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Chapter 15

The brightest things below the sky
Give but a flattering light
we should suspect some danger nigh
When we possess delight. Watts

Such repeated disappointments quite overcame Lucy's
resolution to seek her support by her own labour, and she was often
tempted to return into the country, and beg for some place
of shelter from one of her former neighbours. But there is a sentiment
in the human bosom common alike to rich and poor, which prompts
as in dishonor or poverty, to shun those who knew us in our better days;
in their eyes, we feel the humiliation of the present, more
painfully, contrasted as it must be with recollections of the past. In
the presence of strangers, we are spared this mortification, and
while receiving the alms we have solicited, or writhing under
the scorn of the proud, or the repulse of unkindness, it has been a conso-
lation; which only those can estimate who have fallen into
penury and disgrace, yes, a great consolation to say "no one knows
who I am". For this identity, clings to us in every reverse of fortune;
and the beggar who was once a gentleman, { ?} what no
one else would guess, and feels a support from this internal consciousness