"I proceeded therefore--That I loved Familiar-letter-writing, as I had more than once told her, above all the species of writing: It was writing from the heart (without the fetters prescribed by method or study) as the very word 'Cor-respondence' implied"
— Richardson, Samuel (bap. 1689, d. 1761)
Place of Publication
London
Publisher
Printed for S. Richardson
Date
1751
Metaphor
"I proceeded therefore--That I loved Familiar-letter-writing, as I had more than once told her, above all the species of writing: It was writing from the heart (without the fetters prescribed by method or study) as the very word 'Cor-respondence' implied"
Metaphor in Context
I proceeded therefore--That I loved Familiar-letter-writing, as I had more than once told her, above all the species of writing: It was writing from the heart (without the fetters prescribed by method or study) as the very word Cor-respondence implied. Not the heart only; the soul was in it. Nothing of body, when friend writes to friend; the mind impelling sovereignly the vassal-fingers. It was, in short, friendship recorded; friendship given under hand and seal; demonstrating that the parties were under no apprehension of changing from time or accident, when they so liberally gave testimonies, which would always be ready, on failure, or infidelity, to be turned against them. --- For my own part, it was the principal diversion I had in her absence: But for this innocent amusement, the distance she so frequently kept me at, would have been intolerable.
(IV, L44, pp. 269-270)
(IV, L44, pp. 269-270)
Provenance
See Elizabeth Heckendorn Cook, Epistolary Bodies: Gender and Genre in the Eighteenth-Century Republic of Letters (Stanford UP, 1996), 87.
Citation
Printed in three installments in 1747-8. Over 25 entries in ESTC (1751, 1759, 1764, 1765, 1768, 1772, 1774, 1780, 1784, 1785, 1788, 1790, 1791, 1792, 1794, 1795, 1798, 1800).
Samuel Richardson, Clarissa. Or, The History of a Young Lady: Comprehending the Most Important Concerns of Private Life. In Eight Volumes. To each of which is added a Table of Contents. The Third Edition. In which Many Passages and Some Letters are Restored from the Original Manuscripts. And to Which is Added, an Ample Collection of such of the Moral and Instructive Sentiments Interspersed Throughout the Work, as may be Presumed to be of General Use and Service, 3rd ed., 8 vols. (London: Printed for S. Richardson, 1751). <Link to ESTC><Link to ECCO>
Samuel Richardson, Clarissa. Or, The History of a Young Lady: Comprehending the Most Important Concerns of Private Life. In Eight Volumes. To each of which is added a Table of Contents. The Third Edition. In which Many Passages and Some Letters are Restored from the Original Manuscripts. And to Which is Added, an Ample Collection of such of the Moral and Instructive Sentiments Interspersed Throughout the Work, as may be Presumed to be of General Use and Service, 3rd ed., 8 vols. (London: Printed for S. Richardson, 1751). <Link to ESTC><Link to ECCO>
Date of Entry
08/02/2016
