I acknowledge, we are too apt to call things just, that have been long in practice; and, through ancient custom, these oppressive tradesmen act in open defiance of either equity or conscience, thinking none will call them to account, and they may still ride triumphant upon the stream of avarice. But let not a precedent, abounding with so much mischief, any longer disgrace the age; let not virtue and happiness any longer be bartered, which, in the present case, they evidently are, to the abuse of all civil society, and disuniting the very bands of mutual benefit and preservation; nor suffer these men to monopolize the whole from the female part of the creation, unless there is a provision made to secure them from penury.
Nothing, it is presumed, can be more reasonable and just, than that those who deprive others of subsistence should contribute to their support. For what law, either divine or human, will justify the continuance of a precedent, which has influence sufficient to prevail over the virtue of individuals? What statute is there, which grants that men alone shall live,
