Jane Sinclair; Or, The Fawn Of Springvale - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two by William Carleton
page 57 of 201 (28%)
page 57 of 201 (28%)
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unconnected with any relative association, and one on which the heart
will dwell with delight while nothing intrudes to disturb its serenity, so long was the contemplation of perfect happiness. But the moment she approached her family, or found herself on the eve of taking another step in its progress, such was her almost morbid candor, and her timid shrinking from any violation of truth, that her affection for this very reason became darkened, as she herself said, by snatches of melancholy and pain. It is indeed difficult to say whether such a tender perception of good and evil as characterized all her emotions, may not have predisposed her mind to the unhappy malady which eventually overcame it; or whether, on the other hand, the latent existence of the malady in her temperament may not have rendered such perceptions too delicate for the healthy discharge of human duties. Be this as it may, our innocent and beautiful girl is equally to be pitied; and we trust that in either case the sneers of the coarse and heartless will be spared against a character they cannot understand. At all events, it is we think slightly, and but slightly evident, that even at the present stage of her affection, something prophetic of her calamity, in a faintly perceptible degree may, to an observing mind, be recognized in the vivid and impulsive power with which that affection has operated upon her. If anything could prove this, it is the fervency with which, previous to the hour of appointment, she bent in worship before God, to beseech His pardon for the secret interview she was about to give her lover. And in any other case, such an impression, full of religious feeling as it was, would have prevented the subject of it from acting contrary to its tendency; but here was the refined dread of error, lively even to acuteness, absolutely incapable of drawing back |
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