Page:Works of the Late Doctor Benjamin Franklin (1793).djvu/170

160 and uſeful life; and poſſibly ſome of thoſe accidents or connections, that might have injured the conſtitution, or reputation, or both, are thereby happily prevented. Particular circumſtances of particular perſons, may poſſibly ſometimes make it prudent to delay entering into that ſtate; but in general, when nature has rendered our bodies fit for it, the preſumption is in nature's favour, that ſhe has not judged amiſs in making us deſire it. Late marriages are often attended, too, with this further inconvenience, that there is not the ſame chance that the parents ſhall live to fee their offspring educated. "Late children," ſays the Spaniſh proverb, "are early "orphans." A melancholy reflection to thoſe whoſe caſe it may be! With us in America, marriages are generally in the morning of life; our children are therefore educated and ſettled in the world by noon; and thus, our buſineſs being done, we have an afternoon and evening of cheerful leiſure to ourſelves, ſuch as our friend at preſent enjoys. By theſe early marriages we are bleſſed with more children; and from the mode among us, founded by nature, of every mother ſuckling and nurſing her own child, more of them are raiſed. Thence the ſwift progreſs of population among us, unparalleled in Europe. In fine, I am glad you are married, and congratulate you moſt cordially upon it. You are now in the way of becoming a uſeful citizen; and you have eſcaped the unnatural ſtate of celibacy for life—the fate of many here, who never intended it, but who having too long poſtponed the change of their condition, find, at length, that it is too late to think of it, and ſo live all their lives in a ſituation that greatly leſſens a man's value. An odd volume of a ſet of books, bears not the value of its proportion to the ſet: