The doctor was gentle and modest, and entirely kindly. He held good
Master Feltham's doctrine about reproofs. 'A man,' says he, 'had better
be convinced in private than be made guilty by a proclamation. Open
rebukes are for Magistrates, and Courts of Justice! for Stelled Chambers
and for Scarlets, in the thronged Hall Private are for friends; where
all the witnesses of the offender's blushes are blinde and deaf and
dumb. We should do by them as Joseph thought to have done by Mary, seeke
to cover blemishes with secrecy. Public reproofe is like striking of a
Deere in the Herd; it not only wounds him to the loss of enabling blood,
but betrays him to the Hound, his Enemy, and makes him by his fellows be
pusht out of company.'
So on due invitation from within, the good parson entered, and the
handsome captain in all his splendours--when you saw him after a little
absence 'twas always with a sort of admiring surprise--you had forgot
how _very_ handsome he was--this handsome slender fellow, with his dark
face and large, unfathomable violet eyes, so wild and wicked, and yet so
soft, stood up surprised, with a look of welcome quickly clouded and
crossed by a gleam of defiance.
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