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mind thoughts of future marriage; where he would be grateful to have bestowed on his children the tender care of his deceased wife's sister, an advantage from which they would be utterly precluded, if it was known that it was possible for him to marry that sister. For, my Lords, the state of society in this country is such, that it is held impossible for a man and a woman, not past a certain age, to live together with respectability and propriety without marriage, if they are persons not prevented by any legal impediment from contracting it. My Lords, I hold that this is a distinction between ourselves and some nations of the continent very much in our favour; and most sorry should I be to see the day when that distinction should be removed. My Lords, a deceased wife's sister may now with propriety undertake the care of her orphan nephews and nieces, because she can never stand to their father in any nearer relation. If the prohibitions were removed, it would be impossible for the husband to invite her to come and live under his roof, unless he held out an offer of marriage. The instances where the deceased wife's sister now fills that situation are so many, compared with those where the husband would be desirous of marrying her, that I think a great deal more will be lost on the one hand by permitting such marriages, than you could by possibility gain on the other."
The whole force of this argument rests on the assumption, that the widowed husband may in all cases receive the sister under his roof, and that the legal impediment is the cause. But, the widowed husband may not in all cases re-
