“Oh! where shall I now seek for probity? Disgusted with a perfidious world, in what happy region does truth conceal herself? Father, I hoped that she resided here; I thought that your bosom had been her favourite shrine. And you too prove false? Oh God! And you too can betray me?”

“Matilda!”

“Yes, Father, Yes! ’Tis with justice that I reproach you. Oh! where are your promises? My novitiate is not expired, and yet will you compel me to quit the monastery? Can you have the heart to drive me from you? And have I not received your solemn oath to the contrary?”

“I will not compel you to quit the monastery: you have received my solemn oath to the contrary. But yet when I throw myself upon your generosity, when I declare to you the embarrassments in which your presence involves me, will you not release me from that oath? Reflect upon the danger of a discovery, upon the opprobrium in which such an event would plunge me: reflect that my honour and reputation are at stake, and that my peace of mind depends on your compliance. As yet my heart is free; I shall separate from you with regret, but not with despair. Stay here, and a few weeks will sacrifice my happiness on the altar of your charms. You are but too interesting, too amiable! I should love you, I should dote on you! My bosom would become the prey of desires which honour and my profession forbid me to gratify. If I resisted them, the impetuosity of my wishes unsatisfied would drive me to madness: if I yielded to the temptation, I should sacrifice to one moment of guilty pleasure my reputation in this world, my salvation in the next. To you then I fly for defence against myself. Preserve me from losing the reward of thirty years of sufferings! Preserve me from becoming the victim of remorse! Your