But I must not omit taking notice of the pleasure of beholding the lovely pledges of a tender friendship, daily growing up, and of amusing ourselves, according to our different sexes, in training them to perfection.  We give way to this agreeable instinct of nature, refined by love.  In a daughter, we praise the beauty of her mother; in a son, we commend the understanding, and the appearance of innate probity, which we esteem in his father.  It is a pleasure which, according to Moses, the Almighty himself enjoyed, when he beheld the work of his hands; and saw that all was good.

SPEAKING of Moses, I cannot forbear observing, that the primitive plan of felicity infinitely surpasses all others; and I cannot form an idea Of paradise, more like a paradise, than the state in which our first parents were placed:  That proved of short duration, because they were unacquainted with the world; and it is for the same reason, that so few love matches prove happy.  Eve was like a silly child, and Adam was not much enlightened.  When such people come together, their being amorous is to no purpose, for their affections must necessarily be short-lived.  In the transports of their love, they form supernatural ideas of each other.  The man thinks his mistress an angel, because she is handsome; and she is enraptured with the merit of her lover, because he adores her.  The first decay of her complexion deprives her of his adoration; and the husband, being no longer an adorer, becomes hateful to her who had no other foundation for her love.  By degrees, they grow disgustful (sic) to each other; and, after the example of our first parents, they do not fail to reproach each other With the crime of their mutual imbecillity (sic).  After indifference, contempt comes apace, and they are convinced, that they must hate each other, because they are married.  Their smallest defects swell in each other’s view, and they grow blind to those charms, which, in any other object, would affect them.  A commerce founded merely on sensation can be attended with no other consequences.

A MAN, when he marries the object of his affections, should forget that she appears to him adorable, and should consider her merely as a mortal, subject to disorders, caprice, and ill temper; he should arm himself with fortitude, to bear the loss of her beauty, and should provide himself with a fund of complaisance, which is requisite to support a constant intercourse with a person, even of the highest understanding and the greatest equanimity.  The wife, on the other hand, should not expect a continued course of adulation and obedience, she should dispose herself to obey in her turn with a good grace:  A science very difficult to attain, and consequently the more estimable in the opinion of a man who is sensible of the merit.  She should endeavour to revive the charms of the mistress, by the solidity and good sense of the friend.

WHEN a pair who entertain such rational sentiments, are united by indissoluble bonds, all nature smiles upon them, and the most common objects appear delightful.  In, my opinion, such a life is infinitely more happy and more voluptuous, than the most ravishing and best regulated gallantry.