enthusiasm of success
The coupling of "enthusiasm" and "ardent" in this paragraph seems
to indicate an intention on Mary Shelley's part to underscore how
associated are the two and how problematic they may be in that
association. The two notions have already been mentioned in proximity
in the previous letter (Letter 1.2) and
(Letter 1.3). They will once again be
linked in contiguous paragraphs by Victor Frankenstein, when he recounts
the frenzied rush of discovery that accompanied his search for the
secret of life (1.3.6).
