Eloisa : $b or, A series of original letters · Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Letter CIII. From the Baron D’Etange.
Chapter 101 of 159 · 1 min
_In which the preceding billet was inclosed._
If there remains in the mind of a seducer the least sentiment of honour or humanity, answer the billet of an unhappy girl, whose heart you have corrupted, and who would no longer exist, if I could suppose her to have carried the forgetfulness of herself any farther. I should not indeed be much surprized if the same philosophy which taught her to catch at the first man she saw, should also instruct her to disobey her father. Think of this matter. I always chuse to proceed with lenity and decency, when those methods are likely to succeed; but because I act thus with you, you are not to suppose me ignorant in what manner a gentleman should take revenge of those beneath him.