the very beginning of this brought some just reflections upon me relating to things past, and to the former manner of my living; and, though there was not the least hint in all this from what may be called religion or conscience, and far from anything of repentance, or anything that was akin to it, especially at first, yet the sense of things, and the knowledge I had of the world, and the vast variety of scenes that I had acted my part in, began to work upon my senses, and it came so very strong upon my mind one morning when I had been lying awake some time in my bed, as if somebody had asked me the question, What was I a whore for now? It occurred naturally upon this inquiry, that at first I yielded to the importunity of my circumstances, the misery of which the devil dismally aggravated, to draw me to comply; for I confess I had strong natural aversions to the crime at first, partly owing to a virtuous education, and partly to a sense of religion; but the devil, and that greater devil of poverty, prevailed; and the person who laid siege to me did it in such an obliging, and I may almost say irresistible, manner, all still managed by the evil spirit; for I must be allowed to believe that he has a share in all such things, if not the whole management of them. But, I say, it was carried on by that person in such an irresistible manner, that, as I said when I related the fact, there was no withstanding it; these circumstances, I say, the devil managed not only to bring me to comply, but he continued them as arguments to fortify my mind against all reflection, and to keep me in that horrid course I had engaged in, as if it were honest and lawful.
But not to dwell upon that now; this was a pretence, and here was something to be said, though I acknowledge it ought not to have been sufficient to me at all; but, I say, to leave that, all this was out of doors; the devil himself could not form one argument, or put one reason into my head now, that could serve for an answer—no, not so much as a pretended answer to this question, why I should be a whore now.
It had for a while been a little kind of excuse to me that I was engaged with this wicked old lord, and that I could not in honour forsake him; but how foolish and absurd did it look to repeat the word 'honour' on so vile an occasion! as if a woman should prostitute her honour in point of honour – horrid inconsistency! Honour called upon me to detest the crime and the man too, and to have resisted all the attacks, which, from the beginning, had been made upon my virtue; and honour, had it been consulted, would have preserved me honest from the beginning:
For 'honesty' and 'honour' are the same.
This, however, shows us with what faint excuses and with what trifles we pretend to satisfy ourselves, and suppress the attempts of conscience, in the pursuit of agreeable crime, and in the possessing those pleasures which we are loth to part with.
But this objection would now serve no longer, for my lord had in some sort broke his engagements (I won't call it honour again) with me, and had so far slighted me as fairly to justify my entire quitting of him now; and so, as the objection was fully answered, the question remained still unanswered, Why am I a whore now? Nor indeed had I anything to say for myself, even to myself; I could not without blushing, as wicked as I was, answer that I loved it for the sake of the vice, and that I delighted in being a whore, as such; I say, I could not say this, even to myself, and all alone, nor indeed would it have been true. I was never able, in
