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The Adventures of Hugh Trevor

T >> Thomas Holcroft >> The Adventures of Hugh Trevor




'Oh, of that there is no hope.'

'How do you know? I believe you have thought the same of me: but you
may chance to be mistaken. And now I will tell you a secret. I am in
the very predicament of this Wakefield. A relation is dead, who has
left his property away from me: by what right is more than I can
discover; at least in the spirit of those laws which pretend to
regulate such matters: for their spirit is force. Lands wrested from
the helpless they consign to the robber. I am in possession; and doubt
whether, even according to your code, I ought to resign. I certainly
ought not according to my own. I will acknowledge to you that I think
well of the man who claims the property I withhold. But I cannot think
so well of him as of myself: for I cannot be so well acquainted with
his thoughts as with my own. I know my own wants, my own powers, and
my own plans. I should be glad to do him good, but I should be sorry
to do myself ill. You accuse me of having fallen into erroneous
habits, of making false calculations, and of tasting pleasures that
are dangerous and of short duration. I have ridiculed your arguments:
but I have not forgotten them. Neither has the enquiring spirit that
is abroad been unknown to or unnoticed by me. Early powers of mind
gave me the early means of indulgence. I revelled in pleasure,
squandered all I could procure, and was led by one successful artifice
to another, till I became what I can certainly no otherwise justify
than by the selfish spirit of the world. In this I find the rule is
for each to seize on all that he can, with safety; and to swallow,
hoard, or waste it at will. I have attempted to profit by vice which
I knew not how to avoid. But, if there be a safer road to happiness,
I am no idiot: I am as desirous of pursuing it as you can be. The
respect of the world, the security from pains and penalties, and the
approbation of my own heart, are all of them as dear to me as to you.
I have thought much, have had much experience, and have the power of
comparing facts and sensations as largely perhaps as another.

'I will not deny that to trick selfishness by its own arts, to
laugh at its stupidity, and to outwit its contemptible cunning, are
practices that have tickled my vanity; and have perhaps formed one of
my chief sources of pleasure. But habit and pleasure led me to extend
such projects; and to prey upon the well-meaning, and the kind, with
almost as much avidity as on those of an opposite character.

'However, though I did not want plausible arguments in my own
justification, I cannot affirm that my heart was wholly at ease. New
thoughts have occurred, other prospects have been contemplated, and my
dissatisfaction has increased. You cannot but have remarked that, in
the course of human life, most men undergo more than one remarkable
change. The sober man becomes a drunkard, the drunkard sober, and
the spendthrift sometimes a rational economist: though perhaps more
frequently a miser.

'Yet, though I am disposed to alter my conduct, supposing me
to possess the means of bidding defiance to mankind, I have no
inclination to subject myself to their neglect, their pity, or
their scorn. Be it want of courage or want of wisdom, I have not
an intention to shut myself out from society. If I may be admitted
on fair and liberal terms, I am content: but, I honestly tell you,
admitted I will be. I have shut the door of dependency upon myself,
were I so inclined. Offices of trust would not be committed to me.
And to live rejected, in poverty and wretchedness, pointed at and
pretended to be despised by the knaves and fools with whom the world
is filled, is a condition to which I will never submit.

'Consequently, the property of which I have possessed myself I am in
either case determined to use every effort to keep. If I am suffered
to keep it quietly, my present inclinations are what I have been
describing. If contention must come, we must then have a trial of
skill upon the opposite system.'

I listened to this discourse, attentive to every sentence, anxious for
the next, and agitated by various contradictory emotions. I saw the
difficulties of the supposed case; and knew not what to answer, or
what to advise. That a man like this should become what he seemed half
to promise was a thought that consoled and expanded the heart. But
that it should depend upon so improbable an event as that of another
renouncing a claim, which the law gave him, to property in dispute,
was a most painful alternative. My sensations were of hope suddenly
kindled, and as suddenly killed.

After waiting some time without any reply from me, he added 'Let
us suppose, Mr. Trevor, a whimsical, or if you please a strange,
coincidence between the man with whom you have been so angry
and myself. I mean Wakefield. What if he felt some of the sober
propensities toward which I find a kind of a call in myself?'

'He is not to be trusted. In him it would be artifice: or at least
nobody would believe it could be any thing else.'

'Mark now what chance there is, in a world like this, for a man whom
it has once deemed criminal to reform. Oppressed, insulted, and
pursued by the good, what resource has he but to associate with the
wicked?'

'He that, with the fairest seeming and the most specious pretences,
affirming time after time that, though he had deceived before, he
now was honest, he that shall yet again and again repeat his acts
of infamy cannot complain, if no man should be willing to trust his
happiness to such keeping.'

'I find what I am to expect from you. The very same will be said of
me.'

'No: you have not been equally unprincipled, and vile.'

'These are coarse or at least harsh terms. However, I take them to
myself; and affirm that I have.'

'How can you make such an affirmation? How do you know?'

'A man may calculate on probabilities; and this is a moment in which
I do not wish to conceal the full estimate which I make of my own
conduct from you. Being therefore, seriously and speaking to the
best of my judgment, as culpable as Wakefield, let my course of
life hereafter be what it will, I find I am to expect no credit for
sincerity from you?'

'You do not know Wakefield.'

'Neither it seems do you.'

'There is something in your countenance, in your conversation, and in
the free and undisguised honesty even of your vices, that a man like
Wakefield cannot possess.'

'Have you forgotten that, though I can be open and honest, I can be
artful? Do you not remember billiards, hazard, and Bath?'

'Yes: but Wakefield would be incapable of the qualities of mind which
you are now displaying. With you I feel myself in the company of a man
of a perverted but a magnanimous spirit. With all your faults, I could
hug you to my heart. But Wakefield! who made women and men alike his
prey; to whose devilish arts the virtue and happiness of an amiable,
I may say a charming, woman were sacrificed; and the life of one of
the first of mankind was endangered; that he should resemble you, and
especially that he should resemble you with your present inclinations,
oh! would that were possible!'

'There is generosity in the wish. It denotes a power in you of
allaying one of the most active fiends that torment mankind: the
spirit of revenge.'

'It is a spirit I own to which I have been too subject; and which I
could wish to exorcise for ever.'

'Put it to the test. Let us suppose you should discover as much of
promise in Wakefield as you imagine you do in me.'

'I should then put _him_ to the test. I should demand of him to repair
the wrongs he has done Miss Wilmot!'

'What if you should find him already so disposed?'

'Impossible. Or if he were, it would be with some design!'

'Ay: perhaps a proposition that you should leave him quietly possessed
of the disputed property.'

'And, having obtained that, he would desert his second wife as he had
done his first.'

'There is some difference between a young woman and an old one.
Beside, if your account be true, Mrs. Wakefield, though she was your
mother, was very inferior to Miss Wilmot.'

'You forget that he seduced this lady, and deserted her.'

'I have heard or read of a man who, after being divorced even from a
wife, became more passionately in love with her than ever.'

'Wakefield is incapable of love.'

'You frame to yourself a most black and deformed being of this
Wakefield.'

'And you suppose a degree of sympathy, between yourself and him, which
cannot exist.'

'Why not? His wit, person, and manners, I have heard you describe as
winning.'

'I only gave the picture which I had from an affectionate though a
most injured woman.'

'I recollect the story perfectly. When you repeated it,
notwithstanding my raillery, I was more moved than you had reason to
imagine. I am persuaded that Wakefield himself, had he listened to it,
would have felt a few uneasy sensations.'

'I fear not.'

'Why so? Is he made of materials totally different from other men?
Dissect him, and I imagine you will find he has a heart.'

'But of what quality?'

'Better than you at present seem to give him credit for.'

'What grounds have you for thinking so favourably of him?'

'Very excellent. Don't be surprised. I know the man.'

'Is it possible?'

'Where is the wonder? Knaves of other classes associate, and why
should not gamblers?'

'It may be, then, you are deputed to speak in his behalf?'

'I wrote to you, and introduced this conversation, for that very
purpose. I know him as intimately as I can know any man. I would speak
of him as of myself, of his defects as of my own, and I declare it
as my opinion that, if he might be permitted to enjoy his uncle's
property in peace, he would change his system. To this property he
supposes he has the best claim. He is Thornby's heir at law; and, as
to the manner in which the wealth he left was acquired, if a general
inquisition were made into the original right to every species of
property, he is persuaded that ninety-nine rich men in a hundred would
be turned into the streets to beg.'

'What you have related has greatly surprised me. You have pleaded
and continue to plead his cause very powerfully: but have you no
consideration for me? Granting all you have supposed in his favour
possible, am I so situated as to justify a romantic renunciation of
claims which, if asserted, may aid me to accomplish my dearest hopes?'

'To a man like you perhaps I could be contented to resign these
claims. I need not say "perhaps": I am certain I could, were I
thoroughly persuaded you would forsake a life of artifice and plunder,
and were I myself only concerned.

'But that is not the case. I have an object to accomplish so dear to
my heart that it swallows up lesser considerations, and will not allow
me to neglect any honest means by which it may be promoted. Wealth to
me is indispensible; wealth that shall place me on a level with a rich
and proud family with which I have to contend. I have an impulse such
perhaps as you have never felt. There is a woman in the world, endowed
with such qualities that to say I passionately love her is a most
impotent expression of what I feel: for to tenderness and ardour of
affection must be added all that simplicity, purity, and grandeur
of soul can inspire. To think of life without her is to think of a
world sterile, desolate, and joyless: of a night to which day shall
never succeed: and of existence arrested and chained in motionless
despondency.'

'Which might be very pitiful; or very sublime: just as you please: but
which would be very absurd.'

'Granted: but this is the fever of my mind; the disease to which,
should my hopes be disappointed, I feel myself dangerously impelled.'

'The interpretation of all which is, that, though you have discovered
principles, which if pursued would secure to yourself and mankind in
general certain happiness, and that though you can deal forth their
dogmas and point out the path which others indubitably ought to take,
yet, when your own passions are concerned, you act like the rest of
the world. And you do this, not blindly, as they do, but, with your
eyes open; at the moment that you are reminded of your maxims, and
acknowledge their truth.'

'Your accusation is premature. I have hitherto done nothing more than
express my feelings and my doubts.'

'But these doubts, spurred on by these feelings, assure me that you
will proceed against Wakefield.'

'You may think yourself assured: I conceive myself to be uncertain. I
would willingly condemn myself to great punishment, were it to promote
any plan of the goodness of which there should be a conviction. I can
even suppose cases in which I would not only devote my life, for that
in comparison appears to be a trifle, but would resign the woman whom
my soul adores. Sacrifices like these however cannot be expected on
light occasions. The good to be obtained ought to be evidently greater
than the evil to be endured.'

He paused a moment to collect his ideas, and then replied.

'If, Mr. Trevor, you are the man of that eminent virtue which I have
sometimes thought you, and to which by your discourse to me you have
certainly made very lofty pretensions, I would advise you to reflect
on what I shall once more state. I know that this Wakefield, of
whom you think so ill, and who has been quite as guilty as you have
supposed, is now inclined to be a different man. I would have you
consider, first, to whom does the property in justice belong? I think
you will find that to be doubtful. Next, supposing it to be legally
yours, may you not nevertheless be defrauded of it by law? And,
lastly, appeal to your own principles, and ask yourself whether it be
not better that you should have a chance of doing the good which you
conceive would be done, by recovering such a man as Wakefield to that
respect in society by which his talents might be well employed; or
whether it can be consistent with your own sense of right to take
methods which you acknowledge to be precarious, and unjust, in order
to dispossess him and to appropriate that to yourself to which, if you
are impartial, you will perhaps find it difficult to prove, even to
your own satisfaction, that you have a clear and undoubted claim?'

Through this whole scene, instead of diverting my attention from the
argument by gay raillery, witty allusions, or a recurrence to the
depravity of man, and the practice of the world, he kept closely to
the question, preserved the tone of earnest discussion, and, having
uttered what I have last repeated, took his leave with that serious
air which he had thus unexpectedly assumed, and maintained.




CHAPTER II


_The plan of Wakefield pursued, and the hopes and fears of an
affectionate woman: News of Philip: An artless exculpatory tale_


Quitting the place, meditating on the scene that had passed, surprised
at every part of it, at the interested manner of the man, at the
intimate knowledge which he professed to have of Wakefield, at the
promises and the threats which he appeared to make in his name, at
the coincidence not only of their characters, if his account were
true, but at their similar incidents of fortune and corresponding
inclinations to reform, astonished while I recollected these various
particulars, instead of returning immediately to my lodgings I called
on Miss Wilmot.

When I came to the door, I had scarcely decided with myself whether
it were advisable to relate what had passed to her, which as she was
personally in question I thought myself bound to do whenever it could
be done with safety; or whether, if related at present, it might not
excite hopes that would be disappointed, and anxieties prejudicial to
her peace.

She no sooner saw me than she exclaimed--'I am very glad you are come,
Mr. Trevor! I have two unexpected affairs, on which I wish to consult
you. One of them relates to myself; and I will begin with that because
you are not only concerned in it but are appealed to in a very
remarkable manner. I have received two extraordinary letters; by both
of which I have been not a little affected. Pray read this first. It
is from Mr. Wakefield. The promises it contains, the style it assumes,
and the appeal it makes, are so strange as to appear either like
miracle or romance.'

She then gave me a letter, and I read as follows.

'Should you imagine, Lydia, that because I have long forborn all
intercourse with you I have forgotten you, be assured you are
mistaken. I have treated you so shamefully, and deceived you so often,
that I have little right to expect you should believe my professions,
be moved by my intreaties, or remember me with any other feelings than
those of hatred. Yet, to deal sincerely with you, this is what I do
not expect. I have had such proofs of the kindness of your heart, and
the strength of your affection, that my confidence is still entire.

'It is the more unshaken because my own intentions are direct: of
which the plainness with which I shall deliver my thoughts will I
imagine be some proof.

'I once more repeat, I have behaved to you like a ---- Spare me the
word. It is enough to recollect that I have been the thing. I could
plead the extreme vivacity of my youth, my ungovernable passions, and
the dangerous temptation of critical moments; but that I will not
exhibit any feature of pitiful apology, or endeavour to extenuate what
I cannot defend.

'You are intimate with Mr. Trevor. You know that his mother, my late
wife, is dead; and you have heard of a will, said to have been left by
my uncle. I feel but little scruple in affirming that I imbibed many
of the vices of my early youth from being placed under this uncle's
care. That such a man should die like a coward, and endeavour to
disinherit a relation to save his soul, supposing this disinheritance
to be true, would be no miracle. It would only be an act of
contemptible stupidity.

'I will not here enter into any enquiries of a legal kind: for I
will be open enough to own that, being in possession both in right
of my wife and as the heir of my uncle of the property he left, and
determined as I am to assert my claims, which I think paramount to
those of any other person, I will not commit myself even to you. On
the contrary, I write this letter purposely that you may shew it to
Mr. Trevor.

'You will ask my motive for this, and perhaps will be surprised at my
answer.

'By certain whimsical accidents, I have become acquainted with Mr.
Trevor's principles. I believe, or I rather know, him to be possessed
of a heart and understanding equally excellent. I wish to appeal to
them both. When he shall read this, he will have had a conversation
relating to me; which may have led him to expect the language I am
about to use. In an argument concerning property he cannot forget that
he lately delivered himself thus:

"If I strictly adhere to the principle of justice, I must not singly
consider my own wishes; which may create innumerable false wants, and
crave to have them gratified. I must ask is there no being, within my
knowledge, who may be more benefited by the enjoyment of that which
I am desirous to appropriate to myself than I can? If so, what right
have I to prefer self gratification to superior utility?"

'Mine is a case in point.

'Again: property is left for which he may be induced to contend; and
which, should he do so, will probably be dissipated in law. If not, it
may with no less probability be decided by law to be mine. He affirms
that to contend at law is immoral.

'Do you and he listen to what I have now to say.

'I am desirous of totally changing my conduct. I have a heart more
capable of affection than you, Lydia, have reason to suppose; and I
love you. My ambition at present is to do you much more good than
I have ever done you harm. I am once more at my own disposal; and,
unless that ardent love which you formerly bore me be entirely
changed, which I do not believe it is, I am now sincerely desirous to
make you my wife.

'But I will not deceive you. I can only be such a husband as you desire
on condition of being left in quiet possession of that which I believe
to be my own. I have ruined my character. Offices of emolument are
not easily obtained; but, if they were, I am not a man to be trusted.
I will not live a beggar; deprived of all the blessings in which the
fools around me wallow, till they turn them into curses. I wish to
live happily: unmolesting, and unmolested: but, if I must either prey
or be preyed upon, I am still resolved rather to act the fox than the
goose.

'I know you will condemn this determination; but I am speaking openly;
and telling you what my intentions are, without entering into their
defence.

'Supposing Mr. Trevor to be convinced that the law will decide the
property contested in his favour, the sacrifice demanded of him is
perhaps too great to be expected from any man. Yet, from what I have
heard and what I know, this is the sacrifice that I do expect. I
expect it from his abhorrence of pretending to seek justice by the aid
of law. I expect it from that principle which decides in favour of the
greatest good. And I expect it from the earnest desire I have heard
him express that you might be restored to that happiness which, for a
time, you have lost.

'Should he or you conclude that the motives I now urge originate in
that artifice of which I have been very justly accused, I ought
perhaps to feel no surprise, and shall certainly make no complaint.
But, believe me or believe me not, I have spoken with a sincerity of
heart for which I am likely to gain but little credit. Such I feel,
at this moment, are the misfortunes to which cunning subjects itself.
I am a man but little subject to fear: yet, I own, the fear of being
thought still to possess nothing better than this cunning assaults me,
obliges me to omit the tender epithets that are in my thoughts, and
without addition to sign myself

F. WAKEFIELD.'

While I read, the eyes of Miss Wilmot were fixed upon my countenance.
Whenever I looked toward her, I could perceive the strong emotions, of
hope and fear, by which she was agitated.

When I had ended, I said--'Mr. Wakefield is indeed an extraordinary
man! Be his intentions honest or base, the strength and clearness of
his mind and his knowledge of the human heart, when we recollect how
these faculties have been employed, are truly astonishing. If this be
a plan of artifice, it is little less than miraculous. Yet who can
believe it to be any thing else?'

Miss Wilmot heaved a deep sigh, and attempted to speak: but she only
stammered. Her utterance failed; and her eyes were cast on the floor.
Hope and despair were combating; and the latter was the strongest.
She wished to confide, she wished to plead for the possibility of his
being sincere: but the mischief he had inflicted, the deceit he had
practised, and a remembrance of the picture she had formerly given me
of him, rushed upon her mind; and her spirits sunk.

'Look up, lovely Lydia,' said I, taking her hand, 'and revive. There
is, there must be hope. The man who could write this letter cannot be
all villain.'

The struggle of the passions was violent. A momentary wildness, such
as I had formerly witnessed, flashed in her eyes; she started from
her seat, griped my hand, then bursting into tears exclaimed--'Oh Mr.
Trevor!' and dropped down again upon the chair.

Eager to relieve a heart so overcharged, I again addressed her. 'If,'
said I, 'the property left by Mr. Wakefield's uncle can really be
employed to so noble a purpose as that of reclaiming him and making
you happy, let me perish rather than endeavour to counteract such
blessings. Let me be the thing he so much dreads, a beggar: but let me
obey the purest passions of the heart, when they are sanctioned by the
best principles of the understanding.'

Till this instant she had forgotten that, if I consented to enrich
him, I must rob myself. But the thought no sooner occurred than she
cried, 'No! It must not be! It cannot be! To require it of you is
infamous. It debases him, and would make me hate myself; were I to
participate in such an action.'

'You judge too severely,' I replied. 'I am not so unfortunately
circumstanced as he is. My character is not lost. I am not shut out of
society. I have friends, plans, and prospects; and, granting him to
be sincere, his arguments, as far as they relate to him and me, are I
suspect unanswerable. Of that sincerity I would fain not doubt: but it
is our mutual duty to be wary. Here therefore at present the matter
shall rest. I am determined to bring no action, till time and future
events shall teach me the course I ought to pursue.'

Overwhelmed by a sense of obligation, and by the thronging emotions
of every kind that assailed her, she was again half suffocated with
passion. As she recovered her eyes sufficiently spoke her feelings.

When she grew calm, she was led to ask what conversation I had had,
and with whom, relative to Mr. Wakefield? I gave her the history of
my acquaintance with the supposed Belmont, and of the scene that had
passed that very day: which she thought altogether surprising, and
seemed to shrink with the fear that it was an artful plan, contrived
by artful men. She was in some sort appeased, however, when I once
more reminded her of my determination to wait and hope for the best.

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