Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 1.djvu/317

, and would certainly make you unhappy: that, had you any other offers which your friends or yourself thought more to your advantage, I should think I were very unjust to be an obstacle in your way.' Now for what concerns my fortune, you have answered it. I desire, therefore, you will let me know if your health be otherwise than it was when you told me the doctors advised you against marriage, as what would certainly hazard your life. Are they or you grown of another opinion in this particular? Are you in a condition to manage domestick affairs, with an income of less (perhaps) than three hundred pounds a year? Have you such an inclination to my person and humour, as to comply with my desires and way of living, and endeavour to make us both as happy as you can? Will you be ready to engage in those methods I shall direct for the improvement of your mind, so as to make us entertaining company for each other, without being miserable when we are neither visiting nor visited? Can you bend your love and esteem and indifference to others the same way as I do mine? Shall I have so much power in your heart, or you so much government of your passions, as to grow in good humour upon my approach, though provoked by a —? Have you so much good nature as to endeavour by soft words to smooth any rugged humour occasioned by the cross accidents of life? Shall the place wherever your husband is thrown, be more welcome than courts and cities without him? In short, these are some of the necessary methods to please men, who, like me, are deep read in the world; and to a person thus made, I should be proud in giving all due returns toward making her happy. These are the " questions