your gentleness and affection warmed and opened my senses
If we can take this tribute at face value, as an honest assessment of
the rehabilitation presided over by Henry Clerval, we must then read a
tragic irony into Victor's expression here. He has opened himself up
once more to the generous humanity he had experienced in his domestic
circle, a humanity that might have enveloped his Creature in far different
circumstances from those attending his instant rejection at Victor's hands.
As with other sentiments in these last paragraphs of the chapter,
sentiments predicated on stable norms and humane values, we are given a
last opportunity to pretend, or to hope, that these are universal truths
before the ensuing catastrophe brings us to our senses.
