"religion and a cell but a melancholy recourse; but "I shall not find it so while I am not secluded from "the generous Monimia's cheering eye: her deli"cate and blameless sensibility of human passions "(she to whom suffering is a merit) softens every

care, and raises every joy; while she descends "from the height of grandeur to the gentle offices "of the sincere friend, she forgets every advantage "of fortune, until virtue in distress calls for her "aid; her titles have no energy with her but when "they give her a privilege of doing good, and then "she exerts them to their full force; she feels they "cannot buy freedom to the mind; and that no "calamity will retire in respect to them. Fate has "so ordered it, that there is some similitude in our "destinies, which reconciles me to mine, while she "recommends piety and resignation with the "strongest and most beautiful arguments, her own "example; and fortifies my mind, by putting eཔ་ very virtue, by her own practice, in the most a"miable light. Sometimes she sings a requiem "to our sorrows; soothes them to peace with the "most harmonious numbers, and I have the ease "of seeing my thoughts expressed in her's with e"very elegance; and when the serious soul exerts "itself, she anticipates Heaven, and gives a sweet "foretaste of the songs of angels. Thus we "baffle disappointment, and elude our sufferings; "Honours, Wealth, and Beauty, stand abashed to

"see themselves despised, while Devotion claps "her wings at this her fairest triumph.

"You will, I hope, from what I have said, be "satisfied I am not unhappy; and take this last as66 surance from me, that I can never be so whilst you are blessed. You have annihilated every "sense of sorrow in me; I have no tears but when you claim them.

LETTER

"Adieu."

XVIII.

To Lady MARY, from her sister, just before her death.

I COME, ye ghosts; prepare your roseate bow'rs,

Celestial palms, and ever blooming flow'rs;
Thither where sinners may have rest I go,
Where flames refin'd, in breasts seraphic, glow.

Pope.

This, my dear sister, is my long, my final adieu, till we meet in happier regions. The springs of life are running low, and Nature, tired with human changes, longs to be at rest; the grave attends me, that mansion of silence and repose.

I soon shall close my weary eyes in peace,
And stretch, compos'd upon my dusty bed.
Oh, Death! thy quiet and refreshing shade
Shall yield a long, an unmolested rest,
From all the fruitless toil and vanity
That dwells below the sun-

I have had an ill state of health for some years, and have lately had two fits of an apoplexy; the

third, my physician is so sincere to let me know, will be fatal. I am now indisposed, and find some certain symptoms of its return, which makes me resolve to unburden my soul of its last pressure.

Forgive me, ye injured Shades of my great ancestors, nor blot my name from your illustrious line. --My dear sister, can your rigid virtue forgive my fault, and plead my defence to my injured husband, when I am silent in the dust? Dear Lady Mary, will you not pardon a crime which is blotted out by heaven? With that my peace is made by a long course of temperance. Weeks, and months, and years, are past since the date of my guilt. The rising and the setting sun has been a constant witness to my devotions; the moon and midnight stars were conscious to my tears.

It is, as you know, sixteen years since I was married to Count Edgar. I have had two sons and three daughters; but shall I own this shameful truth? the eldest of the two brothers is not his! On a fatal night (let the horror of darkness cover it) I was, in my husband's absence, by the Marquis de, seduced; it was not the contrivance of a formal amour, but the effect of inadvertency and surprise. Oh! where was my guardian angel in that loose moment, that interval of reproach and madness?

The subject is too infamous for me to enter into particulars; but I have full assurance this youth is

not the Count's son, though his confidence in me, with his easy temper, kept him from ever making the least inquiry into any circumstance of my guilt. He has lately made his will, and to the eldest brother (being his greatest favourite) given his whole etsate, leaving the rest entirely dependent on this son, which, to my confusion, is not his own.

This secret, dear Lady Mary, I must entreat you to discover to Count Edgar after my death, that he may do his own children justice, and only provide moderately for the other. Assure him, that it was only in this instance I ever wronged my fidelity to him. This is the utmost reparation I can make and with a mind unburthened I now cast myself on infinite Mercy, and smile in the view of death.

I come, ye ministers of Fate, I come;

But while I pass the intervening gloom,

Should rising doubts my trembling heart invade,
With music cheer the melancholy shade.

In soothing strains a gentle requiem sing,
And touch with heav'nly art the golden string;
The charming sound shall ev'ry care beguile,
And make the seats of Desolation smile.
My soul, prepar'd by sacred ecstacy,

Shall learn and join the chorus of the sky.

Once more, my dear sister, adieu! Let my crime warn you never to be vain or secure. From the height of self-confidence and arrogant virtue I was left to make this reproachful step to humble me. My repentance has been deep and sincere; and,

through the divine Redemption, my pardon is procured, and my guilt for ever obliterated.

Your dying friend,

HERIMONE.

LETTER XIX.

A letter from ARISTUS, giving his friend a relation of the sudden death of his new bride, who was seized in the chapel while the facred rites were performing.

My fate will furnish you with a full evidence of the vanity of human happiness. My last letter was writ in the height of success, with the most arrogant expectations and boast of a lasting felicity; now it is all changed, the shadows of night cover

me.

The lovely Erminia, whom I had so long pursued, and at last persuaded to crown my wishes, the very morning she gave me her hand, before the sacred ceremony was finished, was surprised with the fatal message of death, and carried in a swoon from the chapel to her chamber, where she soon expired in her mother's arms. This hour she appeared with all the cost and splendour of a youthful bride; the next, she is a pale and senseless corpse, muffled in a ghastly shroud. Those charms, that in the morning promised an eternal bloom, before the evening have dropped their smiling pride;