The Enquirer

FOR THE ENQUIRER.

The Bachelor's Soliloquy. In imitation of Hamlet's.

To wed, or not to wed--That is the question;
Whether 'tis better in the mind to stifle
The heats and tumults of outrageous passion,--
Or with some prudent fair in solemn contract
Of matrimony join--to have--to hold--
No, no--and by heaven! Have to saw end
The heart-aches, and the thousand love sick pangs
Of celibacy--'twere a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd--In nuptial band
To join till death dissolves--Ay, there's the rub;
For in that space, what dull remorse may come,
When we have taken our solemn leave of liberty,
Must give us pause--There's the respect
That slacks our speed in suing for a change.
Else, who would bear the scorns with bachelors
When aged fell, the pains and heart rings
Which each new face must give to roving fancy,
When he might rid himself at once, of all,
By a bare yes.--Who would with patience bear
To fret and linger out a single life,
But that the dread of something yet untry'd,
Some hazard in a state from whose strict bond
Death only can release, puzzles the will,
And makes us rather choose those ills we have,
Than fly to others which we fancy greater?
This last reflection makes us slow and wary,
Filling the dubious mind with dreadful thoughts
Of curtain lectures, jealousies, and cares
Extravagantly great, entail'd on wedlock,
Which, to avoid, the lover checks his passion,
And, miserable, dies a Bachelor!