CIi. V. of pursuing the opposite Mode. 309 



in either way ; this is all I contend for ; I would 

 on no account do more ; but I contend, that at 

 present we are very far from doing this. 



Among the lower classes of society, where the 

 point is of the greatest importance, the poor-laws 

 afford a direct, constant and systematical encou- 

 ragement to marriage, by removing from each in- 

 dividual that heavy responsibility, which he would 

 incur by the laws of nature, for bringing beings 

 into the world which he could not support. Our 

 private benevolence has the same direction as the 

 poor-laws, and almost invariably tends to en- 

 courage marriage, and to equalize as much as 

 possible the circumstances of married and single 

 men. 



Among the higher classes of people, the superior 

 distinctions which married women receive, and 

 the marked inattentions to which single women of 

 advanced age are exposed, enable many men, 

 who are agreeable neither in mind nor person, and 

 are besides in the wane of life, to choose a partner 

 among the young and fair, instead of being con- 

 fined, as nature seems to dictate, to persons of 

 nearly their own age and accomplishments. It is 

 scarcely to be doubted, that the fear of being an 

 old maid, and of that silly and unjust ridicule, 

 which folly sometimes attaches to this name, drives 

 many women into the marriage union with men 

 whom they dislike, or at best to whom they are 

 perfectly indifferent. Such marriages must to 

 every delicate mind appear little better than legal 

 prostitutions; and they often burden the earth 



