Page:A Treatise concerning the Use and Abuse of the Marriage Bed.djvu/44

 People who, though the World calls them Christians, can hardly, without blushing, call themselves so, I must be forced to speak as plainly as the Laws of Decency will allow, in reproving their Conduct, I refer to the Particulars in the following Tract, where they who are guilty may find Room to blush.

were to be wished, that all People that marry were to be ask'd before-hand if they really understood what Matrimony meant, and what the true intent of a married Life was, as well in its Institution, as in the grand Design of Family-Felicity; the married Couple are young, their Blood warm; the Youth, fir'd with the blooming Beauty of his Bride, thinks of little all the while the Apparatus of the Wedding is in hand, nay, perhaps all the while he is (feigning) I should say making, Love to her, as we weakly call his Courting her, I think we should rather call it, all the while he is talking in Jest to her; I say, all this while he is thinking of little but getting to Bed to her. What engages her Thoughts I say nothing to, for Reasons given already.

, coming together without Thought, we are not to wonder they go on without Conduct, that they act a thousand weak and wild Things afterwards, such as they often live to be ashamed of, and to blush at. As they allowed themselves to think no farther than the wedding Week, so how awkwardly do they behave when they come to the graver Part of Life? Matrimony is not a Branch of Life only, but 'tis a State, 'tis a settled Establishment of Life, and an Establishment for a continuance at least of the Life of one of the two. How unhappy are those married People, who rashly coming together, as I said