At least, said I, a little peevishly, let me stay till I am in love, as you are pleased to call it, before I marry.

I would not by any means, replied she, have you marry a man for whom you have not a preferable inclination; but why may you not find, on admitting iVIr. Shirley’s addresses, young, agreeable, worthy, and every way suitable to you, as he is, that he is that man whom your inclination can approve?

I never saw him yet, said I, with the least emotion. I have no aversion to him: I might esteem him: but what is that to the love one is so solemnly to vow to a husband? And should I, after that vow, behold an object whom I could indeed have loved

A Duke de Nemours! said she, taking up the Princess nfClcvcs, that unluckily lay on my table Ah my Henrietta, have I found you out! That princess, my dear, was a silly woman. Her story is written with dangerous elegance; but the whole foimdation of her distresses was an idle one. To fancy herself in love with a mere stranger, because he appeared agreeable at a ball, when she lived hap-])ily M’ith a worthy husband, was mistaking mere ///(//vq — for love, and combating all her life after M’ith a chimera of her own creating. I do not tell you it is impossible for you to meet hereafter with persons in some external accomplishments superior to the deserving man whose wish is to make you happy: but will you suffer your eye to lead you into misery then, when an additional tie of duty forbids its wan-deiiiig? If so, I must suppose it would equally mis — lead you nun\ Tell me, Henrietta, What think you of those girls, who blast all the hopes of their fond parents, by eloping with a well-drest captain, a spruce dancing-master, or a handsome player?

She struck me dumb with shame.

You see then, my dear, the filial duty the duty of a reasonable and modest woman, were she even without parents or friends, forbids fancy to be her guide, as much as the sacred engagement of mar-riage forbids it to be her tormentor.

But have there not been instances, said I; do not you and I know one [we did] in this neighbour-hood, where a truly good woman v, as made misera — ble for years, by having her heart and hand differ — ently engaged?

Mrs. Eggletoii reminded me, that there were, in that case, such extremely particular circumstances, as made it absurd to form from thence a general judgment, in almost every tiling, said she, we act but upon probabilities; and one exception out of a thousand ought never to determine us. Even this exception in the case you hint at, is owing, in some measure, to a pitiably misguided imagination. Let us take our rules, my dear, from plain common sense, and not fro.n poetical refinements.