Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 1.djvu/312

276 of a reason, which I declare (so unpardonably jealous I am) to be a sufficient cause for me to hate any woman any farther than a bare acquaintance. Among all the young gentlemen that I have known, who have ruined themselves by marrying (which I assure you is a great number) I have made this general rule, that they are either young, raw, and ignorant scholars, who, for want of knowing company, believe every silk petticoat includes an angel; or else these have been a sort of honest young men, who perhaps are too literal in rather marrying than burning, and entail a misery on themselves and posterity, by an overacting modesty. I think I am very far excluded from listing under either of these heads. I confess I have known one or two men of sense enough, who, inclined to frolicks, have married and ruined themselves out of a maggot; but a thousand houshold thoughts, which always drive matrimony out of my mind whenever it chances to come there, will, I am sure, fright me from that; beside that, I am naturally temperate, and never engaged in the contrary, which usually produces those effects. Your hints at particular stories I do not understand; and having never heard them but so hinted, thought it proper to give you this, to show you how I thank you for your regard of me; and I hope my carriage will be such as that my friends need not be ashamed of the name. I should not have behaved myself after that manner I did in Leicester, if I had not valued my own entertainment, beyond the obloquy of a parcel of very wretched fools, which I solemnly pronounce the inhabitants of Leicester to be, and so I content myself with retaliation. I " hope