He saw my emotion; and acknowledged the
tenderest friendship for me! Ought I not to be satisfied with that? I
am. I will be satisfied. Does he not love me with the love of mind?
The poor Olivia has not this to comfort herself with. The poor Olivia!
if I see her sad and afflicted, how I shall pity her! All her
expectations frustrated; the expectations that engaged her to combat
difficulties, to travel, to cross many waters, and to come to England--to
come just time enough to take leave of him; he hastening on the wings of
love and compassion to a dearer, a deservedly dearer object, in the
country she had quitted, on purpose to visit him in his--Is not hers a
more grievous situation than mine?--It is. Why, then, do I lament?
But here, Lucy, let me in confidence hint, what I have gathered from
several intimations from Dr. Bartlett, though as tenderly made by him as
possible, that had Sir Charles Grandison been a man capable of taking
advantage of the violence of a lady's passion for him, the unhappy Olivia
would not have scrupled, great, haughty, and noble, as she is, by birth
and fortune, to have been his, without conditions, if she could not have
been so with: The Italian world is of this opinion, at least. Had Sir
Charles been a Rinaldo, Olivia had been an Armida.
O that I could hope, for the honour of the sex, and of the lady who is so
fine a woman, that the Italian world is mistaken!--I will presume that it
is.
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