Fowle's New Hampshire Gazette And General Advertiser

From the St. James's Chronicle.

To the Painter.

Of all human pursuits none, I believe, vary so little as that of matrimony. The two chief qualifications, which are looked after in courtship, are beauty and fortune. The former must be required by a man of opulence, a man who can support the gaieties and dissipations of the fashionable circles; a man profuse in his expenses and liberal in his spirit. For beauty will be extravagant, and will admit of no controul. The latter is indeed acceptable to any rank of life. It has for its admirers the avaricious rich and needy poor. The man, marries from the incitements of pure affection, enjoys that bliss and happiness which proceeds from mutual love and regard; but he, who plunges himself headlong into the bonds of matrimony, merely from views of interest, cannot taste the sweets of conjugal mutuality, and the satisfaction which arises from love, unspotted and reciprocal. Perhaps from a distorted countenance, a disproportion of members, or from what is more disgusting, a deficiency of understanding, all which wants, in his eagerness to gratify his avarice, he had neglected to attend to; he may, when all these farthings make their appearance, be unable to reconcile himself to the object, to whose extrinsic endowments, not personal accomplishments, he had paid his addresses. There is however, a medium between beauty without inheritance, and inheritance without deformity. I reckon that the happiest state in matrimony, where an union is cemented from a reciprocity of sentiment, and from mutual affection. Where the wife brings a sufficiency to support a small family with decency, in case of adversity, independent of the husband's industry and endeavours. The consequence of such an union is harmony and bliss. No general rule, however, is without its exceptions, and no one, I may venture to affirm, will admit of more than the assertion I have now advanced. For many unforeseen circumstances may arise, which may tend to estrange and alienate the affections. The cares of a numerous family may sour the temper of one, and increase the labour and toil of the other, to acquire a competency to support the expences which attend an increase of offspring. To sum up the whole: The man, who is captivated into marriage from the allurements of beauty; may for a short time be happy; but the fair and handsome, as well as the foul and ugly, cannot avoid the wrinkles of old age and child-bearing. On the other hand, the avaricious pursuer of matrimony may, from a fortuitous concurrence of circumstances, perhaps light upon a fortunate match, and enjoy the sweets of a state which he did deserve.

Thus I have considered matrimony in all its different forms, and from an unwillingness of being liable to the misfortunes and uneasinesses which sometimes attend a married state. I am and ever shall remain,

CELEBS.