'You have supposed me dead; though by what strange accident I cannot divine. Under that supposition, it was my miraculous fortune, my ecstatic bliss, to hear you, with a purity of heart and a dignity of sentiment such as none but a heart like yours could conceive or express, avow a former partiality in favour of one who, whatever may be his other faults, would gladly resign his life to secure your happiness: of one who, in his over-weening affection has fondly and foolishly cherished the persuasion that this happiness is inseparable from his own: nay who partly hopes and partly believes, so blind is his egotism, that he is the only man on earth who fully comprehends your wonderful worth and matchless virtues; and who is pursuing the fixed purpose of his soul, that of finally deserving you, from the conviction that he through life will be invariable in that admiration, that tenderness, and that unceasing love without which the life of Olivia might perhaps be miserable. These may be the dreams of vanity, and folly: yet, if I do not mistake, they are the dreams of all lovers. They are indeed the aliment or rather the very essence of love. What delight can equal that of revelling, in imagination, on the happiness we can bestow on those who have bliss so ineffable to bestow upon us? 'What then if I were to see this Olivia mated with a man so dull of faculty as soon to lose all sense of the wondrous treasure in his possession: who never perhaps had any discriminating knowledge of its worth; and who shall be willing to barter it for any vile and contemptible gewgaw that may allure his depraved taste, or sickly appetite? Is there no such man? Are these fears wholly groundless? 'At what an immeasurable distance do I seem cast from the enjoyment of that supreme bliss to which, perhaps, the frenzy only of imagination could make me aspire! There is but one means by which I can be happy. Either I am to be the most favoured of mankind, or I am nothing. Either I rise into godlike existence, or I sink unknown and never to be remembered. Either we are made for each other, or--I dare not think on the reverse. It is too distracting. 'Yet I have no hope! What I now write is presumption, is madness! And why? It is not your beauty, your virtues, or the supreme qualities of your mind that would raise this gulph of misery between us. No. Avarice, vanity, and prejudice are my enemies. It is they that would sacrifice you at their altars. That you will persevere in your refusal is my only hope.