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is never developed for want of an opportunity! Where education has been careful and thorough, there is a great development of power. Society, after the completion of school education, is the means of still further improvement. For a few years it fills the female mind. Every thing is fresh and new, and therefore interesting. One scene of gaiety after another absorbs and engrosses the attention. Emancipation from the confinement of school discipline, and the pleasures of free and independent action, are enough to make life pass agreeably away. But the time at length comes, when all these things begin to pall. The feeling begins, occasionally to come over the young woman, that it is but a sorry account of human life, that it is spent in a perpetual round of frivolities. The human mind is made for serious realities, and never can be satisfied with any thing else. Unless supplied with these it loses its self respect. The mind unoccupied without, turns inward and preys upon itself. In this state of things the moral dispositions suffer. The temper cannot retain its sunny brightness, and a new generation coming forward with the charms of youth and beauty, is in no degree calculated to increase the self complacency of the woman

who has trod the whole round of the gaieties of the world. There is apt to arise about that time a critical spirit, which is not altogether pleased with things as they are. There is a fear of falling into neglect, which becomes watchfully suspicious of any signs of it. The generous feelings are too apt to contract, and the openness and freedom of earlier years give place to reserve. All these evils find their remedy in the new relations which marriage brings about. The affections having found their proper object, harmony and complacency are restored to the soul. The active powers having found something worthy of them to do, go forth in joyful exercise. The critical spirit disappears, and woman, finding herself embarked anew in the great voyage of life, feels disposed to cultivate the best feelings towards her fellow passengers.

If marriage places woman in that sphere where she may attain the greatest happiness, so does it advance her to a station of power and responsibility. Her power over her husband's happiness is almost absolute. wisdom, by steadiness, by forbearance, by

By

meekness, she may be to him a tower of

strength. But no tongue can tell the ways

in which she may annoy and render him wretched.

The first thing to be watched over is the temper. Short of an absolute control of this, there is no happiness in married life. Resentment, just so far as it exists, and so long as it lasts, destroys that state of feeling, which constitutes the happiness of those who are connected by the most sacred tie. The proper affection finds its satisfaction in perpetual demonstrations of kindness. But what an altered and an awful condition of things when a state of feeling has arisen, which finds its highest gratification in crossing and vexing one another! Is it not highly dangerous then to indulge in such a state of feeling for a single moment? Alas! that there should be two human beings so mad and so unprincipled as to pursue such a course of conduct as this!

It is said, that there are few happy matches. Dr. Watts indeed, a century ago, wrote a celebrated poem under this title. If it be a fact, it is the blackest record against humanity. Those who enter into the marriage relation with true attachment, and become unhappy, are the most unfortunate and criminal of man

kind, and they have none to blame but themselves. They are suicides in a double sense. One of the worst indications of the moral condition of our country, is the number of applications for divorce which are, annually made to the legislatures in the different states. By this indication it would seem that we have sunk below even heathen morality. Such a thing as a divorce was not known in the Roman state for four centuries from its foundation. I never see an account of a case of this kind without picturing to myself the deep misery which must precede, accompany, and follow such a proceeding. You never read the details of a divorce, except in cases of gross immorality, without recognising the fact, that the great cause of connubial unhappiness is want of mutual forbearance and self control.

As a wife's control over her husband's happiness is almost unlimited, so is her influence over his fortunes. Some women make it a matter of pride and of boast that they govern their husbands, and consider it a mark of their superiority. The very attempt is a proof of the contrary. It is only the foolish and the weak that can ever even wish to do

so. Such a boast is equally disgraceful to both parties. The will too, often bears an inverse proportion to the other powers of the mind. And you sometimes find women who seem to be little else than the incarnation of a fierce and indomitable will. Such women will have their way, it is true, because a wise man will sacrifice much for peace. But it is no more government than it is when a mob gets the mastery of a town. They govern, it is true, because all government is suspended.

A woman has her husband's fortunes in her power, because she may, or she may not, as she pleases, conform to his circumstances. This is her first duty, and it ought to be her pride. No passion for luxury or display ought for a moment to tempt her to deviate in the least degree from this line of conduct. She will find her happiness and her respectability in it. Any other course is wretchedness itself, and inevitably leads to ruin. Nothing can be more miserable than the struggle to keep up an appearance. If it could succeed, it would cost more than it is worth, and as it never can, its failure involves the deepest mortification. Some of the sublimest exhibitions of human virtue have been made by women, who