The Fortunes and Misfortunes of the Famous Moll Flanders

I cannot say, however, that anything he said made impression enough

upon me so as to give me any thought of the matter, till he told me at

last very plainly, that if I refused, he was sorry to add that he could

never go on with me in that station as we stood before; that though he

loved me as well as ever, and that I was as agreeable to him as ever,

yet sense of virtue had not so far forsaken him as to suffer him to lie

with a woman that his brother courted to make his wife; and if he took

his leave of me, with a denial in this affair, whatever he might do for

me in the point of support, grounded on his first engagement of

maintaining me, yet he would not have me be surprised that he was

obliged to tell me he could not allow himself to see me any more; and

that, indeed, I could not expect it of him.

I received this last part with some token of surprise and disorder, and

had much ado to avoid sinking down, for indeed I loved him to an

extravagance not easy to imagine; but he perceived my disorder. He

entreated me to consider seriously of it; assured me that it was the

only way to preserve our mutual affection; that in this station we

might love as friends, with the utmost passion, and with a love of

relation untainted, free from our just reproaches, and free from other

people's suspicions; that he should ever acknowledge his happiness

owing to me; that he would be debtor to me as long as he lived, and

would be paying that debt as long as he had breath. Thus he wrought me

up, in short, to a kind of hesitation in the matter; having the dangers

on one side represented in lively figures, and indeed, heightened by my

imagination of being turned out to the wide world a mere cast-off

whore, for it was no less, and perhaps exposed as such, with little to

provide for myself, with no friend, no acquaintance in the whole world,

out of that town, and there I could not pretend to stay. All this

terrified me to the last degree, and he took care upon all occasions to

lay it home to me in the worst colours that it could be possible to be

drawn in. On the other hand, he failed not to set forth the easy,

prosperous life which I was going to live.

He answered all that I could object from affection, and from former

engagements, with telling me the necessity that was before us of taking

other measures now; and as to his promises of marriage, the nature of

things, he said, had put an end to that, by the probability of my being

his brother's wife, before the time to which his promises all referred.