I cannot tell my readers what effect such words would have upon girls brought up in their fashion.  As for Sophy, she will have no words to reply; shame and emotion will not permit her to express herself easily; but I am sure that what was said will remain engraved upon her heart as long as she lives, and that if any human resolution may be trusted, we may rely on her determination to deserve her parent’s esteem.

At worst let us suppose her endowed with an ardent disposition which will make her impatient of long delays; I maintain that her judgment, her knowledge, her taste, her refinement, and, above all, the sentiments in which she has been brought up from childhood, will outweigh the impetuosity of the senses, and enable her to offer a prolonged resistance, if not to overcome them altogether.  She would rather die a virgin martyr than distress her parents by marrying a worthless man and exposing herself to the unhappiness of an ill-assorted marriage.  Ardent as an Italian and sentimental as an Englishwoman, she has a curb upon heart and sense in the pride of a Spaniard, who even when she seeks a lover does not easily discover one worthy of her.

Not every one can realise the motive power to be found in a love of what is right, nor the inner strength which results from a genuine love of virtue.  There are men who think that all greatness is a figment of the brain, men who with their vile and degraded reason will never recognise the power over human passions which is wielded by the very madness of virtue.  You can only teach such men by examples; if they persist in denying their existence, so much the worse for them.  If I told them that Sophy is no imaginary person, that her name alone is my invention, that her education, her conduct, her character, her very features, really existed, and that her loss is still mourned by a very worthy family, they would, no doubt, refuse to believe me; but indeed why should I not venture to relate word for word the story of a girl so like Sophy that this story might be hers without surprising any one.  Believe it or no, it is all the same to me; call my history fiction if you will; in any case I have explained my method and furthered my purpose.

This young girl with the temperament which I have attributed to Sophy was so like her in other respects that she was worthy of the name, and so we will continue to use it.  After the conversation related above, her father and mother thought that suitable husbands would not be likely to offer themselves in the hamlet where they lived; so they decided to send her to spend the winter in town, under the care of an aunt who was privately acquainted with the object of the journey; for Sophy’s heart throbbed with noble pride at the thought of her self-control; and however much she might want to marry, she would rather have died a maid than have brought herself to go in search of a husband.