Mr. B. says, he will not permit it.

It is the first _will not_ I have heard from him, or given occasion
for: and I tell him, that it is a point of conscience with me, and
I hope he will indulge me: but the dear gentleman has an odd way of
arguing, that sometimes puzzles me. He pretends to answer me from
Scripture; but I have some doubts of _his_ exposition; and he gives me
leave to write to you, though yet he won't promise to be determined by
your opinions if they are not the same with his own; and I say to him,
"Is this fair, my dearest Mr. B.? Is it?"

He has got the dean's opinion with him; for our debate began before we
came to town: and then he would not let me state the case; but did it
himself; and yet 'tis but an half opinion, as I may, neither. For it
is, that if the husband is set upon it, it is a wife's duty to obey.

But I can't see how that is; for if it be the _natural_ duty of a
mother, it is a _divine_ duty; and how can a husband have power to
discharge a divine duty? As great as a wife's obligation is to obey
her husband, which is, I own, one indispensable of the marriage
contract, it ought not to interfere with what one takes to be a
superior duty; and must not one be one's own judge of actions, by
which we must stand or fall?

I'll tell you my plea:

I say, that where a mother is unhealthy; subject to communicative
distempers, as scrophulous or scorbutic, or consumptive disorders,
which have infected the blood or lungs; or where they have not plenty
of nourishment for the child, that in these cases, a dispensation lies