( 365 )
ings, if you please,—the prejudices, the weakness of others,—has no weight, let, at least, your own ideas of personal propriety, your just pride, your conscious worth, point out to you the path in society which you are so eminently formed to tread. Or, if, singularly independent, you deem that you are accountable only to yourself for your conduct, that notion, beyond any other, must show you the high responsibility of all actions that are voluntary. Remember, then, that your example may be pleaded by those who are not gifted, like you, with extraordinary powers for sustaining its consequences; by those who have neither your virtues to bear them through the trials and vicissitudes of public enterprise; nor your motives for encountering dangers so manifest; nor your apologies—pardon the word!—for deviating, alone and unsupported as you appear, from the long-beaten track of female timidity. Your example may be pleaded by the rash, the thoughtless,
(R 3)
