MARRIAGE ASSERTED: In Answer to a Book Entituled Conjugium Conjurgium.
Of Marriage.
CHAP. I. Its Definition, Nature, Events.
WEll, now we are come to this dreadful Precipice of Marriage that Philog ynus was tumbling down, which made our Authour give this fearful skream of [Page 2] Conjugium Conjurgium, as if he had been stark out of his wits: it shews good nature indeed to be concerned for the mischances which happen to our Friends; but is not our Authour apt to be scar'd? for surely the Precipice is not so dangerous, I have known many go down without breaking their necks: but however Philog ynus by his consent shall not venture. But seeing words are but wind, which speedily convert (as our Hobbists Souls when they die) into the soft air; he is resolved to reiterate his advice with his pen, by refusing which Philog ynus will be the sole cause of his own destruction. And this discourse shall remain as a Monument of his kindness to him Aere perennius,
But though Philogynus may not venture down, I poor Devil must, and [Page 3]the first Monster I meet withal is Nubo himself, whose Pedigree being from [...] a Cloud in English (from the custom used among the Ancients to vail their Brides when they were led to their Husbands, in token of the command their Husbands were to have over them) Therefore a man is overwhelm'd in darkness and lost in a fog that marries. And because Jugo is ex Jugum, Therefore wedlock is a yoak stuft with many cares, miseries, vexations, discontents, and all that rabblement. And because there is an Hebrew word of his acquaintance that signifies trouble, therefore a married life has no other company but troubles, adversities, afflictions, and so forth; but how he will teach Etymologies to make Syllogisms I cannot imagine, no more than I can how Marriage which is in it self honourable, can be an impediment to honourable actions, unless he accounts those Actions honourable which Faux in England would and Ravillac in [Page 4] France did commit: for Osbern another of the same tribe, a hater of marriage like himself, saies that married folk give greater security to the commonwealth where they live than suits with prudence: but neither this way can it possibly be (as our Authour would have it) a hinderance to preferment: No Prince surely would refuse to employ as his Ministers of State those persons only whose chiefest interest consists in the constitution of his government, and accept those who are least capable of giving him sufficient security for their Loyalty. But whether the Country where married men are denied preferments meerly because they are so, be on this side the line or not, we must be content to be ignorant of till he writes next.
Our Authour does rightly observe, That when the Devil had power given him to bereave Job of all but his life, yet he would not take his wife from him, but left her to torment him. And Solomon [Page 5]in those texts he quotes out of the Proverbs, and Jesus the Son of Sirach, do both bear witness in apt and significant expressions that a contentious and wicked wife is a very sore affliction. And after his quotations he enumerates several sad examples of men, some ruin'd, and others made perpetually miserable in this life by their Wives: as Solomon, Sampson, our Edward the second, and others. I answer, that though the misery which befel Solomon and Sampson was caused by the breach of God Almighty's law by Moses which forbad them to marry out of their own nation; yet however the consequence of these Examples and the texts before mentioned is no more but this, that there are such things as wicked women which ought to be avoided: but when Solomon and the same Jesus do both celebrate in other texts the happiness that the man enjoys which marries a vertuous woman, they are so far from decrying a married life as evil, that [Page 6]by this their exceeding care in discovering the Rocks and Quick-sands which a man that is not wary may split on, they do not only suppose that there are numbers of women that are veirtuous, but also that Marriage is absolutely necessary for humane life.
In another place where he saies almost every house can shew the Wife it's Master, what he means by making a woman a man (which no Act of Parliament ever yet tryed to do) I do not know. I have known many houses where by the folly, sloth or other more tolerable divertisements of the husband, the whole weight of family business has devolved upon the Wives shoulders; whom I shall rather stile a Slave than a Mistress. As for those W [...]men who out of the Pride of their heart will usurp Authority over the Man, let them go to St. Paul's Epistles for their penance.
But St. Paul himself in 1 Cor. 7.2. saies, That those which marry shall [Page 7]have trouble in the flesh; therefore our Authour would inferr, none ought to marry. But who will read the whole Chapter will find that St. Paul compares only the Virgin-with the married state, and prefers the former before the latter as freer from troubles and worldly business; but how this Text can any wayes dissuade Philogynus who leads (as his friend our Authour saies) a voluptuous lise, from Marriage, the only way to make that life not a wicked one, he would do well to explain.
But his quotation out of St. Luke, Chap. 14. v. 20. is too disingenuous; where that he may justifie his ridiculous passion against Marriage, he wilfully perverts the words of our blessed Saviour himself, who because in a similitude of a great Supper which a certain man made, and inviting his friends they refused to come (but sent him their several excuses, among which one's was that he was newly [Page 8]married, and therefore desired to be excused) reflecting upon the stubborn Jewes who would not be persuaded though by convincing miracles to believe him the true Messias, but some trivial excuse or other they constantly made not to be happy guests of this his heavenly supper; which made him in the next verse send his servant into the high wayes to gather the Gentiles, that the Kingdome of his Father might be replenished with Believers: our Author therefore concludes that Christs meaning was that the married state (ordained by God his Father in Paradise, and seconded and explain'd by himself at Jerusalem) is a hinderance to the attainment of everlasting life. Good God what pitiful shifts Men are forced to make use of to disguise the Truth!
Now he comes to the true state of the Question, which is, Whether Marriage is not in it self far more happy than a single life, (I mean such a one as he commends:) which comparison [Page 9]because he waves at present, I must do so too, till I come to the Chapter where he discourses of it. But before I leave this I must take notice of an inconvenience which he hints, and is a very great one, and many times brings ill consequences to the married couple; And that is, when each party take wrong measures of their succeeding happiness, and dream of an exact felicity from a state of life (though the happiest) upon earth, God never trusted out of heaven, and for which alone he has bestowed upon mankind such Seraphick hopes. These false measures frustrating the expectation of foolish mindes, who are not prepared against the unavoidable troubles of humane life, without sense or reason load their own state of life (as I have known some old Bachelours also do) with these and such like calumnies, as if the contrary condition of life to theirs were free; never recollecting how slender a penance they are condemn'd to in [Page 10]parison of the fault of Adam (which every Sinner by being so, approves on) who after he was made exquisitely wise and happy, gave his Maker the lie in the compass of four and twenty hours by a sedate action; Wherefore it is not the condition of this or that sort of life, but life it self that is the cause of numerous troubles, and shameful death at the last.
In answer to what is objected that Eve by being married to Adam was the cause of his and his Posterities destruction, I'le only return a few rhymes; for the honour God has since done the B. Virgin, reinstates the sex and makes them not at all in our debt: and let him talk what he will,
But our Authour will have it still that they who design a married life long till they have lost their freedom, and are undone; and the reason why they are undone are the reason why they are undone are three clinches he has pickt up somewhere, which being only to shew his sagacity are nothing to my [Page 12]porpose; I expect reason not clinches. The next thing I meet with is an Acrostick as he calls it, which standing full in my way with the wrong side outwards, I have made bold to set to rights, but he may know it again.
He concludes this Chapter with his subsequent divisions which are two, for Society, and the continuation of our kind, which he reckons the chief ends of Marriage, and proceeds to (whither I must wait on him) Member the first.
MEMBER I. Of the first end of Marriage, Society no Society.
WHere he confesses Marriage were an Heaven upon earth, if it did but answer that end, Society; and truly I am of the mind where it does not, it is no Hyperbole to call it a Hell: but here is the difference, Solomon in the old Testament and S. Paul in the new sufficiently knowing that there can no other expedient be found to answer that felicity which Marriage affords mankind, have very wisely, as well as charitably, laid down such unerring rules which, if observ'd, will render it a heaven upon earth. But on the other side, our Authour gives his Pupil no such rules to proceed by: but in a heat will not allow him to marry at all, under the penalty of forfeiting [Page 14]his wits, freedom, and happiness, all three together, and yet is not able to recommend to him any other sort of life to secure them. And where he saies Marriage is a yoak, he honours it more than he thinks for, if he doth but remember who it was that stiled the duties of Christianity it self a yoak; and upon due enquiry it will be found a part of it, so no heavier. But if the Man drawes counter in the yoak, to the rules of justice and honesty (which is often enough seen) must the Wife be condemned? or is Marriage any whit disparaged? Is their any thing more ridiculous than to affirm a whole Society ought to be abolished because some of them are vicious? These arguments improved and applyed to those societies of Men, which are absolutely necessary for the cementing of the Government where they live, have been the cause of too too dreadful consequences in this Kingdome, by me not now to be remembred.
SECT. I. What Society in Marriage is.
HEre he repeats the duties of married folk each to other, first the Husbands, and then the Wives: and concludes, That seeing there is none that performs this their duty exactly, he would advise his friend by no means to enter into that state: which very argument without the least violence offered to it (upon my former supposition of continency) may as well dissuade an Infidel from turning Christian because that Religion does enjoyn such purity of life, such exalted charity to mankind, and such unfeigned devotion to Godward, that no man ever yet (the Messias alone excepted) exactly obeyed. Neither can any friendship be contracted amongst Equals, or dependencies between Inferiours and their Masters, or indeed any society last, unless each [Page 16]party, or at least one side, resolve not only to be content to wave some punctillioes of their due, but many times solid and real duties. This was the reason that our B. Saviour who styles himself the Prince of peace, did so earnestly recommend to all his followers that necessary duty of forgiving each other, and requiting good for evil: the omission of this one duty (without which no man can be a Christian) how slender a reputation so ever it has in the world, has been the cause of disuniting small and great Societies, and perpetually the ruine of those who despise it most. The pleasure and satisfaction as well as the Policy in so doing, I dare not recommend to any but who have tryed it.
And these most mighty rocks which Mr. Seymar sees in a married life, are most of them but bubbles raised by the storms of passion, and have no duration but in weak minds: and though I commend folly in none, yet is the female [Page 17]Sex to be pardoned if their Passions of love, anger, fear, and the rest are more predominant than Men's: for S. Paul by declaring they are the weaker vessel, does confirm common experience that their judgements are not so fixed, nor their Reason so elated as that Sex which is the glory of God; though their other accomplishments sufficiently answer the end of their Creation to be the glory of man. What he therefore condemns as a fault in that Sex, is so far from being one, and gives them so good a lustre, that I question (though a vice in a man) whether it is not a perfection in them.
Nay in actions of prudence it self (where Men ought to excel) there are Women that outdoe the generality; not that They are improved in wisdom, but Men by debauchery most cursedly degenerated.
He concludes, that seeing a hundred thousand are shipwrackt, for one that arrives to his sweet haven of contentment [Page 18]in Marriage, he would advise Philogynus not to venture at all. I have said before that those who take wrong measures of their succeeding happiness either in this or any other sort of life, are beholding to themselves alone for having their expectation frustrated. There is no happiness here without its allay, but those minds who are most Masters of the affections, approach it nearest. Marriage does both promise and afford a natural, and well grounded friendship (the best we can have on this side heaven) and comprehends in it all those petit satisfactions we receive in inferiour societies; and is the best barr to keep out sin, vanity and shame: it's decency and order sufficiently speak it's Authour; And if the wickedness of men in this state have so far disparaged it as to give it a false gloss to others, it is but time the cheat were discovered, that it is alone the weak passion of fools that complain of their cure when the pain is caused by [Page 19]the disease. And it is notorious that most men who ruine their estates do so either before they marry, or else by continuing some silly vanities they contracted before they entred into this regular condition of life.
That many married men come to ruine is certain, but is Marriage the natural genuine cause of their unhappiness? What mischief does necessarily follow that Vow which is to live continently with a wife in all the mutual acts of friendship? Is it not the breach of this vow, that is alone the cause of calamity? And whether the more understanding is not most guilty, I appeal, who by their Atheistical notions of the state after Death, and by their lewd examples of life whilest they stay here, invert the order of the fall in Adam, and persuade the Women to be wicked.
For this is notorious, that what vice soever the Men bring in fashion, the Women second: it is not an Age [Page 20]High-treason was as much in vogue, and drest in as good cloaths as whoring can be now; and texts of scripture were produced to discourage Loyalty, as now they be to dishearten us from Marriage.
But as the Women did not then run into the same extravagancies of vice with the men, though they followed them, so now they alone do keep and retain that glorious ornament of Modesty, which the Men have cashiered themselves, and endeavour ro rally out of them. To conclude, it is a most disingenuous slander to load the weaker sex with those faults which we our selves commend to them for none, and they must be content to bear the accusation, because Custom and their own innate bashfulness forbid them a Repartee; for
SECT. 2. Of the events and concomitants of a married life.
WHere he continues his anger against Marriage, and quotes Solomon's Ecclesiastes, Chap. 7. to prove there is no such thing as a good wife, the words are, One man among a thousand have I found, but a woman among all those have I not found: but who will observe the discourse from the 23 verse to the end of the Chapter, will find that Solomon after he had reckoned up his own observations concerning true wisdome, and the reason of things, and what is real folly, ingenuously declares (a true sign he had a [Page 22]prospect of them all) the disquisition was too hard for him, and adds in the close of his complaint, that among the sons of men one in a thousand he had found that had acquired wisdome and knowledge, but of the female sex not one, no disparagement to them if rightly understood, far less a barr to this blessed societie of Marriage, all equality being the natural enemy to Societies. But Solomon in this very Chapter, and else-where as he does bitterly exclaim against wicked women, so he does in apt expressions set down the happiness of those who have virtuous, and industrious Wives: which sufficiently demonstrates Solomon did think a good Wife might be found; which me thinks Mr. Seymar is half of the mind himself, when he compares Marriage to an East India voyage, by which a man is either made or marr'd; the difference in the comparison is only that the poor Merchant cannot sometimes shun his ill fortune by any [Page 23]forecast; he that enters into a married life may by timely prudence in his choice before-hand, and discreet managing of his affairs afterwards, very much contribure to his own happiness.
But no handsome can be honest; and his reason is, because a Ballad saies Can she be fair and honest too? and if you wo'nt believe that, he produces some Latin clinches, English ones we have had before. Surely Arguments are very hard to come by when he is forced to supply their stead, with repeating of Ballads, and pittiful pedantick clinches in a subject of this weight and consequence, wherein he endeavours no less than to unravel the original of all Societies and Governments upon the Earth.
The next course he takes to dissuade Philogynus from marriage is to reckon up the several inconveniences of humour, one of which he must of necessity light on, therefore he had better never marry. I have been told by [Page 24]good Logicians, that a Dilemma is no such dangerous argument as it seems to be, it cuts both wayes indeed, but a skilful Opponent may make it serve his turn as well as his Adversarys; So may any Man find as great advantages in most of Mr. Seymar's qualifications of Women, as he does inconveniences; for example, if she be not over-wise, why may not that coolness of temper make her owner of humility? which will render her full as commendable. And if she is a wise-woman in good earnest, her husband will be happy enough in her, for all Mr Seymar does not like her. And surely a young Lady that has not had threescore years experience of folly and vanity, may be as good company as if she had. But he himself (he saies) was vext with a cross, unloving, undutiful wife, therefore no man ever had or shall have any that is otherwise.
Next is some more hedge-rhymes against Women, and then Philogynns [Page 25]is askt whether he is so mad to marry, and after he will allow no man that marries to be in his wits, he raves and talks of frenzie, Bedlam and madness, to which all married men are by him (as he thinks) justly condemned; and so concludes this Section with a seeming allowance to his friend that he may marry if he can find a good wife, but no qualification (that he knows of) can make her so.
SECT. III. The grounds and reasons of Love reasonless and groundless.
IN this Section the first thing is the definition of Love, which he saies is a desire bred of liking, yet for all that it is the product, he saies, of folly, and the passion of the Devil; and his reason is because Plato calls it magnus daemon, which he is resolved to English great devil; and because Plotinus another Heathen no better skil'd in Christianity than Plato, does not know whether it be a good daemon, or a bad daemon, or a passion, or all three, our Conjugium having the casting voice, resolves it into a bad daemon, and calls it a vice.
That I may not be thought guilty of any fallacy, not so much as begging the Question, I do declare that throughout these few sheets, where I find any quotations of heathen Philosophers, [Page 28]whose opinions can be but conjectures any wayes repugnant to the Laws of Christianity, which is true reason cleared and refin'd, without further dispute I reject them, and in most places take no notice of them. The most improved wits could soar no higher than the fallacious guesses of depraved Reason, when Christianity has openly delivered us all knowledge that conduces to the least Jota of our happiness. So if the Scripture allows Marriage, the Precedent of which is, or ought alwaies to be Love, I matter not the brainsick fictions of the Poets, or the more grave mistakes of the antient Philosophers concerning it. But to return.
After he has acknowledged that Love was the original cause both of the worlds creation, and redemption, and that every thing that is beautiful ought to be loved; I wonder that the female sex, whose chiefest ornament and perfection is beauty, should be the only excepted. [Page 29]Through the senses indeed is convey'd all knowledge to the Soul, but her informations of beauty she receives wholly from the eye, a sense that conveys more knowledge and delight to the understanding than all the rest put together: which makes me ignorant of the true cause why some modern Reformists, by cashiering all painting, as well as sculpture out of their Churches, compell their Proselytes to acquire their knowledge in divine matters, through the dull and tedious Maeanders of the Ear. God indeed, as he is the source, and fountain of all beauty, is properly alone the object of love; and when ever we pay any of those rayes, which we see faint and scatter'd in this his world, any such devotion and love, of which he ought to be the sole object, it is no less than Idolatry: but not to like or approve the beauty of the Universe, so as to admire its exact symmetry and proportions, is not Religion put stupidity.
Where our Authour makes a tripartite division of Love for the ends of Pleasure, honesty or profit, he mistakes this passion (if the name is not too slender for this noble motion of the soul) which has no prospect of other ends, but only the desire of union, and being the same as the object loved: for the immoderate desire of wealth, covetousness, arises from the Passion Fear, which never governs but in weak and impotent minds: and to this passion the lowest rank of beasts have their refuge both for their food and safety.
That Seraphick love wherewith the Saints and Angels incessantly do adore the great Jehovah, by a peculiar priviledge in broken and weak shadowes is permitted to descend upon the souls of the highest of mankind, while the rest have no sense of it at all; this indeed when misapplyed in the adoring a Woman, is a fault of a dark dye: but either positively to affirm, [Page 31]or to imply by inferences that beauty in a woman is neither to be liked, not loved, though the design be to contract the exalted friendship of Marriage, is an opinion as irrational as unjust.
I am come now to his mechanick motion of the Animal Spirits in this Passion, which being a translation word for word from the great Des Cartes and not at all to the purpose, I take no farther [Page 32]notice of; only thus, That though Love is it self a pure action of the Soul, yet is there such a harmony betwixt her and the body by reason of those imperceptible ligaments, the vital spirits, which are meerly corporeal, and are the sole life of Brutes, that many times, nay most frequently, it so happens that some other Passion accompanies this most noble one of Love, and too too often excludes her by the consent of a deprav'd will. Thus indeed Lust frequently possesses the whole Man, and by borrowing the splendid name of Love, scandalizes her, but only in the opinion of short-sighted Men. Wherefore I must deny what Mr. Seymar so confidently affirms, That the Love of women's beauty, is lust, especially when Marriage is the design, the laws of which run counter to Lust, and when observed (which is easy enough) a certain remedy against it.
As there is a Lust of the flesh, so St. Paul witnesses there is a Lust of the [Page 33]eye also, because the desires of it are boundless, it is never satisfied with seeing: but Marriage regulates and confines these boundless desires of the flesh; therefore the love of the woman we intend to marry, ought not, nor cannot have any other name than Love, without violating the lawes of speech and reason. It neither is, or ought to be in the same degree of purity with that before mentioned, but however it carries enough of it, if the design be virtuous, to deserve the title of Love; for it naturally affords such mutual, and reciprocal kindnesses, as will easily invite each party to the performance of that command, to love each other as themselves: for the interests of married people are so exactly the same in all things whatsoever, that whoever will but obey the easy directions of nature, to be kind to themselves, cannot possibly be otherwise to their companion. So though contrary interests may disjoyn Father [Page 34]from Son, and Brothers of the same womb from each other; yet here alone in this state nothing but Folly, or Passion the daughter of her, can be the cause of a disunion in affections, which made Ecclesiasticus in his 36. Chap. and 24. verse proclaim, He that gets a wise gets a possession, a help like to himself and a pillar of rest.
I do grant Mr. Seymar that there is a beauty which is conveyed to us by the internal senses, but withall we have larger and more refined conceptions of it than any that is convey'd to us by the eye; for the Imagination, a pure act of the soul, soars far above these earthly things which the external senses convey to the Understanding: but he would inferr that those which affirm Women have beauty are mistaken, because what is convey'd to the soul by the senses, presents things generally more false than what is communicated to it by Reason. The Answer is obvious, Reason and the senses can [Page 35]never be opponents where the subject matter ought primarily to be judged by the senses: a man in a Fever that saies sugar is bitter, does really taste it so, and his reason seconds it: the Musick I hear though never so grating to anothers ear, if my sense of hearing likes it, my Reason will approve of it. Where he saies, some are santastical in their loves; I repeat again, all passions as well as this misapplyed either for time or person may be evil, but regularly and discreetly used, are good; as this particular one of Love to a disingaged person in order to marry her, and live vertuously with her, does not onely deserve the honourable name, and title of Love, but withall is an action (far from a vice, as our Authour would have it, but) commendable and well pleasing in the sight of God and all wise men: which I think is sufficiently proved.
Now comes his proof that Love is [Page 36]the passion of the Devil, because the Heathen which were really worshippers of the Devil, under the names of Jupiter, Mars, &c. talk extravagantly of what they understand not: Then Lucian and his raillery is produced, to render this noble flame of Love ridiculous: and after some more heathenish dreams and fictions, he quotes Gen. Chap. 1. v. 27. in order to abuse it, for he will allow Moses writings no more credit than the Heathens fictions, by first mistaking, and then calling it but a fancy: for he would have his Readers believe that Adam was first an Hermaphrodite, a conceit as wild as it is wicked; for whoever reads the history of the Creation, will find that Moses does first set it down in general terms, and then descends to particulars, a sort of speaking very usual at this day, and of which no Man that ever converst with Men or Books, can possibly be ignorant. From the holy writ to heathenism he goes again, [Page 37]and tells the storys of Mars his Amours, and Vulcan's breaking his leg with a fall from heaven, and Madam Junos jealousie, with the fiction of Jove and Danaë, and with such school-boyes discourse he runs over three leaves, for no other reason as I can guess, but to amuse his Reader; for not the least colour of an Argument can be deduced from them to convince a Christian who believes none of them, that either Marriage or his concomitant Love is a vice.
But though Christians don't think them Gods, Conjugium does, for he saies that not onely over the Gods, but the Devils also Love tyrannizes; and his Authors (he saies) are worthy of credit, where he has stories, which are about Incubi, Succubi, Fauns and Satyres: but amidst these dreams the Holy Writ must not scape unperverted, for Gen. 6. v. 4. where it is said, The sons of God went in to the daughters of men, and of them begat Gyants; [Page 38]he will have it that the blessed Angels of God sent for the tuition and safeguard of Men, betrayed their trust and enticed the Women to be wicked, of whom they begat Gyants. Besides the absurdity in reason that an incorporeal Being can be the Parent of a corporeal, the assertion does not onely oppose the honour and providence of God Almighty in his government of the Earth, but contradict the opinions of the Ancient Fathers, as well as the modern belief of the Catholick, and all Reformed Churches: who do unanimously agree, that by the Sons of God were meant the Sons of Seth, who were so called because they profest the true Faith; and those of Cain's issue which followed erroneous and wicked opinions, were therefore called the Children of Men; Terms as distinctive and intelligible in the Age before the Flood, as that of Jewes and Gentiles was afterwards.
His last evidence that this same Love [Page 39]is the passion of the Devil, is the repetition of sundry relations concerning Succubi, and Incubi; the storyes I know are numerous, but the truth of them as uncertain. It is a very difficult thing to distinguish between a reality and a delusion in such cases: for if the Grand Impostor can put a cheat upon our senses (which is granted by most that by the divine permission he can) it will be very difficult for the Understanding which receives her information from them, to judge of the delusion: Much harder would it be, if it should be found to be only the effect of the disease of Melancholy, which we have reason enough to suspect, because we receive all those relations from persons which are afflicted with that distemper, which does not only hinder the regular motion of some one particular sense, but offers violence to the Understanding it self, and will not permit her to receive any information (no not by Reason) of [Page 40]the true state of things, but through the false perspective of a mistaken fancy. However giving, but not granting, that these Diabolical violences to humane nature are real, the consequence can be but this, that seeing his malice is so transcendent that he will counterfeit his own nature rather than not destroy mankind, it behoves man without delay to furnish himself with the whole armour of God, that he may be able to stand against the wiles of the Devil, Ephes. 6.11. But neither thus can Mr. Seymar prove that either Love or Lust are the Devils passions. And because he is a grand Lyar and our eternal enemy that continually goes about seeking which of us he can devour, that therefore we should neglect either carelesly through mistake, or designedly, our obedience to the Laws of God; of which Marriage is one, to those that cannot live continently; is such an inference that I know not to which I ought rather to condemn it, [Page 41]whether to malicious impiety, or superlative frenzy.
The next dissuasive is because the Bruits are commanded by love to continue their kinds; in which he is mistaken; as it is not lust in them because it is no fault, so neither can it be Love which is peculiar only to rational creatures. So I leave our Authour to find a name for it. But if Nature persuades them, Reason me-thinks should us to continue our kind without being afraid to be laught at, because our kind is more noble, and designed to greater ends.
Then the sympathy between inanimate creatures are recounted to dissuade Philogynus from a Wife, as the Iron and Loadstone, Vine and Elmne, and so forth; that is, because the whole Universe is cemented together by Love or sympathy, therefore Mankind, of which the Woman is a species, must be the onely creatures exempt.
Next he will allow that rational [Page 42]creatures do Love, but he saies 'tis nothing but lust when all's done, and they that have it lack rationality: and then he tells us that Plotinus is in the right, that this Devil Love, is partly Devil, partly a God, and partly a passion: yet for all Plotinus has parted the stakes, he saies it is all three, the God of Gods; such prophane contradictory Bombast his Readers must be content with, and if they will marry he has no other Arguments to hinder them. He concludes this Chapter by repeating what he has babled before that Love is Lust, and an old Wives fable how it was thrown out of heaven with his wings clipt, and so may go to hell, but can never come there again, with such stuffe which one would think should be below the Pen of any Gentleman to converse with, in order to scandalize this noble Act of the soul, of which the Treasures in Heaven are an object, and which the wisest and greatest of Men have allowed; for [Page 43]
SUB-SECT. I. What the grounds and reasons of Love are.
HEre he saies, That let the Stoicks talk what they will, they are stocks and not men that do not love a woman, that are not enclined to their embraces; but those charms which allure them, he wonders should persuade Philogynus to marry them. And now he thinks he has made Philogynus an amends; it would have been too hard to have denied his friend a Woman upon all accounts; a Wise he may not have, that's like a fool or a madman, but a Wench he will allow him: and yet methinks the obligation is no great one, because he does not tell his friend how he should treat her. The wisest and richest of men have never failed of being ruin'd by them; and in my Judgement, Poverty and the Pox are more [Page 45]intolerable grievances than any Mr. Seymar, now he's angry, can pick out of a married life: and at a cheaper rate than one of them I am sure no Man could ever procure Misses.
And now he puts on a disguise, he would have his friend not marry barely for beauty without some other excellent endowments of the soul, and yet from this very section to the end of his book he endeavours to prove, that no Womans soul is endowed with any excellency whatsoever; but railes against the whole sex in ill language, and does not only compare them, but place them in wickedness beneath the Devil himself; as I shall more particularly observe as I go on.
Then he makes six divisions on which love of men to women are grounded, and laughs at them, by stiling them goodly groundsall, although Virtue, Piety and Honesty be his three first.
He saies further it is an infirmity [Page 46]for a man to love a woman, because she is not really amiable, but in his fancy onely, which he can give no reason for, and the sensitive (that is the natural) faculty overrules. But he forgets that the highest of Laws are those which Nature gives, all written precepts are beneath them; and as it is a sin to be guilty of the breach of the latter, it is monstrous to be guilty of the breach of any of the former. The ingenious Sir Thomas Overbury in the choice of a wife comes home to this case in these words.
And as I said before, what the eye thinks beautiful, the Reason will approve to be so too.
DIVISION I. Virtue, Piety and Honesty.
THis Division begins with a great deal of Truth, and Ingenuity, that in the choice of a Wife we ought to found our love to her, on the right basis of virtue, piety and honesty, from whence we may certainly promise our selves a future life full of content, and happiness. To attest which truth Mr. Seymar brings numerous quotations from Jesus the son of Syrach, and Solomon himself: and ends by telling us that such women as these do fear the Lord, and they shall be praised.
His next assertion is as true, that where love to a woman is grounded on any other foundation than virtue and piety, there can be no real, no lasting content; and his reason is a sound one, that the wisdome of the mind is far more beautiful than the lineaments of the face. [Page 48]This discourse is both befitting a Christian and a Gentleman, and if he would have been pleased to proceed to inform his friend of the means to find such a beautiful soul (as no doubt there are millions) under the ill pleasing Vizors of loose customes, childish humours and our modern way of breeding, he would have laid such an obligation on him, as would have deserved the honourable title of a Friend. But he on the contrary, dehorts him from all inquisitions of this nature by telling him such a woman is rara avis, a Latin proverb appliable to a thing that in Nature has no being, as a black swan; and declares that they are creatures stuft with hypocrisy, subtlety, flattery and all sort of mischief, having no truth nor the fear of God in them: And Solomon is quoted to prove the universal wickedness of the sex, who but just now by his own confession did (by earnestly commending to his son a good Wife, then by explaining [Page 49]and delineating what sort of women he esteemed so) not only suppose that there be many such, but also that his son by observing his rules and directions might easily find one. And this very description Prov. 7.5. (and elsewhere throughout his books) of a wicked woman, are onely signs and observations that he had gained by his experience what sort of woman would prove a bad Wife, that his Son might avoid her; as this particular verse of a wheedling smooth tongue, a sign of a false heart: though this verse be more properly the character of one that will prove an Adulteress. So in other places he commends industry, humility and piety, as good qualifications in a Wife, that will make her Husband undoubtedly happy.
Then our Authour repeats several examples, of Solomon, Sampson and others, that were ruin'd by their Wives: and runs over two leaves [Page 50]in quotations from Jesus the Son of Syrach of his dislike of bad Wives, till he comes to a copy of criminal rhymes against the whole sex, which end—
Though our Conjugium might happily in his youth receive such signal inconveniences from women, that may have heat him into this rage against them all; yet me-thinks the honour due to the B. Virgin, who was born a woman, might give some allay if not to his anger, yet how-ever to the foulness of the language.
He proceeds, They are full of selfends, rebellion, pride, envy, &c. never good but when they are pleased, and that is impossible; like the Devil, nay exceed his infernal Majestie in mischief. These are his own words. Then all the Planets are Produced for witnesses [Page 51]how wicked women be, which after his own method I have turn'd a little nearer truth, that he may see the Planets make more against him than for him, as thus:
These Rhymes are searce worth reading, but the fancy is our Authors, I only chang'd the Verse.
But now let us seriously examine these high & mighty accusations which Mr. Seymar has loaded the half of mankind [Page 52]kind withal, and confined them to the female Sex.
It is well observed by the learned Camden, and by Seneca before him, how improper the expression is when we say, manners are more corrupt, and things are worse than they were in the Ages before us. Each Age has its proper disease of vice; things stand at a stay, only moving to and fro as the billowes of the sea in a calm: one Age produces strange anomalous garments, happily covering as deformed minds; another, excess of riot and banquetting; Sometimes Rebellion, Treason, Murther and Sacrilege is the mode; the next Age find no fault with Adulterers, Whoremongers nor Sodomites. So of Nations may be observed, a Vice that is capital in one Countrey, is scarce taken notice of in another: And all Customes which are the strongest of Laws, because voluntarily assented to by the generality of a Countrey, cannot be introduced by other than those who have most credit and reputation [Page 53]among the Vulgar. That this is true the Authours of the last Hurricane in this our native Countrey can attest. Now if it can be proved that the female sex are not in a capacity to bring into vogue any of these epidemick vices, this must at least be the consequence, that in this particular of giving reputation to wickedness, the other sex must be guilty alone. But I must go farther and affirm, that there are vices and those no small ones continually practised and allowed by our own sex, which their inclinations do naturally divert them from; and Custom though to us, has not been so injurious to them yet, as to give them the pasport of decency amongst them; which is so good a barr as puts them almost out of a capacity of being guilty. In this rank I account Treasons, Murthers by Duels and otherwise, Drunkenness, Cheats, Perjury, Prophaneness and Blasphemy, with others which I omit: and though some have endeavoured to debauch [Page 54]the Women so far as to make them guilty of some of them; yet is their number but very few in comparison of men, whose daily practice is most of them. But there is no vice the Women are guilty of, but is as frequently practised by men, and most of their faults have received not onely their advice, and approbation, but their importunity for the committing. Which is enough for the first thing I design to prove, that the Female sex is less wicked than the Male.
The dignity of the Woman in the Creation was to be the Man's companion and Partner in the delights of Paradise, to which end she was endued with a rational soul: and though in one Ray of Divinity, Wisdome, the Man excelled; yet in that other of Beauty, she was his Superiour. So wisely ordered by the great Creatour, that whilst she admired and obey'd him for the greater perfection; he did no less admire, and love her for the less. So by the rules of the Creation [Page 55]the distance was not so great nor she so vile, as to be despised.
She fell indeed, and was first in the transgression: but Man whose priviledge was to be the wiser, followed her; and God Almighty's pardon was equally extensive to the one sex, as the other: and as she had one curse more than Man, so she had an honour beyond him, The seed of the woman shall break the Serpents head, which promise when compleated, we find our Saviour equally conversing with women as men: from a Woman alone he received his flesh, and to a Woman he did first reveal the hard truth of his Resurrection. This sex had the honour to bear him company to the Cross, and the only secular concern he minded in his Agony, was to bid his beloved Disciple take care of the B. Virgin his mother. Which certainly is enough to convince any Christian, that of the female sex there are, and of those not a few, far beneath the Devils in Iniquity.
The Historical Part in both Testaments have recorded the names of several that were eminent for piety, virtue and honesty. Amongst whom Sarah the wife of Abraham the patriarch will stand so long as the world lasts for an exemplary pattern of humility, and obedience.
In all other Histories ancient and modern, Civil and Ecclesiastical, and more particularly in our English Chronicles occurr several Examples of gallant and virtuous Women: and though I must grant there are those that are otherwise, yet that makes against Mr. Seymar; for Solomon, David in the business of Bathsheba, Solyman the Magnificent, Holofernes, our Ed. 4. and the rest which he quotes, received their several damages not by entring into the state of Matrimony, but flying from it, as he persuades his friend here to do: and though there are many Wives that may truly be said to be sore afflictions, yet common observation and [Page 57]experience proves it, that where one man is ruin'd by entring into the regular estate of Wedlock, there are hundreds, I might say thousands, that are lost by shunning the solid content, and true friendship of a Wife, for the giggling, and hypocritical caresses of a Miss. These were the women Solomon points at, and cautions his Son of under the scandalous name of wicked and fools. The son of Syrach's observations second his, and are all to the very same purpose: but to affirm that either of them designed to dehort Mankind from Marriage, is maliciously to pervert the holy Scriptures to a contrary sence; for by these their cautions they supposed Marriage not only lawful, but necessary; and the doom attending the man that perverts holy writt (how practical soever the Custom has been both by Press and Pulpit) take from St. John in his Revelations, Chap. 22. vers. 18, 19. If any man shall add to these things, God shall add to him the [Page 58]plagues that are written in this book; and if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecie, God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy City, and from the things which are written in this book. And that it may appear that this terrible threatning is not confined to St. John's Revelations, who will give himself the trouble will find, though in other words, Moses denouncing it in Deuteronomie, Chap. 4. ver. 2. and Solomon to the same purpose in the Proverbs, Chap. 30. v. 6.
To conclude with these malicious and false accusations against women; If Michael an Archangel durst not give a condemned Spirit ill language, though opposed by him in the prosecution of his Masters command: how far has this Gentleman's tongue exceeded the bounds of modesty, to calumniate the whole female sex in such foul expressions, as are not fit to be given the greatest of Criminals, whenas Millions of these will one day be [Page 59]accepted of to be bright Inhabitants of Heaven?
DIVISION II. Beauty.
THis division is to persuade his friend that no Women are handsom, and his reason is, because all Mankind never was agreed upon the same complexion, shape, stature and proportion that ought to occurr for the perfecting a compleat beauty; and yet he grants that evey individual man can find a woman which he esteems so: then if men (as no doubt they are) be the sole Judges of beauty in women, for whom alone they were made, and they by this their divided choice of love allow beauty to be found in every complexion, shape and stature, Mr. Seymar who will not allow Beauty to belong to [Page 60]any of them, cannot by this his own rule take it ill to be thought none of the number of Mankind.
The Barbarians he allows were so far civilized by Nature as to pay respect to a beautiful woman, and defines beauty to be an exact symmetry of parts; which by his own Proverb of Quot homines tot sententiae, So many men so many minds, must come under the judgement of the fancy alone; which being the immediate product of the soul, does by her approbation of a beauty declare the secret sympathy between the Lover and the Woman loved; and the approbation of anothers judgement in the case is ridiculous and needless.
It is too true, those glorious beauties which adorn the female sex, have besides Time that never fails, hundreds of Accidents that are its mortal enemys, and before the gayety of youth is ended, many times puff it into nothing; Sin has made Mankind [Page 61]too Wicked to have these favours continue long; but Life it self, and all its other inferiour satisfactions are as short-lived as this; and there is none sure that would part with a happy life because he must not enjoy it a whole Century of years. Who remains not satisfied, must adjourn his expectations to eternity, where neither Life or Beauty ever will have end.
Next his Ballad of Can she be fair and honest too, is the second time produced, to prove that all beautiful women (though just now he would not allow there was any such in the world) are fools or whores; a beautiful body is commonly the Index of as fair a mind: and that all handsom women must be fools is no more necessary than that all Poets with old Homer must be blind.
He quotes Prov. 31.30. to what purpose I know not; for Solomon there tells his son, that women that fear [Page 62]God will make the best wives; and therefore advises him to make that the chief ground of his love, because beauty is vain and transitory.
But our Authour would have us when we like a handsom woman, to think her dust and ashes: that she may in time be dust and ashes I believe, but for my life I cannot think her so when all my five senses tell me to the contrary: She is my Equal, and like will to like. I know my doom is to be one of our Authour's Dizzards, which I am contented with: for truly seeing he will allow the Women no Beauty, Men ought not to take it unkindly that he will allow them no Wit.
DIVISION III. Riches, Greatness.
THat our Authour does not like Beauty he told us in his last Division, and now he would persuade us he can't abide Money if his Wife brings it: but surely Money is no Chimaera of the fancy though Beauty be: all the world have agreed long since that Gold is better than Brass: and there is never a Hobbist in Christendome that is so stupid, but believes it a real substance; the fault of it I cannot imagine, let's hear our Authours accusations.
- Imprimis. Money is a Goddess and the world worships it.
- Item. They that marry for money, marry a whore.
- Item. They that marry for money will have children that shall be nonsencical, [Page 64]Gooscapical, coxcomical Ideots.
- Item. (which is the most dreadful thing of all, especially for those that have no land) They that marry for money must make their Wife a Joynture.
For the Imprimis, I have heard that there are some Countries that think the Sun a God and worship him; yet for all that I can be content with his company in my garden, without any danger of Idolatry. And I am of the mind there may some other use be found for Money besides praying to it. For the two first Items, they are both new, that Money will beget gooscapical Children; and that all rich women are whores; if our Authour could but make all Whores rich, he would go nigh to be searcht for the Philosophers stone. But for the last accusation I cannot deny but that it is a most wicked, odious and abominable [Page 65]fact, worse than Witch-craft it self, to do what a man can't do, that is to say, to make a wise a Joynture when a man has not one foot of land.
But when Philogynus has found a woman that is owner of Piety and Virtue; and Solomon witnesses that such there are; the additions of Riches and Beautie will scarce divert him (if he is in his right senses) from making her his Wife.
DIVISION IV. Apparel, Deportment.
HEre he saies first that fine cloaths take fools; and I am of his mind, that whoever values either himself or any body else for their Cloaths, is and ought to be content to be accounted a fool: but there is a contrary opinion that will give him that reputation, which is, to think that there [Page 66]is any habit of cloaths so exotique, as to declare a wicked mind.
The Country a man lives in, his Quality, Time and station must cloath him; and when the women are to blame in this particular, it is no errour of Will but of Judgement onely, the lowest of faults and parponable enough in that Sex. As it is a sign of folly in any to esteem themselves the better for rich and modish garments; so is it the disease of old and grave minds to censure those that wear them therefore foollish, or not pious.
But he saies a woman stark naked is an Antidote against liking her, she's beholding onely to her cloaths for her Beauty; and the Travailers he saies tell him so. Among all the Travails that I have seen I can find no such place, but the Cape of good hope in Africk that he means; from whence I fancy our Authour has taken this new model of an Unmarried [Page 67]Common-wealth: there they never marry, but couple promiscuously (with the Baboons sometimes when the Spirit moves them) without being scared with the damned Bulbeggars of Adultery, Incest and other yet more horrid crimes; and for relation of Wife, Brother, Son, Uncle and so forth, they have no occasion for the names. This Model he recommends to old England, as Harrington did in the last Age his Rota of a Commonwealth: and in my opinion that Country that accepts of the one, will find it necessary to take the other too. But for all his gravity, I am of the mind that if he should be so unfortunate, as once in his life-time to be lockt into a room, with one of our English or French Ladies, that we Gooscapical Lovers call young and handsom; if she should be naked, the sight would not be so terrible as to make him break his neck out at window to be rid of her.
His example of the Gentleman of Florence that married an ugly wife by candle-light, and was fain to be beholding to the Sun next morning to know what shape she was on, by my consent should have kept her in a room that always needed a candle; but what is this to England? have not our Laws sufficientlie provided against such mistakes by confining the ceremony of Marriage to be performed within the compass of those hours, that who is not alwayes drunk, must of necessity then be sober? But what if some Men commit mistakes in their most serious actions of life, as purchasing of land, making of Wills and settlements, marrying and the like? must therefore no body buy land? nor make a Will? nor provide for his Children, because there is a possibility that a Law suit may be the consequence of it?
Well, to gratifie our Conjugium, if he will but allow that his friend [Page 69]may find a Wife that has Piety, Virtue, Beauty and Riches; for her Cloaths rather than they should trouble him, if he will but promise to make them in the fashion, it is more than I know that he himself may not be admitted to be the Taylor.
DIVISION V. Familiarity, Discourse, Singing, Musick, Dancing, &c.
OUr Authour has almost forgot what he designed to prove, which was, That all who marry are Fools and Madmen, under the names of Asses, Dizzards, Gooscaps and the like: for if there are such women who are owners of the two essential qualifications of piety and virtue, and have those substantial and necessary additions of Riches and Beauty, neither singing, Musick or Dancing [Page 70]will be any impediment from discourse and familiarity with the woman a man designs to marry. And hitherto his dissuasions have been so frivolous, that such solid qualifications will easily over-balance them.
How slightly his Gravity may think of those cheerful and innocent divertisements which are usual betwixt the young couple that are resolved to enter into this most sacred and obligatory league of true Virtue, it matters not: The custome of particular Countries, some of which allow more, and some less freedom of converse between the two Lovers before the consummation of the marriage by the Priest, is not my task at present to censure: but as those diseases in the body which arise from Melancholy, are far more dangerous and difficult to cure, than those which the more sanguine complexions are inclined to; so do those diseases of mind which Gravity and sedateness [Page 71]of temper accompany, more properly deserve the scandalous imputation of folly, than the most impertinent and laughing humour in the World. And Solomon that has pronounc'd all our inferiour actions and designes of life which do not immediately tend to that felicity that must for ever last, Vanity; has allowed Wisdom to be equally a Concomitant of the gay and brisk humour, as of that which is more grave and reserved.
His stories of the Ephesian Lady and the like, do perfectly contradict his first Position, which was, that The married state was fit for none but either wicked or fools; for those examples and all the dreadful consequences which he afterwards deduces from singing, Musick and Dancing, he neither has or can apply to any but Whores: a name to which this estate of life is a natural enemy.
For Dancing, if there is any other use of it than to gain a comely deportment [Page 72]of body, I am content that my judgement shall accord with Mr. Seymar's to condemn it.
But Musick being the highest of Pleasures, scarce submitting to the gross name of sensual, the Soul has so great an interest in the delight, I must allow as a very great ornament to those of the female sex that are skil'd in it, especially the vocal: which being a beauty as pleasing to the ear, as motion and harmony of parts are to the eye, aloud proclaim that those which are so endowed are of the favourites of Heaven, where alone Musick and Beauty are in Perfection. And that such Excellencies may be abused, is no more a scandal, than it is to Wisdom that Achitophel was a Villain.
DIVISION VI. Lust.
THis of all his allegations against marriage is least to the purpose, because marriage is its eternal enemy.
And to grant that Love and Lust are both one Passion, is to invert the nature of words, for the notions that the Mind receives upon the naming of these two words are as different, and as opposite, as East from West.
The Poets which he quotes against Marriage, those few that I am acquainted with, have in no sort of writing neither Heroick, Dramatique, Burlesque, Pindarique or any other, so much as endeavoured to prove that Love and Lust are the same Passion, or that Marriage is not essential to Societies. Those two which I have perused most are Mr. [Page 75] Cowley, and Mr. Dreydon; two of Nature Miracles, and who in their several capacities have celebrated Love and Marriage. The writings of the former, no not his Mistress (where it is palpable (not onely by the circumstances of his writing, but also by his own acknowledgement that he is not onely not ashamed for his being in Love with a woman, but also, that he has no good opinion of any man that is not capable of being so too) that he was really in love) must not be condemned by any without the merited imputation of weakness of Judgement. The latter, as I have not the honour of his acquaintance, having but once (to my knowledge) ever seen him, so I dare in spight of customary injustice, commend him, albeit he is alive, and though I know my Pen is far beneath his praise, yet I do as well know so vast a wit must be owner of the same quantity of good nature as will excuse it. What is [Page 76]either wicked or silly in modish colours he has so well painted, as would divert any person that is owner of the least ingenuity, from both: more particularly this of shunning Marriage, and being entred perfidiously to break a vow so easy to be kept, in his Play of Marriage a-la-Mode: a more gentile Satyre against this sort of folly, no Pen can write, where he brings the very assignations that are commonly used about Town upon the stage; and to see both Boxes and Pitt so damnably crouded, in order to see themselves abused, and yet neither to be angry or ashamed, argues such excess of stupidity, that this great Pen it self (if 'twere possible) would be put to a nonplus to express it.
For Chaucer and the rest that he quotes, he knowes (if he knowes any thing) that observations of Vices, are not directions to commit them; Nay farther, the Poets by rallying them, dissuade [Page 77]men from committing them: and where an ingenuous piece of raillery will not dissuade a Man from being a Fop, I am sure the more grave directions in a Sermon cannot.
The Sultan's wife in Arabia that had a mind to leave her Husband for the handsom Travailer, makes against him (if the story be true, for I don't know it) for she had a mind to be a whore, which is against the Lawes of Marriage which forbids her: and if some Ladies in Christendome will be so, she shall have my excuse for being so too. But what is this to the business?
Lust is more outragious (he saies) in women than men; he helps me with an answer for he saies when it takes, and when is that? when they wave the dull conversation of a Husband, for the brisker one of a Gallant.
Therefore let them all alone (quoth he) as to marriage; no otherwise (he [Page 78]means) whatever he payes for them: this has been answered before, and I don't love repetitions.
To conclude, It is notorious that in both capacities single and married, there are Virtuous women: and would be thousands more if Men would accept them for Wives, and not make it their daily business to debauch them: and when they have done, abuse them for their labour. Divines tell us, as it is the Devil's business to invite us to be wicked here, it will be his endeavour at the day of Judgement that we may be condemned for those very faults he persuaded us to commit. The Devil's punishment all men know that believe there is a Devil, (among those that don't let this pass as an impertinence) and they who are guilty of the Devil's faults, cannot take it ill to share with him in his punishment.
MEMBER II. Of the second end of Marriage, the continuation of our kind.
WHich is indeed the chiefest design, that the World may continue peopled regularly, without confusion of alliances, protected by the Lawes, and made capable of the Priviledges of Freemen, of which being in a capacity to inherit is not the least. That Children are primarily Evils, is contrary to the Psalmists opinion, who saies, The man is blest that hath his Quiver full of them: Whoever has observed the rules of Providence will find, that numerous Families are best provided for: And as poor a way as it is of immortalizing our names, however it is the best: and those actions which he stiles nobler, will not appear so when Opinion is gone, and Reason seated in [Page 80]her place. The world is contented to be cheated by false glosses and deceits, she would not else stile the destruction of Mankind noble, and reward the Executioners with all the glorious epithets of good and virtuous. A gallant and wise commander in War no doubt destroyes his enemies with the same reluctancy that he would cut off an arm to save his life: and takes no more pleasure of that his necessitous Act of killing men to be repeated in praise of him, than he would of this other.
That a Peasant may the same way eternize his name as a Monarch, is a very slender argument: for not onely the Essentials but all the pleasures of life God has equally distributed amongst mankind: the advantages of the superfluity of wealth (though rightly used) is so slender an addition to the Proprietour, that none but those whom Fortune has placed at a very great distance, can possibly envy them.
The hazard that Children may miscarry either by Sin or folly cannot divert Philogynus from desiring legitimate issue, no sort of action in secular affairs of life but has its possibility of miscarriage; but in this particular of Children, care and diligence in their Education does contribute so much to their advantage, that it is most commonly the Parents fault if a Child runs either into mistakes of judgement or debauchery of manners; But when a Parent has done his duty, as it cannot but be a great comfort to see his Child make him a proportionable return in being Wise, so has he no reason to repine if he should not.
The Italians (he saies) make little or no difference, between their Children and kindred: I do not know what he means; for I am told that Children do inherit in Italy as in England; and for want of Issue, the next of Kin: he would therefore persuade [Page 82]his friend to adopt an Heir, rather than get one, because by so doing he leaves his estate to one that his judgement approves of, and does not transmit so great a concern to the blind chance of fortune. The Italian I grant to be a very wise man, his business, and pleasures are both directed and improved by much thinking; but withall he has the diseases which attend great Wits, that is, to be guilty sometimes of greater follies than the rest of mankind; for this business of Adoption we find our judgements are so short-sighted, that amongst our own Children whom we daily converse with, and observe, we frequently mistake the good for bad; and whom we think the likeliest to miscarry, many times outstrips his Brothers in Wisdom and Virtue: much harder is the disquisition in a stranger, who may by suiting with our humours (happily the worst of them) steal a secret approbation in our judgement of being [Page 83]virtuous, and gain anothers birthright by nothing but a seven-years well-manag'd Wheedle. The verity of this argument we may see in elective Kingdomes which are generally worse managed than those whose Laws by leaving it to Providence have directed the succession of the Crown to come by inheritance.
MEMBER III. Description of a single or unmarried life.
BY this title I expected either an ingenious Harangue in commendation of a singe life, or elses ome solid Arguments deduced from the Topicks of Virtue and Honesty, the onely Basis of true content, to have persuaded his friend to live a single Man; but I see I am deceived, for his commendation of a Bathelour's [Page 84]life is a very short one; which is, Every body courts him that he would marry a daughter or some other relation, but being once married, each of them by degrees leave off such addresses to him; Therefore, saies our Authour, never marry. So, so, because a Man may have his choice among a thousand Jewels of rich vaIue to chuse one, and but one, therefore by this his rule he must chuse none at all.
Now again he commends the Virgin state, which is nothing to his purpose; his friend is not persuaded any where to go into a Cloyster, neither has he given him any directions about Chastity; well, but he saies Marriage fills the earth, but Virginity Paradise, which is very true.
I do not nor would be thought to make any comparison between the Virgin and married state; I know the former by St. Paul's testimonie is more refined and Angelick; and approaches nearer, by being free from worldly concerns, to the state of the blessed after Death: I do onely commend the legal and regular estate of Matrimony, in opposition to all other sort of addresses to women, as comprehending in it self more security, and content, as well as defending men from all the inconveniences of diseases, [Page 86]poverty and shame: which are certain, though many times late sequels of this vanity. That Marriage brings along with it cares and troubles, is by no means to be allowed of as a literal Truth: those necessary troubles which are congenial to life, by so interested a friend as a Wife, are not onely diverted but alleviated. Fear is a disease of mind which brings Care to her succour when we possess things of the greatest value, which we are least willing to part with, and love best: amongst which Wife and Children are the chiefest. A Crown it self, which is the height of Riches and Honour, cannot be possest without cares and fears, because a thing of that inestimable value: no otherwise do they belong to a married state, but that such enjoy so great blessings, and yet are not out of a posibility of losing them.
The Married do indeed set upon greater Undertakings, especially in Oeconomiques, [Page 87]than is prudence for a single Man to adventure on, because he is assured of so good an interested second: which being not understood, makes many condemn Marriage as the authour of trouble, when as it naturally encounters it.
But Lust through all its ranges of Uncleanness, in its several specious dresses of satisfaction can entitle his followers to no solid content; It is beholding to a debauch of Wine vented in modish nonsence, and continued without a Fever, to have the cheat not discovered by its greatest Admirers at the first onset; before Custome calls in despair and impudence to second her. And then the pedantique contradicting of an immaterial substance persuade their unwilling souls to believe there is no punishment, but what is the immediate product of the Fact; a conceit so wild and silly as has not secured the Authour of it in his life, from any whose Wit will so [Page 88]far conspire with his Malice, that when he has pistoll'd him, to take care to escape unpunished by a halter.
Other commendations of a single life our Authour has not set down, and my observations inform me of no more; so I proceed to the examination of his next.
MEMBER IV. Of second Marriages.
THose that marry once we have heard before are Bedlams, and now our Authour tells us so again: but those that marry twice are Daemoniacks, and without doubt are possest: to prove it he tells of some twice married folk who came to Heaven gate, and St Peter therefore would not let them in: and St. Hierom he quotes against it, and then he brings St. Paul to confirm it, where he saies to be [Page 89]carnally minded is death. His stories such as these every where about his book, I presume are onely to please himself, and I don't envy him the diversion: but that St. Paul's meaning in those words to be carnally minded is death, was to dehort Men from marrying a second Wife after the decease of the first, nothing but stupidity it self can believe. For this passage has relation to the first chapter of this Epistle, which St. Paul writ to the Christians at Rome wherein he condemns the Gnosticks, who though acknowledging the Faith, did notwithstanding eagerly assert the necessity of observing certain Mosaical Rites and Ceremonies, as pretending to a more strict life than the other Christians, and yet lived in all uncleanness, and practised unnatural lusts according to the custome of the Heathen, the consequence of which St Paul saies is death. For the quotation of the Fathers both here and elsewhere, I have [Page 90]not leisure to examine: but whoever does thus wilfully wrest and pervert the Texts of Holy writ, it is more than probable that the Holy Fathers of the Church shall not be more ingenuously used by him in their Writings.
That Love is lust, and that Marriage is stuft with dangers and miseries has been answered in his general accusation of Marriage before: but for another proof that all Marriages both first and second are unlawful, he quotes 1 Cor. 7.1, 7, 8, 26, 27, 38. and repeats the words and so concludes; Which very Chapter without farther arguments confutes his whole book, and the very design of it: for in those Primitive times the Gnosticks pretending more knowledge than was allotted to their share, were of Mr. Seymar's mind, and thought marriage not at all convenient for mankind: commending in words the virgin state, but practising all sorts of lusts and uncleanness. [Page 91]This cursed Heresie had taken root as well at Corinth as at Rome: and in answer to an Epistle which is lost, that the Christians at Corinth had sent to St. Paul concerning some questions, whereof this of Marriage was one, he returns this Epistle in answer; and in this part of it does punctually set down the laws of Christ concerning wedlock: which in short is this, That those who have the gift of continency, he would have devote themselves wholly to prayer and contemplation, by sequestring themselves from the business of the world; and those who have not, to marry and live chastly with a Wife. It is these hypocritical Gnosticks that St Paul speaks of, when he saies, whoever forbids marriage teaches the doctrine of devils; and in my opinion this Treatise of Conjugium Conjurgium comprehends in it exactly that heresy of the Gnosticks in their despising of Marriage which St. Paul in this chapter does both piouslly [Page 92]and elegantlie refute; for they too (as our Authour here) pretended it was to advance the Virgin state: for