Sir William Temple, 1652-54.

The Love Letters of Dorothy Osborne to Sir William Temple, 1652-54 eBook

Dorothy Osborne
This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 319 pages of information about The Love Letters of Dorothy Osborne to Sir William Temple, 1652-54.
consequence than ordinary; it may be numbered amongst the rest of our misfortunes, all which an inconsiderate passion has occasioned.  You must pardon me I cannot be reconciled to it, it has been the ruin of us both.  ’Tis true that nobody must imagine to themselves ever to be absolute master on’t, but there is great difference betwixt that and yielding to it, between striving with it and soothing it up till it grows too strong for one.  Can I remember how ignorantly and innocently I suffered it to steal upon me by degrees; how under a mask of friendship I cozened myself into that which, had it appeared to me at first in its true shape, I had feared and shunned?  Can I discern that it has made the trouble of your life, and cast a cloud upon mine, that will help to cover me in my grave?  Can I know that it wrought so upon us both as to make neither of us friends to one another, but agree in running wildly to our own destruction, and that perhaps of some innocent persons who might live to curse our folly that gave them so miserable a being?  Ah! if you love yourself or me, you must confess that I have reason to condemn this senseless passion; that wheresoe’er it comes destroys all that entertain it; nothing of judgment or discretion can live with it, and it puts everything else out of order before it can find a place for itself.  What has it brought my poor Lady Anne Blunt to?  She is the talk of all the footmen and boys in the street, and will be company for them shortly, and yet is so blinded by her passion as not at all to perceive the misery she has brought herself to; and this fond love of hers has so rooted all sense of nature out of her heart, that, they say, she is no more moved than a statue with the affliction of a father and mother that doted on her, and had placed the comfort of their lives in her preferment.  With all this is it not manifest to the whole world that Mr. Blunt could not consider anything in this action but his own interest, and that he makes her a very ill return for all her kindness; if he had loved her truly he would have died rather than have been the occasion of this misfortune to her.  My cousin Franklin (as you observe very well) may say fine things now she is warm in Moor Park, but she is very much altered in her opinions since her marriage, if these be her own.  She left a gentleman, that I could name, whom she had much more of kindness for than ever she had for Mr. Franklin, because his estate was less; and upon the discovery of some letters that her mother intercepted, suffered herself to be persuaded that twenty-three hundred pound a year was better than twelve hundred, though with a person she loved; and has recovered it so well, that you see she confesses there is nothing in her condition she desires to alter at the charge of a wish.  She’s happier by much than I shall ever be, but I do not envy her; may she long enjoy it, and I an early and a quiet grave, free from the trouble of this busy world, where all with passion pursue their own interests at their neighbour’s charges; where nobody is pleased but somebody complains on’t; and where ’tis impossible to be without giving and receiving injuries.

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The Love Letters of Dorothy Osborne to Sir William Temple, 1652-54 from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.