



Produced by Charles Bowen from page images provided by
Google Books (University of California, Davis)











Transcriber's Notes:
     1. Page scan source:
        The Works of G.P.R. James, Esq.--Volume 16
        https://books.google.com/books?id=dTYoAQAAIAAJ
        (University of California, Davis)
     2. The diphthong oe is represented by [oe].






[Illustration: frontispiece]







THE WORKS
OF
G. P. R. JAMES, ESQ.


REVISED AND CORRECTED BY THE AUTHOR.
WITH AN INTRODUCTORY PREFACE.


"D'autres auteurs l'ont encore plus avili, (le roman,) en y mêlant les
tableaux dégoutant du vice; et tandis que le premier avantage des
fictions est de rassembler autour de l'homme tout ce qui, dans la
nature, peut lui servir de leçon ou de modèle, on a imaginé qu'on
tirerait une utilité quelconque des peintures odieuses de mauvaises
moeurs; comme si elles pouvaient jamais; laisser le c[oe]ur qui les
repousse, dans une situation aussi pure que le c[oe]ur qui les aurait
toujours Ignorées. Mais un roman tel qu'on peut le concevoir, tel que
nous en avons quelques modèles, est une des plus belles productions de
l'esprit humain, une des plus influentes sur la morale des individus,
qui doit former ensuite les m[oe]urs publiques."--MADAME DE STAËL.
_Essai sur les Fictions_.

    "Poca favilla gran flamma seconda:
     Forse diretro a me, con miglior voci
     Si pregherà, perchè Cirra risonda."
                       DANTE. _Paradiso_, Canto I.



VOL. XVI.
DE L'ORME.



LONDON:
PARRY AND CO., LEADENHALL STREET.
M DCCCXLVIII.






DE L'ORME.


BY

G. P. R. JAMES, ESQ.


AUTHOR OF

"MARGARET GRAHAM,"
"THE LAST OF THE FAIRIES," ETC.



-------------------------------



LONDON:
PARRY AND CO., LEADENHALL STREET.
M DCCCXLVIII.






PREFACE

TO THE THIRD EDITION.


Romance writing, when rightly viewed and rightly treated, is of the
same nature as the teaching by parables of the eastern nations; and I
believe, when high objects are steadily kept in view and good
principles carefully inculcated, it may prove far more generally
beneficial than more severe forms of instruction.

The man who is already virtuous and wise, or who, at least, seeks
eagerly to be so, takes up the Essay or the Lecture, and reads therein
the sentiments ever present in his own heart. But while the same man
may find equal pleasure in the work of fiction addressed to the same
great ends, how many thousands are there who will open the pages of
the Novel or the Romance, but who would avoid anything less amusing to
their fancy? If, then, while we excite their imagination with pleasant
images, we can cause the latent seeds of virtue to germinate in their
hearts; if we can point out the consequences of errors, follies, and
crimes; if we can recall good feelings fleeting away, or crush bad
ones rising up under temptation,--and that we can do so with great
effect, may be safely asserted,--we can benefit, in the most essential
particular, a large body of our fellow-men; a much larger body, I
fear, than that which can be attracted by anything that does not wear
the form of amusement.

Such has been my conviction ever since I entered upon a career in
which the public has shown me such undeserved encouragement; and with
such a purpose, and for such an object, have I always written. In some
works I have striven alone to impress those general principles of
honour and virtue, and those high and elevated feelings, which do not
seem to me to be increasing in the world. In others, I have
endeavoured to advocate, without seeming too much to do so, some
particular principle, or to warn against some particular error. In the
following pages my purpose was to expose the evil consequences of an
ill-regulated spirit of enterprise and a love of adventure, and to
deter from errors, the magnitude of which I may have felt by sharing
in them.

To do so, it was necessary to choose as my subject the life of a young
man placed in circumstances of difficulty and temptation; and no
writer can ever hope to produce a good effect by painting man
otherwise than man is.

At the same time I have ever been convinced that no benefit can ensue
from drawing the mind of the reader through long scenes of vice and
guilt, for the sake of a short moral at the end; and in writing the
history of