Letters of affaires love and courtship. Written to several persons of honour and quality; / by the exquisite pen of Monsieur de Voiture, a member of the famous French Academy established at Paris by Cardinall de Richelieu. English'd by J.D.

To Mademoiselle — LETTER XXXII.

MADAM,

THe greatest pleasure I ever had in my life is that of having seen you, and the greatest torment, that of being incap∣able to see you again. May I perish, if my eies could fasten on any thing they thought pleasant since I parted from you! I have left at Blois all the enjoyments I was wont to finde here, and I am more disordered at Paris, then ever I was in any place. And yet I should be much troubled to be lesse afflicted, and am even in love with my sadnesse when I but consider that you would be satisfied with the sight of it. It is certainlie but just that so great a good fortune as that of having found you, should cost me something, nay, though I forfeited all the tranquillitie of this life, I should not think I had bought it at too deare a rate. The least reflection, or the remembrance of the most inconsi∣derable of your actions, or of but some expression of yours, findes me a satisfaction, greater then the affliction all the mis∣fortunes in the World are able to give me, and, even at the same time that I suffer, that I see you not, and am in doubt whether you love me. I would not change conditions with those who are most fortunate, who see, and who enjoy. So great resolution, where there is so much occasion of disturbance, can∣not certainlie but raise in me a serious beliefe that you dissem∣bled not, when you told me that you had bestowed your heart on me; for had I no other then my own, I were not able to hold out against so manie sorrows, and I am satisfied that I can∣not

have such an extraordinarie strength of my self, but must needs have derived it from you. To deal truelie with you, it is, I must confesse a verie strange adventure that's happened to me, to have found in one single person, whatever this World calls amiable, to have no sooner seen her then lov'd her, and to have no sooner lov'd her then lost her, that my felicitie hath been raised and laied on an instant, and that, in so short a time, I have had so much reason to enjoy and to bemoane my selfe. However it be, I cannot but think that a happie hour wherein I saw you, and would not part with the Idaea that remaines of you in my imagination, for all that is most substantial upon earth. I shall be further confi••med in this opinion according to what answer you shall make me, which if it prove as favourable as the words you last gave me, I shall think all I suffer for you well bestowed. You may then safelie slight the danger you say there is in writing, and put your self to some hazard to deliver me out of that I shall be in, if you quit your tendernesse of me. Be pleased therefore to consider, that nothing laies a greater obligation on a candid Soul then an absolute confidence, and that it is but just, you should afford some little comfort to a man, who desires no more, and cannot have any but what he receives from you.