Lady Mary communicated to her new friend all the difficulties of her situation and confessed to her the true state of her heart. That young lady was not void of compassion for her uneasiness; but told her that while she was encouraging Lord Robert's passion, she was losing his esteem, which alone was worth preserving. 'I allow,' said she, 'that by depriving him of his hopes, you may put an end to his addresses; but consider, my dear Lady Mary, what satisfaction they can afford you if they are only the result of a fondness for your person which would lose all its charms for him as soon as it became familiarized by possession. You would then at once find yourself both neglected and despised by the man for whose sake you had rendered yourself truly despicable. I know you are incapable of an action that would at the same time rid you of his esteem and of the more valuable consciousness of knowing yourself to be truly estimable. I am not of the opinion of those who think chastity the only virtue of consequence to our sex; but it is certainly so very essential to us that she who violates it seldom preserves any other. And how should she? For if there are others as great, greater there cannot be, there is none so necessary. But herein I know you are of my opinion; I only therefore intreat you to shew Lord Robert that you are so; do not let him mistake your real sentiments; nor in order to preserve his love, if custom will oblige me to call his passion by that name, leave him reason to flatter himself that you will fall a victim to his arts and your own weakness. 'Consider with yourself,' continued she, 'which is most desirable, his esteem or his courtship? If you really love him, you can make no comparison between them, for surely there cannot be a greater suffering than to stand low in the opinion of any person who has a great share of our affections. If he neglects you on finding that his criminal designs cannot succeed, he certainly does not deserve your love, and the consciousness of having raised yourself in his opinion and forced him to esteem you, together with the pleasure of reflecting that you have acted as you ought, will afford you consolation.'