Endnotes

  1. Her grandfather, in order to invite her to him as often as her other friends would spare her, indulged her in erecting and fitting up a dairy-house in her own taste. When finished, it was so much admired for its elegant simplicity and convenience, that the whole seat (before, of old time, from its situation, called The Grove) was generally known by the name of The Dairy-house. Her grandfather in particular was fond of having it so called. ↩

  2. See Mr. Lovelace’s letter, Letter 31, in which he briefly accounts for his conduct in this affair. ↩

  3. The reason of this their more openly shown animosity is given in Letter 13. ↩

  4. See Letter 8. ↩

  5. Letter 5. ↩

  6. Letter 3. ↩

  7. Letter 4. ↩

  8. Letters 4 and 5. ↩

  9. See Letter 4. ↩

  10. See Letter 4. ↩

  11. Letter 1. ↩

  12. Letter 2. ↩

  13. Letter 1. ↩

  14. See Letter 9. ↩

  15. See Letter 10. ↩

  16. See Letter 10 ↩

  17. See Letter 5. ↩

  18. See Letter 31, for Mr. Lovelace’s account of his behaviour and intentions in his appearance at church. ↩

  19. These gentlemen affected what they called the Roman style (to wit, the thee and the thou) in their letters: and it was an agreed rule with them, to take in good part whatever freedoms they treated each other with, if the passages were written in that style. ↩

  20. Lovelace. ↩

  21. See Letter 20. ↩

  22. See Letter 25. ↩

  23. Alluding to his words in the preamble to the clauses in his will. See Letter 4. ↩

  24. See Letter 42. ↩

  25. See Letter 42. ↩

  26. See Letter 40. ↩

  27. See Letter 37, for the occasion; and Letters 38 and 40, for the freedom Clarissa apologizes for. ↩

  28. Henry VII. ↩

  29. See Letter 28. ↩

  30. Spectator, Vol. VIII, No. 599. ↩

  31. Perhaps it will be unnecessary to remind the reader, that although Mr. Lovelace proposes (as above) to Miss Howe, that her fair friend should have recourse to the protection of Mrs. Howe, if farther driven; yet he had artfully taken care, by means of his agent in the Harlowe family, not only to inflame the family against her, but to deprive her of Mrs. Howe’s, and of every other protection, being from the first resolved to reduce her to an absolute dependence upon himself. See Letter 31. ↩

  32. See Letter 36. ↩

  33. These violent measures, and the obstinate perseverance of the whole family in them, will be the less wondered at, when it is considered, that all the time they were but as so many puppets danced upon Mr. Lovelace’s wires, as he boasts, Letter 31. ↩

  34. This poem, unattributed by Richardson, is by Elizabeth Carter. —⁠Editor ↩

  35. See the next letter. ↩

  36. Mr. Lovelace accounts for this, Letter 35. ↩

  37. See Letter 63. ↩

  38. See Letter 62. ↩

  39. See Letter 64. ↩

  40. It will be seen in Letter 34 that Mr. Lovelace’s motive for sparing his Rosebud was twofold. First, Because his pride was gratified by the grandmother’s desiring him to spare her granddaughter. Many a pretty rogue, says he, had I spared, whom I did not spare, had my power been acknowledged, and my mercy in time implored. But the debellare superbos should be my motto, were I to have a new one. His other motive will be explained in the following passage, in the same. I never was so honest, for so long together, says he, since my matriculation. It behoves me so to be. Some way or other my recess (at this little inn) may be found out, and it then will be thought that my Rosebud has attracted me. A report in my favour, from simplicities so amiable, may establish me, etc.

    Accordingly, as the reader will hereafter see, Mr. Lovelace finds by the effects, his expectations from the contrivance he set on foot by means of his agent Joseph Leman (who plays, as above, upon Betty Barnes) fully answered, though he could not know what passed on the occasion between the two ladies. This explanation is the more necessary to be given, as several of our readers (through want of due attention) have attributed to Mr. Lovelace, on his behaviour to his Rosebud, a greater merit than was due to him; and moreover imagined, that it was improbable, that a man, who was capable of acting so generously (as they supposed) in this instance, should be guilty of any atrocious vileness. Not considering, that love, pride, and revenge as he owns in Letter 31 were ingredients of equal force in his composition; and that resistance was a stimulus to him. ↩

  41. She accordingly encloses Mr. Lovelace’s letter. But as the most material contents of it are given in her abstract, it is omitted. ↩

  42. See Letter 4. ↩

  43. She was mistaken in this. Mr. Lovelace did foresee this consequence. All his contrivances led to it, and the whole family, as he boasts, unknown to themselves, were but so many puppets danced by his wires. See Letter 31. ↩

  44. It may not be amiss to observe in this place, that Mr. Lovelace artfully contrived to drive the family on, by permitting his and their agent Leman to report machinations, which he had neither intention nor power to execute. ↩

  45. See Note in Letter 49. ↩

  46. The Ivy Summerhouse (or Ivy Bower, as it was sometimes called in the family) was a place, that from a girl, this young lady delighted in. She used, in the summer months, frequently to sit and work, and read, and write, and draw, and (when permitted) to breakfast, and dine, and sometimes to sup, in it; especially when Miss Howe, who had an equal liking to it, was her visitor and guest.

    She describes it, in another letter (which appears not) as “pointing to a pretty variegated landscape of wood, water, and hilly country; which had pleased her so much, that she had drawn it; the piece hanging up, in her parlous, among some of her other drawings.” ↩

  47. They might, no doubt, make a dependence upon the reasons she gives: but their chief reliance was upon the vigilance of their Joseph Leman; little imagining what an implement he was of Mr. Lovelace. ↩

  48. This, in another of her letters, (which neither is inserted), is thus described:⁠—“A piece of ruins upon it, the remains of an old chapel, now standing in the midst of the coppice; here and there an overgrown oak, surrounded with ivy and mistletoe, starting up, to sanctify, as it were, the awful solemnness of the place: a spot, too, where a man having been found hanging some years ago, it was used to be thought of by us when children, and by the maidservants, with a degree of terror, (it being actually the habitation of owls, ravens, and other ominous birds), as haunted by ghosts, goblins, specters: the genuine result of the country loneliness and ignorance: notions which, early propagated, are apt to leave impressions even upon minds grown strong enough at the same time to despise the like credulous follies in others.” ↩

  49. Well might he be so sure, when he had the art to play them off, by his corrupted agent, and to make them all join to promote his views unknown to themselves; as is shown in some of his preceding letters. ↩

  50. See Numbers 30. Where it is declared, whose vows shall be binding, and whose not. The vows of a man, or of a widow, are there pronounced to be indispensable; because they are sole, and subject to no other domestic authority. But the vows of a single woman, or of a wife, if the father of the one, or the husband of the other, disallow of them as soon as they know them, are to be of no force.

    A matter highly necessary to be known; by all young ladies especially, whose designing addressers too often endeavour to engage them by vows; and then plead conscience and honour to them to hold them down to the performance. It cannot be amiss to recite the very words.

    Ver. 3 If a woman vow a vow unto the Lord, and bind herself by a bond, being in her father’s house in her youth;

    4. And her father hear her vow, and her bond wherewith she hath bound her soul, and her father shall hold his peace at her; then all her vows shall stand, and every bond wherewith she hath bound her soul shall stand.

    5. But if her father disallow her in the day that he heareth; not any of her vows or of her bonds wherewith she hath bound her soul shall stand: and the Lord shall forgive her, because her father disallowed her.

    The same in the case of a wife, as said above. See ver. 6, 7, 8, etc.⁠—All is thus solemnly closed:

    Ver. 16. These are the statutes which the Lord commanded Moses between a man and his wife, between the father and his daughter, being yet in her youth in her father’s house. ↩

  51. Ecclesiasticus 37:13, 14.

    Ecclesiasticus is a book originally included within the King James Bible, but now regarded as part of the Apocrypha. —⁠Editor ↩

  52. It is easy for such of the readers as have been attentive to Mr. Lovelace’s manner of working, to suppose, from this hint of Miss Hervey’s, that he had instructed his double-faced agent to put his sweetheart Betty upon alarming Miss Hervey, in hopes she would alarm her beloved cousin, (as we see she does), in order to keep her steady to her appointment with him. ↩

  53. See Letters 57 and 58. ↩

  54. See Letter 90 ↩

  55. See Letter 73. ↩

  56. See Letter 113. ↩

  57. Clarissa has been censured as behaving to Mr. Lovelace, in their first conversation at St. Alban’s, and afterwards, with too much reserve, and even with haughtiness. Surely those, who have thought her to blame on this account, have not paid a due attention to the story. How early, as above, and in what immediately follows, does he remind her of the terms of distance which she had prescribed to him, before she was in his power, in hopes to leave the door open for a reconciliation with her friends, which her heart was set upon? And how artfully does he (unrequired) promise to observe the conditions in which she in her present circumstances and situation (in pursuance of Miss Howe’s advice) would gladly have dispensed with?⁠—To say nothing of the resentment she was under a necessity to show, at the manner of his getting her away, in order to justify to him the sincerity of her refusal to go off with him. See, in her subsequent Letter to Miss Howe, Letter 101, her own sense upon the subject. ↩

  58. See Letter 43. ↩

  59. See Letter 91. ↩

  60. See Letter 3. ↩

  61. See Letter 34. ↩

  62. See Letter 57. ↩

  63. Letter 91 paragraphs 37, 38. ↩

  64. Letter 80 and Letter 83 paragraph 1. ↩

  65. Letter 80, paragraph 4. See also Letter 59, paragraph 3. ↩

  66. Letter 91 paragraph 6, and 39. ↩

  67. This will be farther explained in Letter 113. ↩

  68. See Letters 31 and 34. ↩

  69. See Letter 35. ↩

  70. See Letter 92. ↩

  71. See Letter 31. ↩

  72. See Letter 71. ↩

  73. See Letter 98. ↩

  74. Mr. Lovelace might have spared this caution on this occasion, since many of the sex (we mention it with regret) who on the first publication had read thus far, and even to the lady’s first escape, have been readier to censure her for over-niceness, as we have observed in a former note, [note 57], than him for artifices and exultations not less cruel and ungrateful, than ungenerous and unmanly. ↩

  75. The particular attention of such of the fair sex, as are more apt to read for the sake of amusement than instruction, is requested to this letter of Mr. Lovelace. ↩

  76. The story tells us, that whoever drank of this cup, if his wife were chaste, could drink without spilling; if otherwise, the contrary. ↩

  77. This word, whenever used by any of these gentlemen, was agreed to imply an inviolable secret. ↩

  78. See Letter 4. ↩

  79. See Letter 4. ↩

  80. See Letter 80. ↩

  81. See his Letter to Joseph Leman, Letter 95, towards the end, where he tells him, he would contrive for him a letter of this nature to copy. ↩

  82. Mr. Lovelace is as much out in his conjecture of Solomon, as of Socrates. The passage is in Ecclesiasticus, chap. 25.

    Ecclesiasticus is a book originally included within the King James Bible, but now regarded as part of the Apocrypha. —⁠Editor ↩

  83. See his reasons for proposing Windsor, Letter 117⁠—and her Hannah, Letter 118. ↩

  84. That he proposes one day to reform, and that he has sometimes good motions, see Letter 34. ↩

  85. He had said, Letter 110, that he would make reformation his stalking-horse, etc. ↩

  86. This letter Mrs. Greme (with no bad design on her part) was put upon writing by Mr. Lovelace himself, as will be seen in Letter 127. ↩

  87. See Letter 10. ↩

  88. See Letter 47. ↩

  89. This inference of the Lady in his favour is exactly what he had hoped for. See Letter 117. ↩

  90. See this confirmed by Mr. Lovelace, Letter 103. ↩

  91. See Letter 120. ↩

  92. See Letter 111. ↩

  93. See Letter 98. ↩

  94. See Letter 98. ↩

  95. See Letters 2 and 3. ↩

  96. See Letter 100. ↩

  97. The reader will see how Miss Howe accounts for this, in Letter 128. ↩

  98. Luke 15:7. The parable is concerning the Ninety-nine Sheep, not the Prodigal Son, as Mr. Lovelace erroneously imagines. ↩

  99. See Letter 116. ↩

  100. The reader, perhaps, need not be reminded that he had taken care from the first (see Letter 31) to deprive her of any protection from Mrs. Howe. See in his next letter, a repeated account of the same artifices, and his exultations upon his inventions to impose upon the two such watchful ladies as Clarissa and Miss Howe. ↩

  101. See Letter 81. ↩

  102. The reader is referred to Mr. Lovelace’s next letter, for his motives in making the several proposals of which the Lady is willing to think so well. ↩

  103. Antonio Perez was first minister of Philip II king of Spain, by whose command he caused Don Juan de Escovedo to be assassinated: which brought on his own ruin, through the perfidy of his viler master.

    —⁠Gedde’s Tracts

    ↩

  104. See Letters 139 and 140. ↩

  105. See Letter 123. ↩

  106. See Letter 128. ↩

  107. See Letters 59 and 60. ↩

  108. The contents of the Letter referred to are given in Letter 116. ↩

  109. The reader who has seen his account, which Miss Howe could not have seen, when she wrote thus, will observe that it was not possible for a person of her true delicacy of mind to act otherwise than she did, to a man so cruelly and so insolently artful. ↩

  110. See Letter 137. ↩

  111. See Letter 91. ↩

  112. See Letter 110. ↩

  113. See Letter 118. ↩

  114. This letter was from Miss Arabella Harlowe. See Letter 147. ↩

  115. See Letter 91. ↩

  116. Notwithstanding what Mrs. Hervey here says, it will be hereafter seen that this severe letter was written in private concert with the implacable Arabella. ↩

  117. Mr. Lovelace, in his next Letter, tells his friend how extremely ill the Lady was, recovering from fits to fall into stronger fits, and nobody expecting her life. She had not, he says, acquainted Miss Howe how very ill she was.⁠—In the next Letter, she tells Miss Howe, that her motives for suspending were not merely ceremonious ones. ↩

  118. See Letter 127 and Letter 128. ↩

  119. See Letter 128. ↩

  120. See Letter 110. ↩

  121. See Letter 109. ↩

  122. See Letter 131. ↩

  123. See Letter 155. See also Letter 155. ↩

  124. See Letter 130. ↩

  125. Mr. Belford, in Letter 222 reminds Mr. Lovelace of some particular topics which passed in their conversation, extremely to the Lady’s honour. ↩

  126. See Letter 222 above referred to. ↩

  127. See Letter 115 Paragr. 4. ↩

  128. See Letter 143 Paragr. 9. ↩

  129. Phyl-tits, q. d. Phyllis-tits, in opposition to Tom-tits. It needs not now be observed, that Mr. Lovelace, in this wanton gaiety of his heart, often takes liberties of coining words and phrases in his letters to this his familiar friend. See his ludicrous reason for it in Letter 117. Paragr. antepenult. ↩

  130. See Letter 3. ↩

  131. See Letter 144. ↩

  132. See Letter 100. ↩

  133. See Letter 158. ↩

  134. Clarissa proposes Mr. Hickman to write for Miss Howe. See Letter 165, Paragr. 5, & ult. ↩

  135. See Letter 173. ↩

  136. See Letter 120. ↩

  137. See Letter 4. ↩

  138. See Letter 12. ↩

  139. See Letter 98. ↩

  140. We cannot forbear observing in this place, that the Lady has been particularly censured, even by some of her own sex, as overnice in her part of the above conversations: but surely this must be owing to want of attention to the circumstances she was in, and to her character, as well as to the character of the man she had to deal with: for, although she could not be supposed to know so much of his designs as the reader does by means of his letters to Belford, yet she was but too well convinced of his faulty morals, and of the necessity there was, from the whole of his behaviour to her, to keep such an encroacher, as she frequently calls him, at a distance. In Letter 125 the reader will see, that upon some favourable appearances she blames herself for her readiness to suspect him. But his character, his principles, said she, are so faulty!⁠—He is so light, so vain, so various.⁠—Then, my dear, I have no guardian to depend upon. In Letter 125 Must I not with such a man, says she, be wanting to myself, were I not jealous and vigilant?

    By this time the reader will see, that she had still greater reason for her jealousy and vigilance. And Lovelace will tell the sex, as he does in Letter 220, that the woman who resents not initiatory freedoms, must be lost. Love is an encroacher, says he: loves never goes backward. Nothing but the highest act of love can satisfy an indulged love.

    But the reader perhaps is too apt to form a judgment of Clarissa’s conduct in critical cases by Lovelace’s complaints of her coldness; not considering his views upon her; and that she is proposed as an example; and therefore in her trials and distresses must not be allowed to dispense with those rules which perhaps some others of the sex, in her delicate situation, would not have thought themselves so strictly bound to observe; although, if she had not observed them, a Lovelace would have carried all his points. ↩

  141. See Letter 175. ↩

  142. See Letter 171. ↩

  143. See Letter 110. ↩

  144. See Letter 58. ↩

  145. See Letter 177. ↩

  146. See Letter 188. ↩

  147. See Letter 188. ↩

  148. See Letter 156. ↩

  149. See Letter 164. ↩

  150. See Letter 166. ↩

  151. See Letter 177. ↩

  152. See Letter 183. ↩

  153. See Letter 188. ↩

  154. She tells Miss Howe, that she saw this motion in the pier-glass. See Letter 187. ↩

  155. See Letter 196. ↩

  156. See Letter 164, Parag. 2. ↩

  157. See Letter 41. ↩

  158. Within these few years past, a passage has been made from the prison to the sessions-house, whereby malefactors are carried into court without going through the street. Lovelace’s triumph on their supposed march shows the wisdom of this alteration. ↩

  159. Pliny gives this account, putting the number of men slain at 1,100,092. See also Lipsius de Constandia. ↩

  160. See Letter 183. ↩

  161. See Letter 196. ↩

  162. See Letter 188. ↩

  163. See Letter 12. ↩

  164. See Letter 173, & seq. ↩

  165. See Letters 177 and 183. ↩

  166. See Letter 204. ↩

  167. See Letter 173. See also Mr. Lovelace’s own confession of the delight he takes in a woman’s tears, in different parts of his letters. ↩

  168. That the Lady judges rightly of him in this place, see Letter 34 where, giving the motive for his generosity to his Rosebud, he says⁠—“As I make it my rule, whenever I have committed a very capital enormity, to do some good by way of atonement; and as I believe I am a pretty deal indebted on that score; I intend to join an hundred pounds to Johnny’s aunt’s hundred pounds, to make one innocent couple happy.”⁠—Besides which motive, he had a further view in answer in that instance of his generosity; as may be seen in Letters 70, 71, 72. See also note 40.

    To show the consistence of his actions, as they now appear, with his views and principles, as he lays them down in his first letters, it may be not amiss to refer the reader to his letters, 34, 35.

    See also Letter 30⁠—and Letter 40 for Clarissa’s early opinion of Mr. Lovelace.⁠—Whence the coldness and indifference to him, which he so repeatedly accuses her of, will be accounted for, more to her glory, than to his honour. ↩

  169. See Letter 159. ↩

  170. See Letter 159. ↩

  171. As this letter of the Lady to Miss Howe contains no new matter, but what may be collected from one of those of Mr. Lovelace, it is omitted. ↩

  172. See Letter 31. ↩

  173. In Pamela, Letter 124 these reasons are given, and are worthy of every parent’s consideration, as is the whole Letter, which contains the debate between Mr. B. and his Pamela, on the important subject of mothers being nurses to their own children. ↩

  174. See Letter 161 ↩

  175. See Letter 202. ↩

  176. See Letter 110. ↩

  177. See Letter 110. See also Letters 108 and 109. ↩

  178. See Letter 131. ↩

  179. See Letter 108. ↩

  180. See Letter 64. ↩

  181. See Letter 64. ↩

  182. See Letter 110. ↩

  183. See Letter 140. ↩

  184. See Letter 177. ↩

  185. See Letter 201. ↩

  186. See Letter 110. ↩

  187. See Letter 125. ↩

  188. See Letter 177. ↩

  189. See Letter 200. ↩

  190. Letters 130 and 131. ↩

  191. See Letter 148, paragraph 12, and Letter 150, paragraph 12.⁠—Where the reader will observe, that the proposal came from herself; which, as it was also mentioned by Mr. Lovelace, (towards the end of Letter 155). She may be presumed to have forgotten. So that Clarissa had a double inducement for acquiescing with the proposed method of carrying on the correspondence between Miss Howe and herself by Wilson’s conveyance, and by the name of Laetitia Beaumont. ↩

  192. See Letter 178. ↩

  193. He means the freedom Mr. Lovelace took with her before the fire-plot. See Letter 220. When Miss Howe wrote this letter she could not know of that. ↩

  194. See Letter 221. ↩

  195. See Mrs. Norton’s letter, Letter 180. ↩

  196. See Letter 230. ↩

  197. The fashionable wigs at that time. ↩

  198. And here, Belford, lest thou, through inattention, should be surprised at my assurance, let me remind thee (and that, thus, by way of marginal observation, that I may not break in upon my narrative) that this my intrepidity concerted (as I have from time to time acquainted thee) in apprehension of such an event as has fallen out. For had not the dear creature already passed for my wife before no less than four worthy gentlemen of family and fortune?460 and before Mrs. Sinclair, and her household, and Miss Partington? And had she not agreed to her uncle’s expedient, that she should pass for such, from the time of Mr. Hickman’s application to that uncle;461 and that the worthy Capt. Tomlinson should be allowed to propagate that belief: as he had actually reported to two families (they possibly to more); purposely that it might come to the ears of James Harlowe; and serve for a foundation for uncle John to build his reconciliation-scheme upon?462 And canst thou think that nothing was meant by all this contrivance? and that I am not still further prepared to support my story?

    Indeed, I little thought, at the time that I formed these precautionary schemes, that she would ever have been able, if willing, to get out of my hands. All that I hoped I should have occasion to have recourse to them for, was only, in case I should have the courage to make the grand attempt, and should succeed in it, to bring the dear creature (and this out of tenderness to her, for what attention did I ever yet pay to the grief, the execrations, the tears of a woman I had triumphed over?) to bear me in her sight: to expostulate with me, to be pacified by my pleas, and by my own future hopes, founded upon the reconciliatory-project, upon my reiterated vows, and upon the Captain’s assurances. Since in that case, to forgive me, to have gone on with me, for a week, would have been to forgive me, to have gone on with me, forever. And that, had my eligible life of honour taken place, her trials would all have been then over: and she would have known nothing but gratitude, love, and joy, to the end of one of our lives. For never would I, never could I, have abandoned such an admirable creature as this. Thou knowest I never was a sordid villain to any of her inferiors⁠—Her inferiors, I may say⁠—For who is not her inferior? ↩

  199. See Letters 183 and 188. ↩

  200. What is between hooks [ } thou mayest suppose, Jack, I sunk upon the women, in the account I gave them of the contents of this letter. ↩

  201. I gave Mrs. Moore and Miss Rawlins room to think this reproach just, Jack. ↩

  202. See Letter 229. ↩

  203. See Letter 233. ↩

  204. See Letter 229, where Miss Howe says, Alas! my dear, I know you loved him! ↩

  205. See Letters 183 and 188. ↩

  206. See Letter 115. ↩

  207. See Letter 229. ↩

  208. See Letter 229. ↩

  209. See Letter 229. ↩

  210. See Letter 229. ↩

  211. See Letter 229. ↩

  212. See Letter 229. ↩

  213. See Letter 229. ↩

  214. See Letter 229. ↩

  215. See Letter 229. ↩

  216. See Letter 229. ↩

  217. See Letter 220. ↩

  218. See Letter 229. ↩

  219. See Letter 229. ↩

  220. See Letter 229. ↩

  221. See Letter 229. ↩

  222. See Letter 126. ↩

  223. See Letter 127 and Letter 127. ↩

  224. See Letter 139. ↩

  225. See Letter 238. ↩

  226. See Letter 233. ↩

  227. See Letter 110. ↩

  228. See Letter 233. ↩

  229. Letter 198. ↩

  230. The nature of the Bath stone, in particular. ↩

  231. See Letter 223. ↩

  232. The lady innocently means Mr. Lovelace’s forged one. See Letter 239. ↩

  233. See Letters 9, 14 and 19 for what she herself says on that steadiness which Mr. Lovelace, though a deserved sufferer by it, cannot help admiring. ↩

  234. See Letter 248. ↩

  235. See Letter 229. ↩

  236. See Letter 230. ↩

  237. For the account of Mrs. Townsend, etc. see Letter 196. ↩

  238. See Letters 230 and 231. ↩

  239. He alludes here to the story of a pope, who, (once a poor fisherman), through every preferment he rose to, even to that of the cardinalate, hung up in view of all his guests his net, as a token of humility. But, when he arrived at the pontificate, he took it down, saying, that there was no need of the net, when he had caught the fish. ↩

  240. Miss Howe, in Letter 111 says, That she was always more afraid of Clarissa than of her mother; and, in Letter 111. That she fears her almost as much as she loves her; and in many other places, in her letters, verifies this observation of Lovelace. ↩

  241. See Letter 185. ↩

  242. See Letter 248. ↩

  243. See Letter 230. ↩

  244. Ecclesiasticus 26: The whoredom of a woman may be known in her haughty looks and eyelids. Watch over an impudent eye, and marvel not if it trespass against thee. ↩

  245. Letter 202. ↩

  246. See Letter 110. ↩

  247. Her cousin Morden’s words to her in his letter from Florence. See Letter 173. ↩

  248. See Letter 254. ↩

  249. See Letter 230. ↩

  250. She tried to do this; but was prevented by the fellow’s pretending to put his ankle out, by a slip downstairs⁠—A trick, says his contriving master, in his omitted relation, I had taught him, on a like occasion, at Amiens. ↩

  251. See Letter 229. ↩

  252. Letter 252. ↩

  253. See Letter 251. ↩

  254. The Lady, in her minutes, says, “I fear Dorcas is a false one. May I not be able to prevail upon him to leave me at my liberty? Better to try than to trust to her. If I cannot prevail, but must meet him and my uncle, I hope I shall have fortitude enough to renounce him then. But I would fain avoid qualifying with the wretch, or to give him an expectation which I intend not to answer. If I am mistress of my own resolutions, my uncle himself shall not prevail with me to bind my soul in covenant with so vile a man.” ↩

  255. The Lady, in her minutes, owns the difficulty she lay under to keep her temper in this conference. “But when I found,” says she, “that all my entreaties were ineffectual, and that he was resolved to detain me, I could no longer withhold my impatience.” ↩

  256. The Lady mentions, in her memorandum-book, that she had no other way, as is apprehended, to save herself from instant dishonour, but by making this concession. Her only hope, now, she says, if she cannot escape by Dorcas’s connivance, (whom, nevertheless she suspects), is to find a way to engage the protection of her uncle, and even of the civil magistrate, on Thursday next, if necessary. “He shall see,” says she, “tame and timid as he thought me, what I dare to do, to avoid so hated a compulsion, and a man capable of a baseness so premeditatedly vile and inhuman.” ↩

  257. See Letter 263. ↩

  258. The lady had made an attempt to send away a letter. ↩

  259. See the preceding Letter. ↩

  260. See the next Letter. ↩

  261. See Letter 175. ↩

  262. See Letter 261. ↩

  263. See Letter 171. ↩

  264. Mrs. Norton, having only the family representation and invectives to form her judgment upon, knew not that Clarissa had determined against going off with Mr. Lovelace; nor how solicitous she had been to procure for herself any other protection than his, when she apprehended that, if she stayed, she had no way to avoid being married to Mr. Solmes. ↩

  265. See the next letter. ↩

  266. See Letter 229. ↩

  267. See Letter 252. ↩

  268. See Letter 275. ↩

  269. See Letter 48. ↩

  270. The letter she encloses was Mr. Lovelace’s forged one. See Letter 239. ↩

  271. See Letter 238. ↩

  272. See Letter 240. ↩

  273. His forged letter. See Letter 239. ↩

  274. It is proper to observe, that there was a more natural reason than this that the Lady gives for Mr. Lovelace’s blushing. It was a blush of indignation, as he owned afterwards to his friend Belford, in conversation; for the pretended Lady Betty had mistaken her cue, in condemning the house; and he had much ado to recover the blunder; being obliged to follow her lead, and vary from his first design; which was to have the people of the house spoken well of, in order to induce her to return to it, were it but on pretence to direct her clothes to be carried to Hampstead. ↩

  275. The attentive reader need not be referred back for what the Lady nevertheless could not account for, as she knew not that Mr. Lovelace had come at Miss Howe’s letters; particularly that in Letter 183 which he comments upon in Letter 183. ↩

  276. See Letter 239. ↩

  277. See Letter 229. ↩

  278. See Letter 251. ↩

  279. Dr. Lewen, in Letter 427 presses her to this public prosecution, by arguments worthy of his character; which she answers in a manner worthy of hers. See Letter 428. ↩

  280. See the note in Letter 315. ↩

  281. The seven-o’clock prayers at St. Dunstan’s have been since discontinued. ↩

  282. See Letter 320. ↩

  283. See Letter 330. ↩

  284. See Letter 252. ↩

  285. See Letter 339. ↩

  286. See Letter 336. ↩

  287. This was printed as June in the published work but is clearly an error. —⁠Editor ↩

  288. See Mr. Lovelace’s billet to Miss Howe, Letter 332. ↩

  289. See Letter 344. ↩

  290. The 24th of July, Miss Clarissa Harlowe’s birthday. ↩

  291. See the preceding Letter. ↩

  292. See Letter 327. ↩

  293. See Letter 329. ↩

  294. See Letter 332. ↩

  295. See Letter 328. ↩

  296. Those parts of this letter which are marked with an angle quote (thus ‹) were afterwards transcribed by Miss Howe in Letter 373 written to the Ladies of Mr. Lovelace’s family; and are thus distinguished to avoid the necessity of repeating them in that letter. ↩

  297. See Letter 318. ↩

  298. See Letter 308. ↩

  299. See Letter 144. ↩

  300. This was erroneously given as Thursday in the original. —⁠Editor ↩

  301. See Letter 343. ↩

  302. See Letter 360. ↩

  303. She takes in the time that she appointed to meet Mr. Lovelace. ↩

  304. Letters 364, 365, 366. ↩

  305. See Letter 365. ↩

  306. See Letter 365. ↩

  307. See Letter 364. ↩

  308. Mr. Lovelace could not know, that the lady was so thoroughly sensible of the solidity of this doctrine, as she really was: for, in her letter to Mrs. Norton, (Letter 362), she says⁠—“Nor let it be imagined, that my present turn of mind proceeds from gloominess or melancholy: for although it was brought on by disappointment, (the world showing me early, even at my first rushing into it, its true and ugly face), yet I hope, that it has obtained a better root, and will every day more and more, by its fruits, demonstrate to me, and to all my friends, that it has.” ↩

  309. In Lithuania, the women are said to have so allowedly their gallants, called adjutores, that the husbands hardly ever enter upon any part of pleasure without them. ↩

  310. See Letter 208. ↩

  311. See Letter 366. ↩

  312. See Letter 364. ↩

  313. See Letter 364 and Letter 386. ↩

  314. See Letter 366. ↩

  315. See Letter 366. ↩

  316. See Letter 80. ↩

  317. Dr. Lewen. ↩

  318. See Letter 373. ↩

  319. See Letter 359. ↩

  320. See Miss Harlowe’s Letter 386. ↩

  321. See Letter 386. ↩

  322. See the paragraph marked with an angle quote (thus ‹), Letter 388. ↩

  323. In the fire-scene, Letter 225. ↩

  324. Letter 281 in the penknife-scene. ↩

  325. See Letter 402. ↩

  326. 1.

    		 A letter from Miss Montague, dated

    2.

    		 A copy of my answer

    3.

    		 Mr. Belford’s Letter to me, which will show you what my request was to him, and his compliance with it; and the desired extracts from his friend’s letters

    , .

    4.

    		 A copy of my answer, with thanks; and requesting him to undertake the executor-ship

    .

    5.

    		 Mr. Belford’s acceptance of the trust

    .

    6.

    		 Miss Montague’s letter, with a generous offer from Lord M. and the Ladies of that family

    .

    7.

    		 Mr. Lovelace’s to me

    .

    8.

    		 Copy of mine to Miss Montague, in answer to hers of the day before

    .

    9.

    		 Copy of my answer to Mr. Lovelace

    .

    ↩

  327. See Letter 32. ↩

  328. 1.

    A copy of mine to my sister, begging off my father’s malediction

    dated July 21

    2.

    My sister’s answer

    dated July 27

    3.

    Copy of my second letter to my sister

    dated July 29

    4.

    My sister’s answer

    dated Aug. 3

    5.

    Copy of my Letter to my mother

    dated Aug. 5

    6.

    My uncle Harlowe’s letter

    dated Aug. 7

    7.

    Copy of my answer to it

    dated the 10th

    8.

    Letter from my uncle Antony

    dated the 12th

    9.

    And lastly, the copy of my answer to it

    dated the 13th

    ↩

  329. She means that of making Mr. Belford her executor. ↩

  330. For what these gentlemen mean by the Roman style, see Letter 31 in the first note. ↩

  331. See Letter 399. ↩

  332. Textual error: was shown in original as . —⁠Editor ↩

  333. Mr. Belford’s objections, That virtue ought not to suffer in a tragedy, is not well considered: Monimia in the Orphean, Belvidera in Venice Preserved, Athenais in Theodosius, Cordelia in Shakespeare’s King Lear, Desdemona in Othello, Hamlet, (to name no more), are instances that a tragedy could hardly be justly called a tragedy, if virtue did not temporarily suffer, and vice for a while triumph. But he recovers himself in the same paragraph; and leads us to look up to the future for the reward of virtue, and for the punishment of guilt: and observes not amiss, when he says, He knows not but that the virtue of such a woman as Clarissa is rewarded in missing such a man as Lovelace. ↩

  334. See Letter 429. ↩

  335. The Rev Mr. Norris, of Bremerton. ↩

  336. Madam Maintenon was reported to have prevailed upon Louis XIV of France, in his old age, (sunk, as he was, by ill success in the field), to marry her, by way of compounding with his conscience for the freedoms of his past life, to which she attributed his public losses. ↩

  337. This man came from her cousin Morden; as will be seen hereafter, Letters 455 and 459. ↩

  338. Letter 429. ↩

  339. Explained in Letter 431. ↩

  340. The stiff visit this good divine was prevailed upon to make her, as mentioned in Letter 75 (of which, however, she was too generous to remind him) might warrant the lady to think that he had rather inclined to their party, as to the parental side, than to hers. ↩

  341. See Letter 407. ↩

  342. See Letter 317. ↩

  343. Her letter, containing the reasons she refers to, was not asked for; and Dr. Lewen’s death, which fell out soon after he had received it, was the reason that it was not communicated to the family, till it was too late to do the service that might have been hoped for from it. ↩

  344. See Letter 409. ↩

  345. See Letter 429. ↩

  346. The former housekeeper at Harlowe-place. ↩

  347. See Letter 405. ↩

  348. Mr. Belford has not yet sent him his last-written letter. His reason for which see Letter 426. ↩

  349. See Letter 426. ↩

  350. See Letter 173. ↩

  351. See Otway’s Orphan. ↩

  352. See Letters 282, 283, 284, 288. ↩

  353. See Letter 282. ↩

  354. See Letter 384. ↩

  355. See Letter 397. ↩

  356. See Letter 397. ↩

  357. See Letter 399. ↩

  358. See Letter 399. ↩

  359. The Windmill, near Slough. ↩

  360. See Letter 423. ↩

  361. See Letter 443. ↩

  362. See Letter 399. ↩

  363. See Letter 440. ↩

  364. It may not be amiss to observe, that Mr. Belford’s solicitude to get back his letters was owing to his desire of fulfilling the lady’s wishes that he would furnish Miss Howe with materials to vindicate her memory. ↩

  365. See Letter 435. ↩

  366. See Letter 426. ↩

  367. See Letter 10. ↩

  368. See Letter 177. ↩

  369. See Letter 397. ↩

  370. See Letter 401. ↩

  371. These are the lines the lady refers to:

    From death we rose to life: ’tis but the same,
    Through life to pass again from whence we came.
    With shame we see our passions can prevail,
    Where reason, certainty, and virtue fail.
    Honour, that empty name, can death despise;
    Scorn’d Love to death, as to a refuge, flies;
    And Sorrow waits for death with longing eyes.
    Hope triumphs o’er the thoughts of death; and Fate
    Cheats fools, and flatters the unfortunate.
    We fear to lose, what a small time must waste,
    Till life itself grows the disease at last.
    Begging for life, we beg for more decay,
    And to be long a dying only pray.

    ↩

  372. Meaning his meditated second violence (See Letter 281) and his succeeding letters to her, supplicating for her pardon. ↩

  373. See Letter 397. ↩

  374. See Letter 401. ↩

  375. See Letter 426. ↩

  376. See Letter 436. ↩

  377. See Letter 448. ↩

  378. Begun on Monday , and by piecemeal finished on Tuesday; but not sent till the Thursday following. ↩

  379. I.e. At the time this Letter was written. ↩

  380. Joy, let me here observe, my dear Sir, by way of note, is not absolutely inconsistent with melancholy; a soft gentle joy, not a rapid, not a rampant joy, however; but such a joy, as shall lift her temporarily out of her soothing melancholy, and then let her down gently into it again; for melancholy, to be sure, her reflection will generally make to be her state. ↩

  381. And here, by way of note, permit me to say, that no sermon I ever composed cost me half the pains that this letter hath done⁠—but I knew your great appetite after, as well as admiration of, the ancient wisdom, which you so justly prefer to the modern⁠—and indeed I join with you to think, that the modern is only borrowed, (as the moon doth its light from the sun), at least, that we excel them in nothing; and that our best cogitations may be found, generally speaking, more elegantly dressed and expressed by them. ↩

  382. See Letter 475. ↩

  383. See Letter 465. ↩

  384. See Letter 460. ↩

  385. See the beginning of Letter 476. ↩

  386. The words thus enclosed [ ] were omitted in the transcript to Mr. Lovelace. ↩

  387. Whoever has seen Dean Swift’s Lady’s Dressing Room, will think this description of Mr. Belford’s not only more natural, but more decent painting, as well as better justified by the design, and by the use that may be made of it. ↩

  388. See Judges 12:6. ↩

  389. See Letter 486. ↩

  390. See the Will. ↩

  391. This letter contains in substance⁠—her thanks to the good woman for her care of her in her infancy; for her good instructions, and the excellent example she had set her; with self-accusations of a vanity and presumption, which lay lurking in her heart unknown to herself, till her calamities (obliging her to look into herself) brought them to light.

    She comforts her on her early death; having finished, as she says, her probatory course, at so early a time of life, when many are not ripened by the sunshine of Divine Grace for a better, till they are fifty, sixty, or seventy years of age.

    I hope, she says, that my father will grant the request I have made to him in my last will, to let you pass the remainder of your days at my Dairy-house, as it used to be called, where once I promised myself to be happy in you. Your discretion, prudence, and economy, my dear, good woman, proceeds she, will male your presiding over the concerns of that house as beneficial to them as it can be convenient to you. For your sake, my dear Mrs. Norton, I hope they will make you this offer. And if they do, I hope you will accept it for theirs.

    She remembers herself to her foster-brother in a very kind manner; and charges her, for his sake, that she will not take too much to heart what has befallen her.

    She concludes as follows:

    Remember me, in the last place, to all my kind well-wishers of your acquaintance; and to those I used to call My Poor. They will be God’s poor, if they trust in Him. I have taken such care, that I hope they will not be losers by my death. Bid them, therefore, rejoice; and do you also, my reverend comforter and sustainer, (as well in my darker as in my fairer days), likewise rejoice, that I am so soon delivered from the evils that were before me; and that I am now, when this comes to your hands, as I humbly trust, exulting in the mercies of a gracious God, who has conducted an end to all my temptations and distresses; and who, I most humbly trust, will, in his own good time, give us a joyful meeting in the regions of eternal blessedness. ↩

  392. See Letter 5. ↩

  393. A blank, at the writing, was left for this date, and filled up on this day. See Letter 454. ↩

  394. The date of the year is left blank for particular reasons. ↩

  395. See Letter 13. ↩

  396. See Letter 147. ↩

  397. See Letter 147. ↩

  398. See Letter 476. ↩

  399. Job 15:31, 32, 33. ↩

  400. See Letter 454. ↩

  401. See Letter 144. ↩

  402. See Letter 346. ↩

  403. See her letter, enclosed in Mr. Lovelace’s, No. 372.

    The reader may observe, by the date of this letter, that it was written within two days of the allegorical one, to which it refers, and while the lady was labouring under the increased illness occasioned by the hurries and terrors into which Mr. Lovelace had thrown her, in order to avoid the visit he was so earnest to make her at Mr. Smith’s; so early written, perhaps, that she might not be surprised by death into a seeming breach of her word.

    High as her Christian spirit soars in this letter, the reader has seen, in Letter 467 and in other places, that that exalted spirit carried her to still more divine elevations, as she drew nearer to her end. ↩

  404. See his delirious Letter, No. 497. ↩

  405. This Letter appears not. ↩

  406. See Letter 510. ↩

  407. See Letter 499. ↩

  408. See Letter 339. ↩

  409. See the Postscript to Letter 443. ↩

  410. See Letter 490. ↩

  411. See Letter 510. ↩

  412. See Letter 511. ↩

  413. The preceding Letter. ↩

  414. What is between crotchets, thus [ ], Mr. Belford omitted in the transcription of this Letter to Miss Howe. ↩

  415. See Letter 42. ↩

  416. See Letter 519. ↩

  417. See Letter 399. ↩

  418. See Letter 2. ↩

  419. In her commonplace book she has the following note upon the recollection of this illness in the time of her distress:

    “In a dangerous illness, with which I was visited a few years before I had the unhappiness to know this ungrateful man! (would to Heaven I had died in it!) my bed was surrounded by my dear relations⁠—father, mother, brother, sister, my two uncles, weeping, kneeling, round me, then put up their vows to Heaven for my recovery; and I, fearing that I should drag down with me to my grave one or other of my sorrowing friends, wished and prayed to recover for their sakes.⁠—Alas! how shall parents in such cases know what to wish for! How happy for them, and for me, had I then been denied to their prayers! But now I am eased of that care. All those dear relations are living still⁠—but not one of them (such as they think, has been the heinousness of my error!) but, far from being grieved, would rejoice to hear of my death.” ↩

  420. These double dates are due to the fact that the United Kingdom had not yet converted to the Gregorian calendar whereas most of Europe had done so. —⁠Editor ↩

  421. See Letter 107. See also Letters 109, 137, 138, and many other places. ↩

  422. See Letter 243.⁠—It may be observed further, that all Clarissa’s occasional lectures to Miss Howe, on that young lady’s treatment of Mr. Hickman, prove that she was herself above affectation and tyranny.⁠—See, more particularly, the advice she gives to that friend of her heart, Letter 243.⁠—“O my dear,” says she, in that Letter, “that it had been my lot (as I was not permitted to live single) to have met with a man by whom I could have acted generously and unreservedly!” etc. etc. ↩

  423. See Letters 235 and 243. ↩

  424. See Letter 243. ↩

  425. See Letters 211, 212. ↩

  426. See Letter 245. ↩

  427. See Letter 467. ↩

  428. See Letter 510. ↩

  429. See Letter 17. ↩

  430. Ecclesiasticus 25:19. ↩

  431. See Letters 515 and 531. ↩

  432. Several worthy persons have wished, that the heinous practice of duelling had been more forcibly discouraged, by way of note, at the conclusion of a work designed to recommend the highest and most important doctrines of Christianity. It is humbly presumed, that these persons have not sufficiently attended to what is already done on that subject in Letter 56 and in Letters 490, 517, 519. ↩

  433. See Letter 194. ↩

  434. Spectator, Vol. I, No. XL. ↩

  435. Yet, in Tamerlane, two of the most amiable characters, Moneses and Arpasia, suffer death. ↩

  436. See Spectator Vol. VII. No. 548. ↩

  437. A caution that our Blessed Saviour himself gives in the case of the eighteen person killed by the fall of the tower of Siloam, Luke 13:4. ↩

  438. Vitiis nemo sine nascitur: optimus ille, Qui minimis urgentur. ↩

  439. Rapin, on Aristotle’s Poetics. ↩

  440. Psalm 73. ↩

  441. See Letter 532. ↩

  442. See Letter 535. ↩

  443. See Letter 419. ↩

  444. And here it may not be amiss to remind the reader, that so early in the work as Letter 82 the dispensations of Providence are justified by herself. And thus she ends her reflections⁠—“I shall not live always⁠—may my closing scene be happy!”⁠—She had her wish. It was happy. ↩

  445. See Letter 193 and Letter 193. ↩

  446. See Letter 346. ↩

  447. See Letter 346. ↩

  448. See Letter 366. ↩

  449. See Letter 520. ↩

  450. See Letter 55. ↩

  451. See Letter 55. ↩

  452. See Letter 346. ↩

  453. See Letter 366. ↩

  454. See Letter 510. ↩

  455. See Letter 227. ↩

  456. This quotation is translated from a Critique on the History of Clarissa, written in French, and published at Amsterdam. The whole Critique, rendered into English, was inserted in the Gentleman’s Magazine of and . The author has done great honour in it to the History of Clarissa; and as there are Remarks published with it, which answer several objections made to different passages in the story by that candid foreigner, the reader is referred to the aforesaid Magazine for both. ↩

  457. See Letter 182. ↩

  458. See her mother’s praises of her to Mrs. Norton, Letter 39. ↩

  459. See Letter 529. ↩

  460. See Letter 158, towards the conclusion. ↩

  461. See Letter 170. ↩

  462. See Letter 170. ↩