Date: 1790

"The ruling passion of Mrs. Melbourne's soul was her love of her daughter; but it was carried to an excess that rendered it illiberal and selfish: her mind resembled a convex glass, and every ray of affection in her bosom was concentered in one small point."

— Williams, Helen Maria (1759-1827)

Date: 1790

"The idle crowd in fashion's train, / Their trifling comment, pert reply, / Who talk so much, yet talk in vain, / How pleas'd for thee, Oh nymph, I fly! / For thine is all the wealth of mind, / Thine the unborrow'd gems of thought, / The flash of light, by souls refin'd, / From heav'n's empyreal ...

— Williams, Helen Maria (1759-1827)

Date: 1790

"He was undeceived too late. The world will blame his imprudence, and think he deserved to suffer from it: but, while foresight and policy are so common, let us forgive those few minds of trusting simplicity, who are taught in vain the lesson of suspicion, on whom impressions are easily made, and...

— Williams, Helen Maria (1759-1827)

Date: 1790

"Love comes to the bosom under the gentle forms of esteem, of sympathy, of confidence: we listen with dangerous pleasure to the seducing accents of his voice, till he lifts the fatal veil which concealed him from our view, and reigns a tyrant in the soul. Reason is then an oracle no longer consul...

— Williams, Helen Maria (1759-1827)

Date: 1790

"She was indeed persuaded, that she felt no other uneasiness than what arose from the agitation with which she perceived that Seymour's mind was struggling; but perhaps there was something of self-deception in this young lady's reflections; as to a passenger, in a boat that glides rapidly down a ...

— Williams, Helen Maria (1759-1827)

Date: 1790

"If her heart was not quite at peace, its exquisite sensibility was corrected by the influence of reason; as the quivering needle, though subject to some variations, still tends to one fixed point."

— Williams, Helen Maria (1759-1827)

Date: 1790

"The lover, like the poor Indian, who prefers glass, beads and red feathers to more useful commodities, sets his affections upon a trifle, which some illusion of fancy has endeared, and which is to him more valuable than the gems of the eastern world, or the mines of the west; while reason, like ...

— Williams, Helen Maria (1759-1827)

Date: 1790

"Julia was sensible that by accepting Mr. F--, she would put a final end to her present perplexities, and perhaps banish for ever, from the mind of Seymour, that unhappy passion which her presence nourished."

— Williams, Helen Maria (1759-1827)

Date: 1790

"Julia, since the period of Seymour's marriage, had endeavoured, by every effort in her power, to banish his idea from her mind."

— Williams, Helen Maria (1759-1827)

Date: 1790

"But, the region of passion is a land of despotism, where reason exercises but a mock jurisdiction; and is continually forced to submit to an arbitrary tyrant, who, rejecting her fixed and temperate laws, is guided only by the dangerous impulse of his own violent and uncontroulable wishes."

— Williams, Helen Maria (1759-1827)