instance it was easy for me to deem that I had committed no crime. I had destroyed a man, noxious to the world; with the wealth by which he afflicted society I had been the means of blessing many; in the individual consequences mankind had really gained by my deed; the general consequence I had overlooked till now, and now it flashed upon me. The scales fell from my eyes, and I knew myself for what I was! All my calculations were dashed to the ground at once, for what had been all the good I had proposed to do--the good I had done--compared to the anguish I now inflicted on your house? Was your father my only victim? Madeline, have I not murdered her also? Lester, have I not shaken the sands in his glass? You, too, have I not blasted the prime and glory of your years? How incalculable--how measureless--how viewless the consequences of one crime, even when we think we have weighed them all with scales that would have turned with a hair’s weight! Yes; before I had felt no remorse. I felt it now. I had acknowledged no crime, and now crime seemed the essence itself of my soul. The Theban’s fate, which had seemed to the men of old the most terrible of human destinies, was mine. The crime--the discovery--the irremediable despair--hear me, as the voice of a man who is on the brink of a world, the awful nature of which Reason cannot pierce--hear me! when your heart tempts to some wandering from the line allotted to the rest of men, and whispers ‘This may be crime in others, but is not so in thee’--tremble; cling fast, fast to the path you are lured to leave. Remember me!