on a miserable existence in insupportable pain. I am at last, in
recompense for all my labours and my crimes, dismissed from it with the
disappointment of my only remaining hope, the destruction of that for
the sake of which alone I consented to exist. It was worthy of such a
life, that it should continue just long enough to witness this final
overthrow. If however you wish to punish me, you must be speedy in your
justice; for, as reputation was the blood that warmed my heart, so I
feel that death and infamy must seize me together."

I record the praises bestowed on me by Falkland, not because I deserved
them, but because they serve to aggravate the baseness of my cruelty. He
survived this dreadful scene but three days. I have been his murderer.
It was fit that he should praise my patience, who has fallen a victim,
life and fame, to my precipitation! It would have been merciful in
comparison, if I had planted a dagger in his heart. He would have
thanked me for my kindness. But, atrocious, execrable wretch that I have
been! I wantonly inflicted on him an anguish a thousand times worse than
death. Meanwhile I endure the penalty of my crime. His figure is ever in
imagination before me. Waking or sleeping, I still behold him. He seems
mildly to expostulate with me for my unfeeling behaviour. I live the
devoted victim of conscious reproach. Alas! I am the same Caleb Williams
that, so short a time ago, boasted that, however great were the
calamities I endured, I was still innocent.

Such has been the result of a project I formed, for delivering myself
from the evil that had so long attended me. I thought that, if Falkland
were dead, I should return once again to all that makes life worth
possessing. I thought that, if the guilt of Falkland were established,
fortune and the world would smile upon my efforts. Both these events are
accomplished; and it is now only that I am truly miserable.

Why should my reflections perpetually centre upon myself?--self, an
overweening regard to which has been the source of my errors! Falkland,
I will think only of thee, and from that thought will draw ever-fresh
nourishment for my sorrows! One generous, one disinterested tear I will
consecrate to thy ashes! A nobler spirit lived not among the sons of
men. Thy intellectual powers were truly sublime, and thy bosom burned
with a god-like ambition. But of what use are talents and sentiments in
the corrupt wilderness of human society? It is a ran