to be happy, we must always have something in view. The person of your lady is already all your own, and will not grow more pleasing in your eyes, I doubt, though the rest of your sex will think her handsomer for these dozen years. Turn therefore all your attention to her mind, which daily grows brighter by polishing. Study some easy science together, and acquire a similarity of taste while you enjoy a community of pleasures. You will, by this means, have many images in common, and be freed from the necessity of separating to find amusement. Nothing is so dangerous to wedded love, as the possibili ty of either being happy out of the company of the other : endeavor, therefore, to cement the present intimacy on every side. Let your wife never be kept ignorant of your income, your expenses, your friendships or aversions; let her know your very faults, but make them amiable by your virtues; consider all concealment as a breach of fidelity; let her never have any thing to find out in your character, and remember, that from the moment one of the partners turns spy upon the other, they have commenced a state of hostility.

Seek not for happiness in singularity; and dread a refinement of wisdom as a deviation into folly. Listen not to those sages who advise you always to scorn the counsel of a woman, and if you comply with her requests pronounce you wife-ridden. Think not any privation, except of positive evil, and excellence; and do not congratulate yourself that your wife is not a learned lady, or is wholly ignorant how to make a pudding. Cookery, and learning, are both good in their places, and may both be used with advantage.

With regard to expense I can only observe, that the money laid out in the purchase of distinction is seldom or

never profitably employed. We live in an age when splendid equipage and glittering furniture are grown too common to catch the notice of the meanest spectator; and for the greater ones, they only regard our wasteful folly with silent contempt, or open indignation. This may, perhaps, be a displeasing reflection, but the following consideration ought to make amends. The age we live in, pays, I think, peculiar attention to the higher distinctions of wit, knowledge and virtue, to which we may more safely, more cheaply, and more honorably aspire. The giddy flirt of quality frets at the respect she sees paid to Lady Edgecumbe, and the gay dunce sits pining for a partner, while Jones, the orientalist, leads up the ball.

I said that the person of your lady would not grow more pleasing to you, but pray let her never suspect that it grows less so; that a woman will pardon an affront to her understanding much sooner than one to her person, is well known; nor will any of us contradict the assertion. All our attainments, all our arts, are employed to gain and keep the heart of man; and what mortification can exceed the disappointment, if the end be not obtained? There is no reproof however pointed, no punishment however severe, that a woman of spirit will not prefer to neglect; and if she can endure it without complaint, it only proves that she means to make herself amends by the attention of others for the slights of her husband. For this and for every reason, it behoves a married man not to let his politeness fail, though his ardor may abate; but to retain, at least, that general civility towards his own lady which he is so willing to pay to every other, and not show a wife of eighteen or twenty years old, that every man in company can treat her with more complaicence than he who so often vowed to her eternal fondness.

ones.

It is not my opinion that a young woman should be indulged in every wild wish of her gay heart or giddy head, but contradiction may be softened by domestic kindness, and quiet pleasures substituted in the place of noisy Public amusements are not indeed so expensive as is sometimes imagined, but they tend to alienate the minds of married people from each other. A well chosen society of friends and acquaintance, more eminent for virtue and good sense than for gaiety and splendor, where the conversation of the day may afford comment for the evening, seems the most rational pleasure this great town can afford.

That your own superiority should be always seen, but never felt, seems an excellent general rule. A wife should out-shine her husband in nothing, not even in her dress. If she happens to have a taste for the trifing distinction that finery can confer, suffer her not a moment to fancy, when she appears in public, that Sir Edward or the Colonel are finer gentlemen than her husband. The bane of married happiness among the city men in general has been, that finding themselves unfit for polite life, they transferred their vanity to their ladies, dressed them up gaily, and sent them out a gallanting, while the good man was to regale himself with port wine or rum punch, perhaps among mean companions, after the countinghouse was shut; this practice produced the ridicule thrown on them in all our comedies and novels since commerce began to prosper. But now that I am so near the subject, a word or two on jealousy may not be amiss, for though not a failing of the present age's growth, yet the seeds of it are but too certainly sown in every warm bosom for us to neglect it as a fault of no consequence. If you are ever tempted to be jealous, watch your wife

narrowly, but never tease her: tell her your jealousy, but conceal your suspicion: Let her, in short, be satisfied that it is only your odd temper, and even troublesome attachment, that makes you follow her; but let her not dream that you ever doubted seriously of her virtue, even for a moment. If she is disposed towards jealousy of you, let me beseech you to be always explicit with her, and never mysterious: be above delighting in her pain, nor do your business, nor pay your visits, with an air of concealment, when all you do might as well be proclaim. ed perhaps in the parish vestry. But I will hope better than this of your tenderness and of your virtue, and will release you from a lecture you have so very little need of, unless your extreme youth and my uncommon regard, will excuse it. And now farewell: make my kindest compliments to your wife, and be happy in proportion as happiness is wished you by,

Dear sir, &c.

LETTER 187.

From Dr. Franklin, to John Alleyne, Esq. on early Marriage.

DEAR JACK,

You desire, you say, my impartial thoughts on the subject of an early marriage, by way of answer to the numberless objections that have been made by the too many numerous persons to your own. You may remember when you consulted me on the occasion, that I thought youth on both sides to be no objection. Indeed, from the marriages that have fallen under my observation, I am rather inclined to think, that early ones stand the best chance of happiness. The temper and habits of the

young have not yet become so stiff and uncomplying, as when more advanced in life; they form more easily to each other, and hence many occasions of disgust are removed. And if youth has less of that prudence which is necessary to manage a family, yet the parents and elder friends of young married persons are generally at hand to offer their advice, which amply supplies that defect; and by early marriage, youth is sooner formed to regular life; and possibly some of those accidents or connections, that might have injured the constitution, or reputation, or both, are thereby happily prevented. Particular circumstances of particular persons, may possibly sometimes make it prudent to delay entering into that state; but in general, when nature has rendered our bodies fit for it, the presumption is in nature's favor, that she has not judg ed amiss in making us desire it. Late marriages, are often attended, too, with this further inconvenience, that there is not the chance that the parents shall live to see their offspring educated. "Late children," says the Spanish proverb, "are early orphans." A melancholy reflection to those whose case it may be ! With us in America, marriages are generally in the morning of life; our children are therefore educated and settled in the world by noon; and thus, our business being done, we have an afternoon and evening of cheerful leisure to ourselves, and just such as our friend at present enjoys. By these early marriages we are blest with more children; and from the mode among us founded by nature, of every mother suckling and nursing her own child, more of them are raised. Hence the swift progress of population among us, unparalleled in Europe. In fine, I am glad you are married, and congratulate you most cordially upon it. You are now in the way of becoming a most use