take shame to myself, and marry.

But if I should, Jack, (with the strongest antipathy to the state that
ever man had,) what a figure shall I make in rakish annals? And can I
have taken all this pains for nothing? Or for a wife only, that, however
excellent, [and any woman, do I think I could make good, because I could
make any woman fear as well as love me,] might have been obtained without
the plague I have been at, and much more reputably than with it? And
hast thou not seen, that this haughty woman [forgive me that I call her
haughty! and a woman! Yet is she not haughty?] knows not how to forgive
with graciousness? Indeed has not at all forgiven me? But holds my soul
in a suspense which has been so grievous to her own.

At this silent moment, I think, that if I were to pursue my former
scheme, and resolve to try whether I cannot make a greater fault serve as
a sponge to wipe out the less; and then be forgiven for that; I can
justify myself to myself; and that, as the fair invincible would say, is
all in all.

As it is my intention, in all my reflections, to avoid repeating, at
least dwelling upon, what I have before written to thee, though the state
of the case may not have varied; so I would have thee to re-consider the
old reasonings (particularly those contained in my answer to thy last*
expostulatory nonsense); and add the new as they fall from my pen; and
then I shall think myself invincible;--at least, as arguing rake to rake.


* See Vol. V. Letter XIV.