He does not attempt to conceal from her the magnitude of the misfortune, because so far from being a mere novice in sorrow, she has tasted it from her earliest years in all its varieties; and because his purpose was to conquer her grief, not to extenuate its causes.

Those many miseries would indeed have been in vain, if they had not taught her how to bear wretchedness.

He will prove to her therefore that she has no cause to grieve either on his account, or on her own.

Not on his--because he is happy among circumstances which others would think miserable and because he assures her with his own lips that not only is he _not_ miserable, but that he can never be made so.

Every one can secure his own happiness, if he learns to seek it, not in external circumstances, but in himself.