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between the Man and his Wife, especially as some People would have it be understood, and as the common Talk is managed when such Things come in our way; that the Ladies will take no Offence at me, I dare say. I don't take the State of Matrimony to be designed as that of Apprentices who are bound to the Family, and that the Wife is to be us'd only as the upper Servant in the House. The great Duty between the Man and his Wife, I take to consist in that of Love, in the Government of Affection, and the Obedience of a complaisant, kind, obliging Temper; the Obligation is reciprocal, 'tis drawing in an equal Yoke; Love knows no superior or inferior, no imperious Command on one hand, no reluctant Subjection on the other; the End of both should be the well-ordering their Family, the good-guiding their Houshold and Children, educating, instructing and managing them with a mutual Endeavour, and giving respectively good Examples to them, directing others in their Duty by doing their own well, guiding themselves in every Relation, in order to the well guiding all that are under them; filling up Life with an equal Regard to those above them, and those below them, so as to be Exemplar to all.
This is Matrimony in its just appointed meaning, whatever Notions our fashionable People may have of it. What Import else can those Words have in them, which we find so carefully placed, and so openly repeated in the Office at the Time of Marriage, Wilt thou love her, live with her, comfort her, honour, keep her, and again, to love and to cherish, and afterward 'tis added, that you will do all this according
to
