Page:Clermont - Roche (1798, volume 2).djvu/170

"Oh! my daughter (he said), let the assurance of the felicity to which the spirit of your friend has departed, comfort you for her loss; life at best is but a state of pilgrimage. God, no doubt, to prevent our too great attachment to a state which we must resign, has chequered it with good and evil, so that few, after any long continuance in it, can, if possessed of reason and religion, regret a summons from it. To the Countess it was a happy release; her virtues had prepared her to meet it with fortitude, and her sorrows with pleasure; she knew she was about appearing before a merciful Being, who would reward the patience with which she bore those sorrows—sorrows that corroded the springs of life: so far am I permitted to say, in order to try and reconcile you to her loss, but the source of them I am bound to conceal. Endeavour (he proceeded) to compose yourself; Madame D'Alembert may soon be expected, and it will be some little comfort to the poor mourner to receive your soothing at-