Charlotte Temple by Mrs. Susanna (Haswell) Rowson
page 30 of 137 (21%)
page 30 of 137 (21%)
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will be too much the modern man of refinement, to practice it in their
favour. Gracious heaven! when I think on the miseries that must rend the heart of a doating parent, when he sees the darling of his age at first seduced from his protection, and afterwards abandoned, by the very wretch whose promises of love decoyed her from the paternal roof--when he sees her poor and wretched, her bosom tom between remorse for her crime and love for her vile betrayer--when fancy paints to me the good old man stooping to raise the weeping penitent, while every tear from her eye is numbered by drops from his bleeding heart, my bosom glows with honest indignation, and I wish for power to extirpate those monsters of seduction from the earth. Oh my dear girls--for to such only am I writing--listen not to the voice of love, unless sanctioned by paternal approbation: be assured, it is now past the days of romance: no woman can be run away with contrary to her own inclination: then kneel down each morning, and request kind heaven to keep you free from temptation, or, should it please to suffer you to be tried, pray for fortitude to resist the impulse of inclination when it runs counter to the precepts of religion and virtue. CHAPTER VII. NATURAL SENSE OF PROPRIETY INHERENT IN THE FEMALE BOSOM. "I CANNOT think we have done exactly right in going out this evening, |
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