392 NEW ATLANTIS. 



rality of wives. To this he said, &quot; You have reason 

 for to commend that excellent institution of the Feast 

 of the Family. And indeed we have experience, that 

 those families that are partakers of the blessing of that 

 feast do flourish and prosper ever after in an extraor 

 dinary manner. But hear me now, and I will tell you 

 what I know. You shall understand that there is not 

 under the heavens so chaste a nation as this of Ben- 

 salem ; nor so free from all pollution or foulness. It is 

 the virgin of the world. I remember I have read in 

 one of your European books, of an holy hermit amongst 

 you that desired to see the Spirit of Fornication ; and 

 there appeared to him a little foul ugly J^thiop. 1 But 

 if he had desired to see the Spirit of Chastity of Bensa- 

 lem, it would have appeared to him in the likeness of 

 a fair beautiful Cherubin. For there is nothino- amono-st 



o o 



mortal men more fair and admirable, than the chaste 

 &quot; minds of this people. Know therefore, that with them 

 there are no stews, no dissolute houses, no courtesans 

 nor anything of that kind. Nay they wonder .(with 

 detestation) at you in Europe, which permit such 

 things. They say ye have put marriage out of office : 

 for marriage is ordained a remedy for unlawful con 

 cupiscence ; and natural concupiscence seemeth as a 

 _spur to marriage. But when men have at hand a 

 remedy more agreeable to their corrupt will, marriage 

 is almost expulsed. And therefore there are with you 

 seen infinite men that marry not, but chuse rather a 

 libertine and impure single life, than to be yoked in 

 marriage ; and many that do marry, marry late, when 

 the prime and strength of their years is past. And 

 when they do marry, what is marriage to them but a 



1 The Klein Meister of La Motte Fouqud s Sintrcun. R. L. E. 



