 part, or break with his uncle entirely, his uneasiness became more insupportable. The tortures which he had felt in observing the favour Celestina had shewn to Montague Thorold, by whispering and laughing with him, gave him a cruel foretaste of what he should suffer were he to see her married to him; yet his reason, whenever he was calm enough to listen to it, told him how absurd, how improper it was, to indulge such sensations of anguish and regret; since, if the relationship which had been hinted at did really subsist between them, he could never take any other part in regard to her than a friendly and fraternal concern in her happiness;

and since the age, family, and circumstances of Montague Thorold were all without objection, he ought, if she believed such an alliance would make her happy, not only to rejoice in it but promote it.
From this, however, his heart absolutely revolted; and all he could prevail upon himself to think of was, to make for Celestina some more ample provision if he was once convinced of their relationship, and to wish her happy: for to see her happy, when another was to be the object of her love, he found would be to him the cruellest punishment that Fate could inflict.
Sometimes he thought, that since every other woman on earth was indifferent to him, he ought to learn to approve of Miss Fitz-Hayman, of whose apparently encreasing affection towards him he could not be insensible. But love was never yet the effect of effort; and while he compared her, with all her laboured accomplishments, to Celestina, he found too certainly that he never could love her, and that with such

sentiments to promise it, was an unworthy prostitution of his honour.
His coldness, however, and visible reluctance, discouraged none of the other parties who desired this marriage: and Miss Fitz-Hayman, with all that pride which her birth, her fortune, and the exalted idea of her own merit, gave her, seemed to be, either from her affection to Willoughby or some other cause, content to receive his hand with the hope of afterwards winning his heart. Convinced that he had no attachment but to Celestina, and certain that the impediments between them must effectually prevent his ever again thinking of her with the fond partiality he had done, she seemed very easy as to his indifference towards herself; foreseeing, perhaps, that their lives would be such after they were married as would very soon produce it, if they did not set out with it: or, to judge more candidly, she
