SERMON V.

INCOMPATIBLES.

Conrade-You should hear reason.

Don John-And when I have heard it, what blessing bringeth it?

Conrade-If not a present remedy, yet a patient sufferance.

Don John-I wonder, that thou being (as thou say'st thou art) born under Saturn, goest about to apply a moral medicine to a mortifying mischief. Much Ado about Nothing.

THE moment we received your round robin, most unfortunate Incompatibles, requesting our ghostly counsel and aid in your difficulties, the image of Signior Benedick was in our mind's eye, the hero of that famous comedy,. "Much Ado about Nothing." Don't imagine that we are disposed to trifle with you, we are

quite aware that your case is no comedy, and we are far from wishing to say that you make much ado about nothing. No, your case is by no means comic; the lines of disappointment and sorrow are very legible in every upturned face on which we are now gazing; you have all much reason to make much ado, for you have managed somehow or other to get into something very like a man-trap, an instrument, as you are aware, which does not discriminate the genders, but catches men and women alike if they should be so incautious as to put their foot into it.

Benedick started well, didn't he? That was a very sensible resolve of his after the handsome acknowledgment he made of the obligations he was under to a woman, when he said, "because I will not do them the wrong to mistrust any, I will do myself the right to trust none; and the fine is (for the which I may go the finer,) I will live a bachelor." You Benedicks wish you had stuck to that bit of evanescent wisdom, don't you? And you Beatrices would only have been too happy

if

you had all left your Benedicks in that mood. But you would seek each other out,

and tickle and teaze one another into the fatal compliance, till at last your Benedick sagely asked himself, "Doth not the appetite alter? A man loves the meat in his youth that he cannot endure in his age. The world must be peopled ;" and your Beatrice exclaimed, "Can this be true? Stand I condemned for pride and scorn so much? Contempt, farewell! and maiden pride, adieu! No glory lives behind the back of such. And, Benedick, love on, I will requite thee." And so here you are! as incompatible as a sick head-ache or a chronic stomach-pain with a hearty appetite, or a tight boot with a protuberant bunion or a sensitive corn.

What a sensible fellow that Justin was who gave such excellent advice to his friend the worthy Knight of Lombardy, who had made up his mind to marry. It was not your good fortune to have a Justin among your friends. But people about to marry seldom ask for or take advice. Hear, however, the sage Justin, 'tis somewhat too late, but mayhap may secure more attention for that very reason.

"The venture's greater, I'll presume to say
To give your person than your goods away;
And therefore, Sir, as you regard your rest,
First learn your lady's qualities at least:

Whether she's chaste or rampant, proud or civil,

Meek as a saint, or haughty as the devil;
Whether an easy, fond, familiar fool,

Or such a wit as no man e'er can rule.
'Tis true, perfection none must hope to find
In all this world, much less in womankind;
But if her virtues prove the larger share,

Bless the kind Fates, and think your fortune rare,
Ah, gentle Sir, take warning of a friend,
Who knows too well the state you thus commend ;
And, spite of all his praises, must declare,
All he can find is bondage, cost, and care.
Heaven knows I shed full many a private tear,
And sigh in silence, lest the world should hear.
But, by the immortal Powers, I feel the pain,
And he that smarts has reason to complain."

Well, it is an old saying that marriage is a lottery ;-a —a lottery, too, with a goodly number of prizes. A good wife

or a good hus

We know the You have not

band is a tolerably good thing. meaning of that deep sigh. found that good thing. There were no blanks in the bag, and yet somehow you have all drawn blank disappointment. There is another old saying, that marriages are made in Heaven. You don't quite see that, do you? You would not think it reverent to say so, as it would not comport with your notions of the consummate wisdom of the super-terrestrial

management.

Quite right; don't charge Heaven with all the blockheadedness and bungling that foolish men and women exemplify in this world. No; marriages are experiments, speculations, purely human contracts, haphazard manufactures, at least, not a few of them; yours for example; and very sorry manufactures they are. They come out of some old stupid botching carpenter's shop, where the mechanical arts of dovetailing and neat joinery are neither practised nor understood. You have been put together in a very loose shaky sort of way, out of mixed and unseasoned timber, and now there you are unglued, with all your nails started, full of yawning chinks, and ready to go to pieces.

Yes, yes, don't be impatient. You know all this well enough, we are quite aware of that, but if you come to us you must expect to hear something about your bad carpentry. If you, Miss Rose Wood, had no more sense of the fitness of things than to go and unite yourself to that essentially vulgar fellow Mr. Common Deal; and you, Mr. Polished Mahogany, would form an alliance with that dull stupid sister of Deal's; and you, Mr. Hard