Falkner by Mary Shelley

In the human heart, and, if observation does not err, more particularly in the heart of man, the passions exert their influence fitfully. With some analogy to the laws which govern the elements, they now sleep in calm, and now arise with the violence of furious winds. Falkner had latterly attained a state of feeling approaching to equanimity. He displayed more cheerfulness -- a readier interest in the daily course of events -- a power to give himself up to any topic discussed in his presence; but this had now vanished. Gloom sat on his brow -- he was inattentive even to Elizabeth. Sunk back in the carriage -- his eyes bent on vacancy, he was the prey of thoughts, each of which had the power to wound.

It was a melancholy journey. And when they arrived in London, Falkner became still more absorbed and wretched. The action of remorse, which had been for some time suspended, renewed its attacks, and made him look upon himself as a creature at once hateful and accursed. We are such weak beings, that the senses have power to impress us with a vividness which no mere mental operation can produce. Falkner had been at various times haunted by the probable consequences of his guilt on the child of his victim. He recollected the selfish and arrogant character of his father; and conscience had led him to reproach himself with the conviction, that whatever virtues young Neville derived from his mother, or had been implanted by her care, must have been rooted out by the neglect or evil example of his surviving parent. The actual effect of her loss he had not anticipated. There was something heart-breaking to see a youth, nobly gifted by nature and fortune, delivered over to a sullen resentment for unmerited wrongs -- to dejection, if not to despair. An uninterested observer must deeply compassionate him; Elizabeth had done so, child as she was, with a pity almost painful from its excess; what, then, must he feel who knew himself to be the cause of all his wo?