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his Wife, however great, always bowing and scraping and sinking to one another, we are apt to say there's more Manners than Affection between them.
But on the other hand, when the Husband and Wife are so far from treating one another with Ceremony, that they cannot keep up common Civility, but that they treat one another with Disdain and Contempt, there's a certain loss both of Affection and good Manners too.
For this Reason I would advise all the good Husbands and Wives that will accept that Advice, never to mingle their Discourses, especially before Company, with Raillery and Jest upon one another; when a Woman once comes to make a Jest of her Husband, she is lost, she is gone; and when the Man makes a Jest of his Wife he is a going, at least in my Opinion: I shall explain the Words gone and going presently; when a Man makes a Jest of his Wife every Body believes he hates her; when the Woman makes a Jest of her Husband, they believe she cuckolds him.
At least 'tis a fatal Sign that all conjugal Affection is dead and buried from between them. I frequently visited my Friend M———, when his Wife and he had been married about two Years, but I was most irksomely entertained every time with his Banters and Turns of Wit, his Sarcasms, Jests, and indeed Buffoonry, all upon his Wife; I observed at first she took it well enough, and now and then gave him a smart return, which was not to his Advantage; for she had a World of Wit, but her Modesty and Sense convinced her, without any Bodies reproof, that it was no Part for a
