.

My mother has given back the deed of settlement of my estate, and
accepted of an assignment on my half pay: she is greatly a loser; but
she insisted on making me happy, with such an air of tenderness, that I
could not deny her that satisfaction.

I shall keep some land in my own hands, and farm; which will enable
me to have a post chaise for Emily, and my mother, who will be a good
deal with us; and a constant decent table for a friend.

Emily is to superintend the dairy and garden; she has a passion for
flowers, with which I am extremely pleased, as it will be to her a
continual source of pleasure.

I feel such delight in the idea of making her happy, that I think
nothing a trifle which can be in the least degree pleasing to her.

I could even wish to invent new pleasures for her gratification.

I hope to be happy; and to make the loveliest of womankind so,
because my notions of the state, into which I am entering, are I hope
just, and free from that romantic turn so destructive to happiness.

I have, once in my life, had an attachment nearly resembling
marriage, to a widow of rank, with whom I was acquainted abroad; and
with whom I almost secluded myself from the world near a twelvemonth,
when she died of a fever, a stroke I was long before I recovered.

I loved her with tenderness; but that love, compared to what I feel
for Emily, was as a grain of sand to the globe of earth, or the weight
of a feather to the universe.

A marriage where not only esteem, but passion is kept awake, is, I
am convinced, the most perfect state of sublunary happiness: but it
requires great care to keep this tender plant alive; especially, I
blush to say it, on our side.

Women are naturally more constant, education improves this happy
disposition: the husband who has the politeness, the attention, and
delicacy of a lover, will always be beloved.

The same is generally, but not always, true on the other side: I
have sometimes seen the most amiable, the most delicate of the sex,
fail in keeping the affection of their husbands.

I am well aware, my friend, that we are not to expect here a life of
continual rapture; in the happiest marriage there is danger of some
languid moments: to avoid these, shall be my study; and I am certain
they are to be avoided.

The inebriation, the tumult of passion, will undoubtedly grow less
after marriage, that is, after peaceable possession; hopes and fears
alone keep it in its first violent