acted by a person of the most spotless
purity as I have done, if you, by rejecting me, show that I have offended
beyond the possibility of forgiveness.

I do most solemnly assure you that no temporal or worldly views induce me
to this earnest address. I deserve not forgiveness from you. Nor do my
Lord M. and his sisters from me. I despise them from my heart for
presuming to imagine that I will be controuled by the prospect of any
benefits in their power to confer. There is not a person breathing, but
yourself, who shall prescribe to me. Your whole conduct, Madam, has been
so nobly principled, and your resentments are so admirably just, that you
appear to me even in a divine light; and in an infinitely more amiable
one at the same time than you could have appeared in, had you not
suffered the barbarous wrongs, that now fill my mind with anguish and
horror at my own recollected villany to the most excellent of women.

I repeat, that all I beg for the present is a few lines to guide my
doubtful steps; and, if possible for you so far to condescend, to
encourage me to hope that, if I can justify my present vows by my future
conduct, I may be permitted the honour to style myself,

Eternally your's,
R. LOVELACE.

LETTER LXXX

MISS CLARISSA HARLOWE, TO LORD M. AND TO THE LADIES OF HIS HOUSE
[IN REPLY TO MISS MONTAGUE'S OF AUG. 7. SEE LETTER LXXVI. OF THIS VOLUME.]
TUESDAY, AUG. 8.

Excuse me, my good Lord, and my ever-honoured Ladies, from accepting of
your noble quarterly bounty; and allow me to return, with all grateful
acknowledgement, and true humility, the enclosed earnest of your goodness
to me. Indeed I have no need of the one, and cannot possibly want the
other: but, nevertheless have such a sense of your generous favour, that,
to my last hour, I shall have pleasure in contemplating upon it, and be
proud of the place I hold in the esteem of such venerable persons, to
whom I once had the ambition to hope to be related.

But give me leave to express my concern that you have banished your
kinsman from your presence and favour: since now, perhaps, he will be
under less restraint than ever; and since I in particular, who had hoped
by your influence to remain unmolested for the remainder of my days, may
again be subjected to his persecutions.

He has not, my good Lord, and my dear Ladies, offended against you, as he
has against me; yet you could all very generously intercede for him with
me: and shall