Page:A Treatise concerning the Use and Abuse of the Marriage Bed.djvu/124

 Love; as Hatred succeeded the same kind of Affection in Ammon, when he had ravished his Sister, and which made him, as it were, kick her down Stairs.

A true Affection can never be the Product of a vitious Inclination, any more than an evil Tree can bring forth good Fruit, 'tis contrary to the Nature of the Work; a chast, affectionate Embrace is quite another Thing; the one is from Heaven formed in the Soul for the good of Mankind, by the glorious Hand of a beneficent Power, and directed for the Propagation of a chast and virtuous Breed, fitted with inbred original Modesty and Principles of Virtue, as it were, convey'd by Blood to the Honour of the very Ordinance of Matrimony it self, and of the primitive Institution of it in Paradise: Shall we constitute a vitious or vitiated Desire in the room of Love, and a corrupt Combination of two enflamed Pieces of Pollution under the shelter of legal Forms, and call this Matrimony? It can produce nothing but Mischief and Confusion, the Nature of the Thing dictates no other.

say Love is not essential to the Form of a Marriage, is true; but to say it is not essential to the Felicity of a married State, and consequently to that which I call Matrimony, is not true; and you may as truly say, that Peace is not essential to the good of a Family; as that the Harmony and Conjunction of Souls are not essential to the Happiness of the Persons joyn'd together.

the Man or Woman that is to marry do not value whether they are Happy or no, or whether they live with the Person they are to marry in a state of War or Peace, always Jar-