The novels of Charles Brockden Brown, consisting of Wieland;or, The transformation. Arthur Mervyn; or, Memoirs of the year 1793. Edgar Huntly; or, Memoirs of a sleep-walker. Jane Talbot. Ormond; or, The secret witness. Clara Howard; or, The enthusiasm of love. With a memoir of the author.

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CLARA HOWARD; OR,

the first transgression she imputed to herself: Wilmot
was the innocent and injured person; she only was the
injurer and criminal. Those upbraidings which the anguish of his heart might have prompted him to use were
anticipated, dwelt uponf and exaggerated; all the miseries
of this alliance passed in as vivid hues before her imagination as before his. These images plunged her into the
most profound and pitiable sorrow.
" Wilmot's generosity would by no means admit that
hers only was the guilt: on the contrary, his candour,
awakened by her example, was busy in aggravating his
own crime. His heart was touched by the proofs of her
extreme dejection, her disinterested regard: he reflected
that her portion of evil was at least equal to his own.
Her sensibility to reputation, her sense of right, her dependence on her father for the means of subsistence, her
attachment to her country and kindred, all contributed
to heighten her peculiar calamity, since she believed her
fame to be blasted forever; since her conscience reproached her with all the guilt of their intercourse; since
her father had sworn never to treat her as his child; since
she had lost, in her own opinion, the esteem of all her
relations and friends, and solemnly vowed never to set
foot in her native country.
" Wilmot's efforts to console his wife produced, insensibly, a salutary effect on his own feelings. Being obliged
to search out topics of comfort for her use, they were
equally conducive to his own, and a habit of regarding
objects on their brightest side-of considering my cousin
as merely a subject of tenderness and compassion-somewhat blunted the edge of his own misfortunes.
"My father took infinite though unsolicited pains to
reconcile the parent and child; but my uncle could not be
prevailed on to do more than allow Wilmot a small annuity,
with which he retired to the town of Nice, and, by a recluse and frugal life, subsisted, if not with elegance, at
least with comfort. Mary Anne was extremely backward
to cultivate the society of her old friends; their good
offices she took pains to repel and elude, and her only
source of consolation with regard to them appeared to
be the hope that they had entirely forgotten her. We,