The New Hampshire Gazette

To the Publisher, &c.

Mr. R. Quibus the Bachelor, in your Paper No. 223.
Having told us a long Canterbury Story, and
advanced much in Favour of Love and Matrimony, I
began to recollect whether the honest Man might not,
like other unexperienced People of round Judgments,
(as they say) make Mountains of Mole Hills, and form
Ideas which never existed in Nature; and so by promising great Things, lead such honest unthinking People
as himself into Scrapes, which they cannot be so easily
relieved from: Therefore, as an Antidote, I here make
some Extracts from one of the wisest Authors of the last
Age, who was himself a married Man, and so rather
prejudiced of that Side; and willing, like the worthy
Professors of Matrimony, to make his Party as extensive
as he could. Now if Mr. Bachelor meant any Thing
by his Essay, let him confute the Positions here laid
down, which are inserted to shew the right and just
Side of the Question, for the Direction of a Number of
well meaning pious Youth, who expect Candor; and
unless the Answer comes from real Principle, will pass
Sentence, that the Answerer be tost in a Blanket.

"Love, like a burning Glass, contracts the dilated
Lines of an unlawful Passion, and fixes them upon one
Object bestowed by our Fellow Creatures (the exacter
Observers of the Dictates of Nature) promiscuously,
without Partiality in Affection, upon every distinct
Female of their respective Species: Whereas Man, by
the Severity of the Law, and his own more stupendous
Folly, out of a Jealousy to be robb'd of a present Desire,
is so hurried away by the first Apparition of an imaginary
Beauty, (suppos'd by his Fancy, grossly abused by her
Servants the Senses) that no Reason can for the present
be audible, but what pleadeth in Favour of this soft
Passion, which makes a deeper or less Impression
according to the Temper of the Heart it meets with,
causing Madness in some, Folly in others; placing, like
stupid Idolaters, Divinity in a silly Creature, set by the
Institutions of Nature in a Far inferior Class of Perfection
beneath which makes it his Business to worship and adore;
imagining as false Felicities in the Fruition as they
apprehend Miseries in the Loss; which all they desire
is but the Fruit of that Tree, the Kernel of that Apple.
which first destroyed us all: fair to Sight, but of fatal
and dreadful Consequence to the Taster, rendering him
subject to Slavery that was born free, and suffering her
to command who ought in right Reason to serve and obey:
For those Virtues, Graces, and reciprocal Desires, be-
bewitch'd Affections expected to meet and enjoy, Fruition
and Experience will find absent, and nothing left but a
printed Box.

"Marriage, like a Trap set for Flies, may possibly
be anointed at the Entrance with a little Voluptuousness,
under which is contained a Draught of deadly Wine,
more pricking and tedious than the Pain it pretends
to cure, leaving the Patient in little quieter Condition
in the Morning. &c.

"But to hang a fair Woman in one's Heart, or turn
Host to one who receives Guests, is so high an Indis-
cretion, that it would not only exceed Repentance, but
Pity and Forgiveness, especially to one who has had
these Rocks mark'd out on all Sides by the Splinters of
others Shipwrecks: For Eve, by stumbling at the
Serpent's Solicitations, cast her Husband out of Paradise;
nor are her Daughters surer of Foot, being as fickle.
unsteady, and unable to bear so much of our Reputation
as Religion and Custom hath enjoined upon them, that
an unballasted Behaviour, without other Leakage, is
sufficient to cast away a Husband's Esteem; neither doth
the Penalty of a light Report laid on the Mother conclude
there, but diffuseth itself like a Leprosy over Posterity,
being uncapable of any other Cure than Length of Time
can deduce out of Forgetfulness: And yet if Marriage
could answer the Expectation of all it boasts, the Cure
of it in the large Bill our mountebank Teachers proclaim
in every Street, it were some small Argument, which
upon Trial he comes so far short of, as to satisfy none,
but rather aggravate the Evils of Solitude.

And for your Comfort, you are posted off both by
Lawyer and Divine, to the same Patience here, more
opportunely propos'd, before you are fallen under so
mischievous and expensive a Conjunction.

Yeoman Youth.