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countenance I shall never forget, as you said that I could not

have addressed you in any possible way that would induce

you to accept me.'

'Oh, do not repeat what I then said. These recollections

will not do at all. I assure you that I have long been most

heartily ashamed of it.'

Darcy mentioned his letter. 'Did it,' said he, -- 'did it

_soon_ make you think better of me? Did you, on reading it,

give any credit to its contents?'

She explained what its effects on her had been, and how

gradually all her former prejudices had been removed.

'I knew,' said he, 'that what I wrote must give you pain,

but it was necessary. I hope you have destroyed the letter.

There was one part, especially the opening of it, which I

should dread your having the power of reading again. I can

remember some expressions which might justly make you

hate me.'

'The letter shall certainly be burnt, if you believe it

essential to the preservation of my regard; but, though we

have both reason to think my opinions not entirely unalter-

able, they are not, I hope, quite so easily changed as that

implies.'

'When I wrote that letter,' replied Darcy, 'I believed my-

self perfectly calm and cool; but I am since convinced that

it was written in a dreadful bitterness of spirit.'

'The letter, perhaps, began in bitterness, but it did not

end so. The adieu is charity itself. But think no more of

the letter. The feelings of the person who wrote and the

person who received it are now so widely different from

what they were then, that every unpleasant circumstance

attending it ought to be forgotten. You must learn some

of my philosophy. Think only of the past as its remem-

brance gives you pleasure.'

'I cannot give you credit for any philosophy of the kind.

_Your_ retrospections must be so totally void of reproach,

that the contentment arising from them is not of philosophy,

but, what is much better, of ignorance. But with _me,_ it

is not so. Painful recollections will intrude, which cannot,

which ought not to be repelled. I have been a selfish being

all my life, in practice, though not in principle. As a child

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