I know not to what sacrifices you allude in saying, there exist some which are too great for you to make. Worldly possessions, I am certain, are without value in your eyes: should then hereafter generosity or a sense of justice require of you some trifling renunciation in this respect, could it possibly cost you much pain, or would you long deliberate what course you should adopt? In order to be rich and powerful, Elizabeth needed not to become the heiress of Torrenburg. Independent of her husband’s attachment, fortune had already rendered her mistress of sufficient wealth to make it easy for her to afford posterity an admirable example of self-denial. She who can dispose of castles and villages[2] without receiving on the one hand any return but ingratitude, and on the other but hatred and rebellion, may surely bring herself in the course of time to restore those possessions (to which the prepossession of her fascinated husband could in _fact_ give her no right) to the forsaken innocent orphans, whose claims have so undeservedly been set aside. How glorious a recompense _hereafter_ would she earn by such an act! What gratitude, what tranquillity of soul would she obtain at _present_! what rapturous admiration would she be viewed with even by the latest posterity! How shining and how distinguished would be the place allotted to her among the illustrious ladies, who derive their blood from the Counts of Carlsheim and Sargans. Footnote 2: Elizabeth of March (who inherited from her husband the valuable county of Torrenburg and other extensive possessions to the exclusion of his natural heirs) bestowed considerable districts of her territory on the people of Zurich, which excited great discontent among her vassals. _Elizabeth to Conrad._ Conrad, what am I to think of you?—you almost adopted in your first letters to me the tone of adoration; I was a “model of female constancy;” I was “an unequalled woman.” In your last, the secret seems to have escaped you, “that nothing but the prepossession of a fascinated husband could have made me what I am.” I guess your views: you hope to draw from me some decision favorable to the claims of the Damsels of Werdenberg; but in truth I am not arrived at such high excellence in the science of self-denial. It is easy, my good Abbot, to give away half our property out of pure _generosity_, even though we meet in return with nothing but ingratitude; but it is hard, very hard to bestow that same half on those who think they have a _title_ to it, even though all the universe should admire and praise us for ... having done our _duty_. My brother Oswald, who has arrived here within these few days, salutes you, and recommends himself to your prayers. _Conrad to Elizabeth._