Page:Dream Life - Mitchell - 1899? Altemus.djvu/36

. Both give me high and judicious compliment—all the more grateful because only half deserved. For I never yet was conscious—alas, that the confession should be forced from me!—of winning the heart of any maiden whether native, or Italian; and as for such delicacy of imagination as to work up a lovely damsel out of the withered remnant that forty odd years of Italian life can spare, I can assure my middle-aged friends, (and it may serve as a caveat)—I can lay no claim to it whatever.

The trouble has been, that those who have believed one passage have discredited another; and those who have sympathized with me in trifles, have deserted me when affairs grew earnest. I have had sympathy enough with my married griefs; but when it came to the perplexing torments of my single life not a weeper could I find!

I would suggest to those who intend to believe only half of my present book, that they exercise a little discretion in their choice. I am not fastidious in the matter; and only ask them to believe what counts most toward the goodness of humanity, and to discredit—if they will persist in it—only what tells badly for our common nature. The man or the woman who believes well, is apt to work well; and Faith is as much the key to happiness here, as it is the key to happiness hereafter.