You feem, like most of the writers that have gone before you, to have allowed, as an uncontefted principle, that Marriage is generally unhappy: but I know not whether a man who profeffes to think for himself, and concludes from his own obfervations, does not depart from his character when he follows the crowd thus implicitly, and receives maxims without recalling them to a new examination, especially when they comprife fo wide a circuit of life, and include fuch variety of circumstances. As I have an equal right with others to give my opinion of the objects about me, and a better title to determine concerning that ftate which I have tried, than many who talk of it without experience; I am unwilling to be restrained by mere authority from advancing what, I believe, an accurate view of the world will confirm, that marriage is not commonly unhappy, otherwife than as life is unhappy; and that most of those who complain of connubial miferies, have as much fatisfaction as their nature would have admitted, or their conduct procured, in any other condition.

It is, indeed, common to hear both fexes repine at their change, relate the happiness of their earlier years, blame the folly and rashness of their own choice, and warn those whom they fee coming into the world against the fame precipitance and infatuation. But it is to be remembered, that the days which they fo much wish to call back, are the days not only of celibacy but of youth, the days of novelty and improvement, of ardour and of hope, of health and vigour of body, of gaiety and lightness of heart. It is not eafy to furround life with any circumstances in which youth will not be delightful; and I am afraid that whether married or unmarried, we fhall find the vesture of terreftrial exiftence more heavy and cumbrous, the longer it is worn.

That they cenfure themselves for the indifcretion of their choice, is not a fufficient proof that they have chosen ill, fince we fee the fame difcontent at every other part of life which we cannot change. Converse with almost any man, grown old in a profeffion, and you will find him regretting that he did not enter into fome different course, to which he too late finds his genius better adapted, or in which he discovers that wealth and honour are more eafily attained. The

merchant,' fays Horace, envies the foldier, and the foldier recounts the felicity of the merchant; the lawyer, when his clients harafs him, calls out for the quiet of the countryman; and the countryman, when bufinefs calls him to town, proclaims that there is no happiness but amidst opulence and crowds.' Every man recounts the inconveniences of his own station, and thinks thofe of any other lefs, because he has not felt them. Thus the married praife the eafe and freedom of a fingle ftate, and the fingle fly to marriage from the wearinefs of folitude. From all our obfervations we may collect with certainty, that mifery is the lot of man, but cannot difcover in what particular condition it will find most alleviations; or whether all external appendages are not, as we use them, the caufes either of good or ill.

Whoever feels great pain, naturally hopes for eafe from change of polture; he changes it, and finds himfelf equally tormented: and of the fame kind are the expedients by which we endeavour to obviate or elude thofe uneafineffes to which mortality will always be fubject. It is not likely that the married ftate is eminently milerable, fince we fee fuch numbers, whom the death of their partners has fet free from it, entering it again.

Wives and husbands are, indeed, inceffantly complaining of each other; and there would be reason for imagining that almoft every houfe was infefted with perverfeness or oppreffion beyond human fufferance, did we not know upon how

finall occafions fome minds burit out into lamentations and reproaches, and how naturally every animal revenges his pain upon thofe who happen to be near, without any nice examination of it's caufe. We are always willing to fancy ourselves within a little of happiness; and when, with repeated efforts, we cannot reach it, perfuade ourselves that it is intercepted by an ill-paired mate, fince, if we could find any other obftacle, it would be our own fault that it was not removed.

Anatomifts have often remarked, that though our difeafes are fufficiently numerous and fevere, yet when we enquire into the structure of the body, the tenderness of fome parts, the minuteness of others, and the immenfe multiplicity of animal functions that must concur to the healthful and vigorous exercise of

all

all our powers, there appears reafon to wonder rather that we are preferved fo long, than that we perifh fo foon, and that our frame fubfifts for a fingle day, er hour, without diforder, rather than that it fhould be broken or obstructed by violence of accidents, or length of time.

The fame reflection arifes in my mind, upon obfervation of the manner in which marriage is frequently contracted. When I fee the avaricious and crafty taking companions to their tables, and their beds, without any enquiry, but after farms and money; or the giddy and thoughtless uniting themselves for life to those whom they have only feen by the light of tapers at a ball; when parents make articles for their children, without enquiring after their confent; when fome marry for heirs to difappoint their brothers, and others throw themfelves into the arms of thofe whom they do not love, because they have found themselves rejected where they were more folicitous to pleafe; when fome marry because their fervants cheat them; fome because they squander their own money, fome because their houfes are pestered with company, fome because they will live like other people, and fome only becaufe they are fick of themfelves; I am not fo much inclined to wonder that marriage is fometimes unhappy, as that it appears fo little loaded with calamity; and cannot but conclude that fociety has fomething in itself eminently agreeable to human nature, when I find it's pleafures fo great that even the ill choice of a companion can hardly overbalance

them.

By the ancient cuftom of the Mufcovites, the men and women never faw each other till they were joined beyond the power of parting. It may be fufpected that by this method many un

fuitable matches were produced, and many tempers affociated that were not qua lified to give pleasure to each other. Yet perhaps, among a people fo little delicate, where the paucity of gratifications, and the uniformity of life, gave no opportunity for imagination to interpofe it's objections, there was not much danger of capricious diflike; and while they felt neither cold nor hunger, they might live quietly together, without any thought of the defects of one, another.

Amougft us, whom knowledge has made nice, and affluence wanton, there are, indeed, more cautions requifite to fecure tranquillity, and yet if we obferve the manner in which those converse who have fingled out each other for marriage, we fhall, perhaps, not think that the Ruffians loft much by their restraint. For the whole endeavour of both parties, during the time of courtship, is to hinder themselves from being known and to disguise their natural temper, and real defires, in hypocritical imitation, ftudied compliance, and continued affectation. From the time that their love is avowed, neither fees the other but in a mask; and the cheat is managed often, on both fides with fo much art, and difcovered afterwards with fo much abruptnefs, that each has reason to suspect that fome transformation has happened on the wedding-night, and that by a strange impofture one has been courted, and another married.

I defire you, therefore, Mr. Rambler, to question all who fhall hereafter come to you with matrimonial complaints, concerning their behaviour in the time of courtship, and inform them that they are neither to wonder nor repine, when a contract begun with fraud has ended in difappointment.

I am, &c.

have here none with whom I can freely converfe. While I am thus employed, some tedious hours will flip away, and when I return to watch the clock, I fhall find that I have disburdened myself of part of the day.

You perceive that I do not pretend to write with much confideration of any thing but my own convenience; and, not to conceal from you my real fentiments, the little time which I have spent, against my will, in folitary meditation, has not much contributed to my veneration for authors. I have now fufficient reafon to fufpect that, with all your fplendid profefhons of wisdom, and seeming regard for truth, you have very little fincerity; that you either write what you do not think, and willingly impofe upon mankind, or that you take no care to think right, but while you fet up your felves as guides, mislead your followers by credulity, or negligence; that you produce to the publick whatever notions you can fpeciously maintain, or elegantly exprefs, without enquiring whether they are juft; and tranfcribe hereditary fallehoods from old authors perhaps as ignorant and carelefs as yourselves.

You may perhaps wonder that I exprefs myself with fo much acrimony on a queftion in which wonen are fuppofed to have very little intereft; and you are likely enough, for I have feen many inftances of the faucinefs of fcholars, to tell me, that I am more properly employed in playing with my kittens, than in giving myself airs of criticifin, and cenfuring the learned. But you are miftaken, if you imagine that I am to be intimidated by your contempt, or filenced by your reproofs. As I read, I have a right to judge; as I am injured, have a right to complain; and thefe privileges, which I have purchased at fo dear a rate, I shall not easily be perfuaded to resign. To read has, indeed, never been my bufinefs; but as there are hours of leifure in the most active life, I have paffed the Superfluities of time, which the diverSons of the town left upon my hands, in turning over a large collection of tragedies and romances, where, amongft others fentiments, common to all authors of this clafs, I have found almoft every page filled with the charms and happiness of a country life; that life to which every ftatefman in the highest elevation of his profperity is contriving to retire; that life to which every tragick heroine in fome

fcene or other wishes to have been born, and which is reprefented as a certain refuge from folly, from anxiety, from paffion, and from guilt.

It was impoffible to read fo many paffionate exclamations, and foothing defcriptions, without feeling fome defire to enjoy the state in which all this felicity was to be enjoyed; and therefore I received with rapture the invitation of my good aunt, and expected that by fome unknown influence I fhould find all hopes and fears, jealoufies and competitions, vanifh from my heart upon my firft arrival at the feats of innocence and tranquillity; that I fhould fleep in halcyon bowers, and wander in elyfian gardens, where I should meet with nothing but the foftnefs of benevolence, the candour of fimplicity, and the cheerfulness of content; where I fhould fee reason exerting her fovereignty over life, without any interruption from envy, avarice, or ambition, and every day paffing in fuch a manner as the fevereft wisdom should approve.

This, Mr. Rambler, I tell you I expected, and this I had by an hundred authors been taught to expect. By this expectation I was led hither, and here I live in perpetual uneafinets, without any other comfort than that of hoping to re

turn to London.

Having, fince I wrote my former letter, been driven, by the mere neceflity of efcaping from abfolute inactivity, to make my leifmore acquainted with the affairs and inhabitants of this place, I am now no longer an abfolute ftranger to rural converfation and employments, but am far from difcovering in them more innocence or wifdom, than in the fentiments or conduct of thofe with whom I have paffed more cheerful and more fafhionable hours.

It is common to reproach the teatable, and the park, with giving opportunities and encouragement to fcandal. I cannot wholly clear them from the charge; but muft, however, obferve, in favour of the modifh prattlers, that, if not by principle, we are at leaft by accident, lefs guilty of defamation than the country ladies. For having greater numbers to obferve and cenfure, we are commonly content to charge them only with their own faults or follies, and fel dom give way to malevolence, but fuch as arifes from fome injury or affron, real or imaginary, offered to ourselves.

But in thefe diftinct provinces, where the fame families inhabit the fame houses from age to age, they tranfmit and recount the faults of a whole fucceffion. I have been informed how every eftate in the neighbourhood was originally got, and find, if I may credit the accounts given me, that there is not a fingle acre in the hands of the right owner. I have been told of intrigues between beaus and toafts that have been now three centuries in their quiet graves; and am often entertained with traditional fcandal on perfons of whofe names there would have been no remembrance, had they not committed fomewhat that might difgrace their defcendants.

In one of my vifits I happened to commend the air and dignity of a young lady, who had just left the company; upon which two grave matrons looked with great linefs at each other, and the elder afked me whether I had ever feen the picture of Henry the Eighth. You may imagine that I did not immediately perceive the propriety of the queftion; but after having waited awhile for information, I was told that the lady's grandmother had a great great grandmother that was an attendant on Anna Bullen, and fupposed to have been too much a favourite of the king.

If once there happens a quarrel between the principal perfons of two families, the malignity is continued without end, and it is common for old maids to fall out about fome election, in which their grandfathers were competitors: the heart-burnings of the civil war are not yet extinguifhed; there are two families in the neighbourhood who have destroyed each other's game from the time of

Philip and Mary; and when an account came of an inundation, which had injured the plantations of a worthy gentleman, one of the hearers remarked, with exultation, that he might now have fome notion of the ravages committed by his ancestors in their retreat from Bofworth.

Thus malice and hatred defcend here with an inheritance; and it is neceffary to be well verfed in hiftory, that the various factions of this country may be understood. You cannot expect to be on good terms with families who are refolved to love nothing in common; and, in felecting your intimates, you are perhaps to confider which party you most favour in the barons wars. I have often loft the good opinion of my aunt's vifitants by confounding the interefts of York and Lancaster; and was once cenfured for fitting filent when William Rufus was called a tyrant. I have, however, now thrown afide all pretences to circumfpection, for I find it impoffible in lefs than seven years to learn all the requifite cautions. At London, if you know your company, and their parents, you are fafe; but you are here fufpected of alluding to the flips of great-grandmothers, and of reviving contefts which were decided in armour by the redoubted knights of ancient times. I hope therefore that you will not condemn my impatience, if I am weary of attending where nothing can be learned, and of quarrelling where there is nothing to conteft, and that you will contribute to divert me while I stay here by some facetious performance."

I am,

Sir,

EUPHELIA.

N° XLVII.