Dorcas thought and meant no harm in meeting Swan. Even if
her nature had been more wakened and conscious,--even if she had had
either the habit or the power of analyzing her own sensations,--even
if she had seen her soul from without, as she certainly did not
within,--she would have recoiled from the thought of deliberate
coquetry.
In the nature even of a coquette there is not necessarily either
cruelty or hardness. It cannot be a fine nature, and must be deficient
in the tact which appreciates the feelings of another, and
the sympathy that shrinks from injuring them. It may be called
selfishness, which is another term for thoughtlessness or want of
consideration or perception, but it is not deliberate selfishness.
This last is often found with fine perceptions and intuitive tact. It
is rather a natural obtuseness, a want of thought on the subject. Such
persons remember and connect their own sensations with the object,
thinking little or nothing of the feelings they may themselves excite
by the heedlessness of their manner.
If Dorcas had once thought of the value of the hearts she played with,
and as it were tossed from hand to hand,--if she had even weighed one
against another, she might have had some sorrow in grieving either.
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