Confession; Or, The Blind Heart. A Domestic StorySimms, William Gilmore
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Confession; Or, The Blind Heart. A Domestic Story
Simms, William Gilmore
Domestic fiction
What were my own features then? What the expression of my eyes? It was
well that I could not see them; I felt that they must be frightful. But
what did I expect to see in this espionage? As I live, honestly now, and
with what degree of honesty I then possessed, I may truly declare that
when I THOUGHT upon the subject at all, I had no more suspicion that my
wife would be guilty of any gross crime, than I had of the guilt of the
Deity himself. Far from it. Such a fancy never troubled me. But, what
was it to me, loving as I did, exclusive, and selfish, and exacting as
I was--what was it to me if, forbearing all crime of conduct, she yet
regarded another with eyes of idolatry--if her mind was yielded up to
him in deference and regard; and thoughts, disparaging to me, filled her
brain with his superior worth, manners, merits? He had tastes, perhaps
talents, which I had not. In the forum, in all the more energetic, more
imposing performances of life, William Edgerton, I knew, could take no
rank in competition with myself. But I was no ladies' man. I had no arts
of society. My manners were even rude. My address was direct almost to
bluntness. I had no discriminating graces, and could make no sacrifice,
in that school of polish, where the delicacy is too apt to become false,
and the performances trifling. It is idle to dwell on this; still more
idle to speculate upon probable causes. It may be that there are persons
in the world of both sexes, and governed by like influences, who have
been guilty of like follies; to them my revelations may be of service.
My discoveries, if I have made any, were quite too late to be of much
help to me.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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