Hannah Webster Foster

The Coquette Hannah Webster Foster

Book ExcerptThey had been set in family connection, intimate by kin, intimate in earliest life by every outward tie, and especially intimate by the subtile affinities of their spiritual natures. Yet he who can, under any circumstances, entreat the love of woman, and then take advantage of her weakness or her confidence, is an anomaly in nature, and should have a special, judiciary here and in heaven. Since so much of the romance here following is truth, veritable truth, it is to be regretted that any error of historical character was suffered to assume importance in the narrative. Yet this is so often the case in works of this kind, that it is not remarkable here. More surprising is it that truth was so carefully and conscientiously guarded and preserved. In conflicting statements, it is difficult to determine the precise year of the marriage of Mr. Edwards, whether before or after the death of "Eliza Wharton," although it may have been long before, even as one of his biographers has it, and that recklessness and e