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sat upon his always pleasant Countenance! What Torment swell'd his Breast, when, within the compass of half a Year, he finds the virtuous Charmer, the Mistress of his chast Affections, not only with Child, but not able any longer to conceal, that by the unalterable Laws of Nature it could not be his.
He is surprized, he charges her with it, she confesses it with the utmost Testimonies of penitence and regret for the Injury done him, and, with the force of an inimitable Conduct, reingages him; he forgives her, but finds out the Man, fights him, wounds him, and is killed himself in the unequal Quarrel. Miserable Effect of abus'd Matrimony!
But even all this is not the great Point aim'd at in this Work: Our View is the criminal use of the lawful Liberties of Matrimony, and that I shall come to in its Place.
Among these however this is not the least, and therefore proper to this Place, viz. That we find wrong Notions of the matrimonial Vow, wrong Thoughts of the conjugal Obligation have possess'd the Minds of both Men and Women, and they marry now meerly to gratify the sensual Part, without the Views which the Nature of the Thing, called Matrimony, ought to give them. This is what I call making a jest of the Institution, that marry in sport, and, like the little Children, who not knowing what they are doing, say to one another, Come, Let us Play at Man and Wife.
They that make a jest of marrying, generally live to be the Jest both of the married and unmarried World; when they marry in jest they come to mourn in earnest, they tie them-
