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"I hope 'tis nothing but her extreme sensibility, and that after those first violent struggles are over, reason and discretion will reassume their empire."

— Sheridan [née Chamberlaine], Frances (1724-1766)

Author

Sheridan [née Chamberlaine], Frances (1724-1766)

Work Title

Memoirs of Miss Sidney Bidulph

Place of Publication

London

Publisher

Printed for R. and J. Dodsley

Date

1761

Metaphor

"I hope 'tis nothing but her extreme sensibility, and that after those first violent struggles are over, reason and discretion will reassume their empire."

Metaphor in Context

The noise she heard in the court, and which she took for the chariot, was nothing more than a little market-cart, which was used to carry home provisions, and which now arrived filled with necessaries for the house; and on its entering the court, she observed one of the servants lock the gate and take the key out. This action seemed to deprive her almost of her reason. She cast a frantic look at me, What, sir, am I a prisoner then? Am I to be detained here by force? No, no, I must not suffer this, starting up from her seat, I drew near her, and ventured to lay hold of her hand. Let me go, sir; let me be gone from hence this minute. Whither would you go, madam? Home, home; whither should I go but home to my mama! Unkind, said I, 'tis to Falkland you would fly, not to your mama; but remember he is now perhaps the husband of Cecilia. --What have I done to you, cried she, that you treat me thus inhumanly? A flood of tears succeeded her words. 'Tis a trite observation, that nothing affects a man so much as weeping beauty. I now felt the truth of it, and was really so touched at her tears, that I fell on my knees before her, and said as many tenderly extravagant things, as if I had been actually over head and ears in love; but the obdurate fair was not to be moved. Let me be gone, sir, let me go home to my mama, was the burden of her song. But think of the consequences, madam, think of your reputation; 'tis already known that you have passed two nights in my lodgings. --In your lodgings, sir! Yes, madam, those apartments in which you spent two nights at Brumpton, are mine; it will be known that you left them in my chariot, and that I accompanied you out of town, and that at a time too, when you expected to receive a visit from your uncle. It will be known, that, instead of returning home, you retired to the house of my particular friend, a single man, no lady to bear you company, and that I attended you hither: what must the world think of all this, madam? Will it not naturally conclude me to be already possessed of that happy title to which I aspire? And will it not be more for your honour, permit me to say, for the honour of your family too, to give proof to this natural conclusion, than by undeceiving people, to leave them at liberty to judge (pardon me, if I presume to say) perhaps very unfavourably of your conduct? She wrung her hands with all the marks of the bitterest anguish. I endeavoured to sooth her. Sometimes I implored her pity, and in the humblest language beseeched her to grant me the return I desired; then again I represented to her the precipice on which she stood. This last idea seemed to strike her with horror, and I really thought, more than once, that she gave some indications of a situation of mind too alarming to name; yet I hope 'tis nothing but her extreme sensibility, and that after those first violent struggles are over, reason and discretion will reassume their empire; and that finding she has no other party to choose, she will condescend to be lady Audley, with no other stain than what matrimony will wipe out, that of running away with her lover, rather than continue Miss Arnold with an indelible blot on her reputation.
(pp. 185-8)