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As for our masculine friend, he is ungrateful, while our feminine friend is too exacting. You were right; they are both wrong and it is not their fault, it is the social machinery which insists on it. The notions of the obliged are changed, those of the obliger ought to change also.
This is one reason why you must not always reckon upon gratitude in conferring an obligation. It is a very high mind to which gratitude is not a painful sensation. If you wish to please, you will find it wiser to receive solicit even favours, than accord them; for the vanity of the obliger is always flattered that of the obligee rarely. Well, this is an unforeseen digression: let me return!
Duty is obligation. There can be no obligation without an obliger. Virtue is a law, to which it is the will of the lawgiver that we should conform; which will we should in no manner be bound to obey, unless some dreadful punishment were attached to disobedience. This is the philosophy of slavery and superstition.
"Should he also observe, that riches employed in another manner, in removing the real miseries of humanity, in cherishing, comforting, and supporting all around, produced a contrary effect, and tended equally to make the obliged and the obliger happy; should he conceal this great eternal truth, or should he divulge it with all the authority he possessed, conscious, that in whatever degree it became the rule of human life, in the same degree would it tend to the advantage of all the world?"
In the minor matter, for instance, of small money obligations, that shortness of memory which the school of Professors Panurge and Falstaff rashly praises, may often betray into some unfortunate allusion or reference to the subject which shall pain the delicate feelings of the obliger; or, if he be of coarser clay, shall lead him in his anger to express himself with unseemliness, and thereby to do violence to his mental tranquillity, in which alone, as Marcus Aurelius teacheth, lieth the perfection of moral character.
Now, though since God has thought proper to make one powerful and another helpless, the connection of obliger and obliged is all fair; and though my being under your patronage is to me highly honourable, yet, Sir, allow me to flatter myself that, as a poet and an honest man you first interested yourself in my welfare, and principally as such still, you permit me to approach you.
"Le Pere Missionnaire des Hurons, prevoyant que cette affaire auroit peut-etre une suite qui pourrait etre prejudiciable aux soins qu'il prenoit de leur instruction, demanda qu'il lui fut permis d'aller a leur village pour les obliger de trouver quelque moyen qui fut capable d'appaiser le ressentiment des Francois.
And if I do her this justice, shall I not have a claim of her gratitude? And will she not think herself the obliged, rather than the obliger? Then let me tell thee, Belford, it is impossible so far to hurt the morals of this lady, as thou and thy brother varlets have hurt others of the sex, who now are casting about the town firebrands and double death. Take ye that thistle to mumble upon.
This is one reason why you must not always reckon upon gratitude in conferring an obligation. It is a very high mind to which gratitude is not a painful sensation. If you wish to please, you will find it wiser to receive solicit even favours, than accord them; for the vanity of the obliger is always flattered that of the obligee rarely. Well, this is an unforeseen digression: let me return!
The absolute want of dignity that is almost as marked a characteristic in Richardson as his lack of humour, shows itself again and again. After all, Mr. B. would never have married Pamela if he could have persuaded her to live with him in any other way; so the cringing gratitude expressed by Pamela and her parents to the "good gentleman" and the "dear obliger" is only revolting.
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