ous and wicked than man himself. But this is because she knows, by the long and bitter experience of her sex, that the world is thenceforth against her. We call her a sinner; but how wide is the difference between her sin and the crimes of men! Her sin, at the worst, is a sin against herself, and she is the sufferer: man sins against his fellow-men for the sake of his own gain. Yet the thief and the murderer are not punished more remorselessly than is she; for death itself is a light penalty, compared with the lingering tortures of a life of shame. If she were made the object of compassion and protection instead of scorn, she would still remain good and pure,—yes, pure; for impurity begins only after love has been profaned and obliterated.
Sinfire's fault has surely been a generous on; but, though she may have made a tragical mistake, all is not yet lost for her. Love has led her astray: may not love redeem her also? She stands now at the point of peril: one step more, and it is too late! If I can win her now, . . . should I cherish her or reverence her less than if she came to me, fresh and unbreathed-on, from her mother's bosom? The world may doubt it; Sinfire herself might hesitate; but in my own mind there is no doubt at all. If she loves me, then that love condones all. And should any one sneer, let him beware!
Who am I, indeed, that I should judge her? "There is no crime," said Goethe, "that I might not have committed." I go further, and say that I do not hold criminal many of the things that men, in the specious interests of society, have arbitrarily adjudged to be such. Actions should be estimated, not in themselves, but according to their motives and consequences. A lie may be wrong; but not the lie that saves a friend from unmerited disaster. A theft may be wrong; but not the theft that deprives the drunkard of his fatal draught. A murder may be wrong; but not the murder that removes a monster from the earth. The binding together of a man and a woman may be wrong; but not if the bond be an interior, a voluntary, and a loving one. There is nothing in me that need cause me to shrink from Sinfire, were she as wicked as she is beautiful. If her eyes have looked upon hell, yet there can be no heaven for me where she is not; and that dark experience of hers would only unite us more absolutely.
Is it I who write in this way? Am I in earnest? Is not this a mere intellectual passion,—diversion, rather,—which I cultivate for the sake of variety and occupation? I have never kissed Sinfire: I have never told her that I loved her: I have no reason to suppose that she loves me,—quite the contrary! And what, after all, is this mystery of intrigue that invests her, but a sheer invention of my own? I have seized upon I know not what hints and innuendoes and appearances,
