The father, as is usual in such cases, was the last to hear it; and believing me to be an excellent shot, and a keen sportsman, all he requires in a son-in-law, except a good family, he proposed the match to my father, who gladly embraced the offer, and fills his letters with blossoms, blushes, and unsophisticated charms; congratulates me on my conquest, and talks either of recalling me shortly to England, or bringing the fair _fifteen_ and old _Nimrod_ to Ireland on a visit with him. But the former he will not easily effect, and the latter I know business will prevent for some weeks, as he writes that he is still up to his ears in parchment deeds, leases, settlements, jointures. Mean time, “Song, beauty, youth, love, virtue, joy, this group Of bright ideas, flowers of Paradise as yet unforfeit,” crown my golden hours of bliss; and whatever may be my destiny, I will at least rescue one beam of unalloyed felicity from its impending clouds--for, oh! my good friend, there is a prophetic something which incessantly whispers me, that in clouds and storms will the evening of my existence expire. Adieu, H. M. LETTER XXIII. TO J. D. ESQ., M. P. It is certain, that you men of the world are nothing less than men of _pleasure_:--would you taste it in all its essence, come to Inismore. Ah! no, pollute not with your presence the sacred _palladium_ of all the primeval virtues; and attempt not to participate in those pure joys of the soul it would be death in me to divide even with you Here Plato might enjoy, and Epicurus revel: here we are taught to feel according to t. doctrine of the latter, that the happiness of mankind consists in _pleasure_, not such as arises from gratification of the senses, or the pursuits of vice--but from the enjoyments of the mind, the pleasures of the imagination, the affections of the heart and the sweets of virtue. And here we learn, according to the precepts of the former, that the summit of human felicity may be attained, by removing from the material, and approaching nearer to the intellectual world; by curbing and governing the passions, which are so much oftener inflamed by imaginary than real objects; and by borrowing from temperance, that zest which can alone render pleasure forever poignant and forever new. Ah! you will say, like other lovers, you now see the moral as well as the natural world through a prism; but would this unity of pleasure and virtue be found in the wilds of Inismore, if Glorvina was no longer there? I honestly confess to you I do not think it would, for where yet was pleasure ever found where woman was not? and when does the heart so warmly receive the pure impressions of virtue, as when its essence is imbibed from woman’s lip?