paternal authority!--What a force united must they be supposed to have,
when singly each consideration is sufficient to carry all before it!

This is the formidable appearance which the address of this
disagreeable man wears at present.

My BROTHER and my SISTER triumph.--They have got me down, as Hannah
overheard them exult. And so they have (yet I never knew that I was
insolently up); for now my brother will either lay me under an obligation
to comply to my own unhappiness, and so make me an instrument of his
revenge upon Lovelace; or, if I refuse, will throw me into disgrace
with my whole family.

Who will wonder at the intrigues and plots carried on by undermining
courtiers against one another, when a private family, but three of
which can possibly have clashing interests, and one of them (as she
presumes to think) above such low motives, cannot be free from them?

What at present most concerns me, is, the peace of my mother's mind!
How can the husband of such a wife (a good man too!--But oh! this
prerogative of manhood!) be so positive, so unpersuadable, to one who
has brought into the family means, which they know so well the value
of, that methinks they should value her the more for their sake?

They do indeed value her: but, I am sorry to say, she has purchased
that value by her compliances; yet has merit for which she ought to be
venerated; prudence which ought of itself to be conformed to in every
thing.

But whither roves my pen? How dare a perverse girl take these