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I could name so many Examples of this kind, and give you an Account of so many Families ruined by it, that it would tire you in the reading. But give me leave to single out one for your Remark, which, though the Case was nearer home, you must allow me to place at some Distance, that the particular Families may not be marked out and exposed. Suppose then the Scene in France, not far from a great City, not the greatest but the greatest City but one in the Kingdom: A certain rich Merchant had two Sons, and though he had a very great Estate, it was of his own Purchasing, so that there was no Entail upon it, and he was therefore at liberty to give it to which of his Sons he pleased.
His eldest Son was a young Gentleman of good Sense, and a very agreeable Person, and his Father had bestowed some Charge upon his Education, had given him learning and good Breeding, to qualify him, as he said, for the Life of a Gentleman, and, as he usually expressed it, to make him know how to live agreeable to the Fortune he was able to give him; but withal, the Father kept him pretty much in Subjection; and the more, by making him always sensible how much it was in his Power to make him a Gentleman or a Beggar, that is to say, to give him an Estate, and make him live like a Gentleman, or turn him loose in the World to seek his Fortune.
Particularly, the Father was often repeating to his Son, how he expected that he should conform himself to his Measures in taking a Wife, and that if he did not, he would absolutely disinherit him, and give his Estate to his younger Brother.
Whe-
