Men who act in this way often defeat their own intention; and by constant opposition render their wives lavish and improvident, who would be quite the reverse where they treated in a more liberal manner. Wherever it is adopted, it is utterly destructive of connubial confidence, and often compels women to shelter themselves under mean contrivances and low arts." You complain that your wife uses maneuvers and efforts to get money from you: be generous to her, treat her as a wife ought to be treated, and I venture to affirm you shall have no further cause of complaint. "A man who supplies unavoidable and necessary expenses with a parsimonious hand, will rarely be attentive to the extra calls of sickness, or endeavor to alleviate, by his kindness, the sufferings of a constitution perhaps wearing out in his service. It was observed, upon the subject of cruelty to animals, that many, because they would not drown, burn or scourge a poor animal to death, think themselves sufficiently humane, though they suffer them to famish with hunger; and does not the conduct of many husbands suggest a similar idea? They imagine that if they provide carefully for the maintenance of their families; if their conduct is moral; if they neither beat, starve, nor imprison their families; they are all that is requisite to constitute good husbands, and they pass for such among the crowd; but as their domestic virtues are chiefly of the negative kind, the happiness of her whose lot it is to be united to such an one for life, must be the same description. Even the large allowance, "Have what you like," is insufficient to satisfy the feelings of many a woman, who would be more gratified by the presentation of a flower, accompanied with expressions of tenderness, than by the most costly indulgence they could procure for themselves. "
"CONCLUSION:
And now, proud lord, farewell! my whisper is nearly ended, and I am very certain my silence shall not grieve you. But ere we finally part, allow me to call to your recollection that most important period of your life, when, at the altar of your God, and in the presence of your fellow-creatures, you solemnly vowed to love your wife, to comfort her, to honor and keep her, in sickness and in health, for better for worse, in poverty and in riches, and, forsaking all others, to keep thee only unto her, as long as you both should live! Let me ask, have you kept this solemn vow? Commune with your own heart, ask your conscience and your feelings; and tremble before an offended God if you have dared to break it."