itor!--Must I not
be deplorably in love, that can go through these difficulties, encounter
these contempts?--By my soul, I am half ashamed of myself: I, who am
perjured too, by priority of obligation, if I am faithful to any woman
in the world?

And yet, why say I, I am half ashamed?--Is it not a glory to love her
whom every one who sees her either loves, or reveres, or both? Dryden
says,

The cause of love can never be assign'd:
'Tis in no face;--but in the lover's mind.
--And Cowley thus addresses beauty as a mere imaginary:

Beauty! thou wild fantastic ape,
Who dost in ev'ry country change thy shape:
Here black; there brown; here tawny; and there white!
Thou flatt'rer, who comply'st with ev'ry sight!
Who hast no certain what, nor where.

But both these, had they been her contemporaries, and known her, would
have confessed themselves mistaken: and, taking together person, mind,
and behaviour, would have acknowledged the justice of the universal
voice in her favour.

--Full many a lady
I've ey'd with best regard; and many a time
Th' harmony of their tongues hath into bondage
Brought my too-diligent ear. For sev'ral virtues
Have I liked several women. Never any
With so full a soul, but some defect in her
Did quarrel with the noblest grace she ow'd,
And put it to the foil. But SHE!--O SHE!
So perfect and so peerless is created,
Of ev'ry creature's best.

SHAKESP.

Thou art curious to know, if I have not started a new game? If it
be possible for so universal a lover to be confined so long to one
object?--Thou knowest nothing of this charming creature, that thou canst
put such questions to me; or thinkest thou knowest me better than
thou dost. All that's excellent in her sex is this lady!--Until by
MATRIMONIAL or EQUAL intimacies, I have found her less than angel, it is
impossible to think of any other. Then there are so many stimulatives
to such a spirit as mine in this affair, besides love: such a field of
stratagem and contrivance, which thou knowest to be the delight of my
heart. Then the rewarding end of all!--To carry off such a girl as this,
in spite of all her watchful and implacable friends; and in spite of a
prudence and reserve that I never met with in any of the sex;--what a
triumph!--What a triumph over the whole sex!--And then such a revenge to
gratify; which is only at present politically reined in, eventually to
break forth with greater fury--Is it possible, thinkest thou