Page:The Mysterious Warning - Parsons (1796, volume 4).djvu/252

 stored his serenity, than a hundred arguments from the Count on the folly of indulging regret for such a character as Charlotte's.

"I must ever pity her fate (said Ferdinand) deprived by her birth of the precepts and example of a virtuous parent, her mind was contaminated before she was of an age to acquire any fixed principles. No father to own, or support her, left, deserted by every connexion, and consigned to the trust of such depraved wretches: Ah! my friend, who can wonder at the excesses that followed, and the ruin that befell two unfortunate young women!

"Let the seducer of innocence but reflect one moment on the crimes he propagates, the destruction he meditates, and the dreadful consequences of his success; let him but reflect on the accumulated sins which may be multiplied on his head by the unfortunate beings he may give existence to; let him but extend his views beyond his own selfish gratifications, and he will shrink with horror