pleases, provided he possess a superior understanding and an entire
command of his temper. But Oh! how severe the task to preserve a
perfect equality in despite of the ill humour, caprice, or injustice
of a woman for whom you undergo a thousand difficulties, encounter
continual labours, and undauntedly expose yourself to every fatigue
and danger!--I blush to think I have sunk beneath the trial.--But we
have both gone too far to recede: we have mutually said and done what
never can be forgotten.

'As good temper is the basis of connubial felicity, means must be
taken by which it may be cultivated and preserved. From the first hour
of marriage, beware of too much familiarity, and of encouraging or of
taking liberties. Be as circumspect in your behaviour as if a stranger
were present, and dread deviating from that respect which is due from
man to woman, and from woman to man, in a single state. This does not
imply coldness, or formality, but the cheerful intercourse of good
sense. Behave as you would to a person from whom you are happy to
receive a visit, and with whose company you are delighted. Should you
indulge those ebullitions of passionate fondness which lose sight of
these limits, it is impossible to foretell to what they may lead. A
caress neglected, or supposed to be neglected, a kiss not returned
with the like warmth, or a fond pressure not answered with equal
ardour, may poison a mind which applauds itself for the delicacy of
its sensations.

'Do not expect to find your wife all perfection. I know the romance
of lovers: they read descriptions in which the imagination has been
exhausted, to depict enamoured youth superior to every terrestrial
being; and they are convinced that, above all others, the object
of their own particular choice has never yet been equalled. Such