conversing; but that Part is not at all concerned in this Discourse, our present Design looking quite another way.
The last of these, (viz.) Modesty with respect to Sexes, is the Subject intended in this Tract, especially as it is confined to this one Branch of it, namely, the Conjugal Part of Life; the Intercourse between the Sexes, or the freedom of conversing between a Man and his Wife; in which many think all the Rules and Laws of Modesty are finished and at an end; a Mistake so gross, so full of fatal Mischiefs to the Publick Virtue, and to the intent and meaning of Decency in general, that it is much in a Nation so every way Virtuous as this, and where the Rules of Virtue are enforced by wholesome Laws, such a corrupt Notion should spread so far, and so many Absurdities break out into Practice upon that Subject.
The Notion is, that there is no more such a Thing as Modesty to be named between a Man and his Wife; that as they are but one Flesh, and indeed but one Body, there's no Nakedness between them: That were they alone Covering would be not only needless but Nonsence, if the Climate did not require it; that nothing can be indecent, nothing improper; that there's no Restraint, and that no Law can be broken by them, but every thing is Handsome, every thing Honest, and every thing Modest; that 'tis a full Answer to all Reproach in any Case that may be charg'd, to say it was my own Wife; or it was none but my own Husband; this is made the Covering to all manner of surfeiting Indecencies and Excesses; of which I am to speak at large in their Order.
