ABSTRACT
The dilemma in which I had now involved myself seemed to promise either indelible disgrace or perpetual penance. I had been led away by the ignis fatuus53 of the passions; the dazzling flame which plays about the senses for a time, and then vanishes into nothing, while the dawn of reason opens, and shedding a genuine lustre on surrounding objects, harmonizes the mind, and takes from it every thing deceptive. The brilliant graces of Lady Arabella, though they embellished the circles of dissipation, were of a species too gaudy for the tranquil scenes of life. Like the splendid illuminations of a ball room, they glittered to the vacant eye of folly, while they banished all the train of sober enjoyments from the mind; enjoyments that are best felt in the calm shades of repose, the noiseless solitudes of unsophisticated nature.
