. Falkland in his maturer years, and have always
admired him as the living model of liberality and goodness. If you could change
all my ideas, and show me that there was no criterion by which vice might be
prevented from being mistaken for virtue, what benefit would arise from that? I
must part with all my interior consolation, and all my external connections. And
for what? What is it you propose? The death of Mr. Falkland by the hands of the
hangman?
    No. I will not hurt a hair of his head, unless compelled to it by a
principle of defence. But surely you owe me justice?
    What justice? The justice of proclaiming your innocence? You know what
consequences are annexed to that. But I do not believe I shall find you
innocent. If you even succeed in perplexing my understanding, you will not
succeed in enlightening it. Such is the state of mankind, that innocence when
involved in circumstances of suspicion can scarcely ever make out a
demonstration of its purity, and guilt can often make us feel an insurmountable
reluctance to the pronouncing it guilt. Meanwhile for the purchase of this
uncertainty I must sacrifice all the remaining comforts of my life. I believe
Mr. Falkland to be virtuous, but I know him to be prejudiced. He would never
forgive me even this accidental parley, if by any means he should come to be
acquainted with it.
    Oh, argue not the consequences that are possible to result! answered I
impatiently. I have a right to your kindness; I have a right to your assistance!
    You have them. You have them to a certain degree; and it is not likely that
by any process of examination you can have them entire. You know my habits of
thinking. I regard you as vicious; but I do not consider the vicious as proper
objects of indignation and scorn. I consider you as a machine: you are not
constituted, I am afraid, to be greatly useful to your fellow men; but you did
not make yourself; you are just what circumstances irresistibly compelled you to
be. I am sorry for your ill properties; but I entertain no enmity against you,
nothing but benevolence. Considering you in the light in which I at present
consider you, I am ready to contribute every thing in my power to your real
advantage, and would gladly assist you, if I knew how, in detecting and
extirpating the errors that have misled you. You have disappointed me, but I
have no reproaches to utter: it is more necessary for me to feel compassion for
you, than that I
