Abasement, repentance,
remorse, all combined as they were within him, fall far short of what
he felt; he was degraded in his own eyes, deprived of self-respect, and
stripped of every claim to the confidence of his brother, as he was
to the well-known character for integrity which had been until then
inseparable from the name. That, however, which pressed upon him with
the most intense bitterness was the appalling reflection that he could
no longer depend upon himself, nor put any trust in his own resolutions.
Of what use was he in the world without a will of his own, and the power
of abiding by its decisions? None; yet what was to be done? He could not
live out of the world, and wherever he went, its temptations would beset
him. Then there was his beloved Margaret Murray! was he to make her the
wife of a common drunkard? or did she suspect, when she pledged herself
to him, that she was giving away her heart and affections to a poor
unmanly sot, who had not sense or firmness to keep himself sober? He
felt in a state between distraction and despair, and putting his hands
over his face, he wept bitterly. To complete the picture, his veins
still throbbed with the dry fever that follows intoxication, his stomach
was in a state of deadly sickness and loathing, and his head felt
exactly as if it would burst or fly asunder.
Alas! had his natural character been properly understood and judiciously
managed; had he been early taught to understand and to control his
own obvious errors; had the necessity of self-reliance, firmness, and
independence been taught him; had his principles not been enfeebled
by the foolish praise of his family, nor his vanity inflated by their
senseless appeals to it--it is possible, nay, almost certain, that he
would, even at this stage of his life, have been completely free
from the failings which are beginning even now to undermine the whole
strength of his moral constitution.
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