The Fortunes and Misfortunes of the Famous Moll Flanders

I had weight of guilt upon me enough to sink any creature who had the

least power of reflection left, and had any sense upon them of the

happiness of this life, of the misery of another; then I had at first

remorse indeed, but no repentance; I had now neither remorse nor

repentance. I had a crime charged on me, the punishment of which was

death by our law; the proof so evident, that there was no room for me

so much as to plead not guilty. I had the name of an old offender, so

that I had nothing to expect but death in a few weeks' time, neither

had I myself any thoughts of escaping; and yet a certain strange

lethargy of soul possessed me. I had no trouble, no apprehensions, no

sorrow about me, the first surprise was gone; I was, I may well say, I

know not how; my senses, my reason, nay, my conscience, were all

asleep; my course of life for forty years had been a horrid

complication of wickedness, whoredom, adultery, incest, lying, theft;

and, in a word, everything but murder and treason had been my practice

from the age of eighteen, or thereabouts, to three-score; and now I was

engulfed in the misery of punishment, and had an infamous death just at

the door, and yet I had no sense of my condition, no thought of heaven

or hell at least, that went any farther than a bare flying touch, like

the stitch or pain that gives a hint and goes off. I neither had a

heart to ask God's mercy, nor indeed to think of it. And in this, I

think, I have given a brief description of the completest misery on

earth.

All my terrifying thoughts were past, the horrors of the place were

become familiar, and I felt no more uneasiness at the noise and

clamours of the prison, than they did who made that noise; in a word, I

was become a mere Newgate-bird, as wicked and as outrageous as any of

them; nay, I scarce retained the habit and custom of good breeding and

manners, which all along till now ran through my conversation; so

thorough a degeneracy had possessed me, that I was no more the same

thing that I had been, than if I had never been otherwise than what I

was now.

In the middle of this hardened part of my life I had another sudden

surprise, which called me back a little to that thing called sorrow,

which indeed I began to be past the sense of before. They told me one

night that there was brought into the prison late the night before

three highwaymen, who had committed robbery somewhere on the road to

Windsor, Hounslow Heath, I think it was, and were pursued to Uxbridge

by the country, and were taken there after a gallant resistance, in

which I know not how many of the country people were wounded, and some

killed.