To this instance, may be added that of a most virtuous and beautiful French lady, the marchioness of Gange. Her two brothers-in-law made dishonourable propositions to her, and successively tried many arts, to prevail on her to gratify their base inclinations; but, notwithstanding one of them, who was an extreme cunning man, and governed the marquis her consort entirely, threatened to instil into the mind of her husband suspicions of her fidelity, she vigorously rejected their entreaties. Finding themselves in spite of the menace, repeatedly repulsed with scorn and indignation, they resolved to carry the threat into execution; and, having prevailed on the credulous husband to entertain doubts of his wife’s honour and constancy, he consented that the two brothers should take away the life of the innocent marchioness; which they did in a barbarous and cruel manner, by first forcing her to swallow a poisonous draught, but afterwards, doubting of the efficacy of the potion, they gave her several desperate wounds. Although she survived both the wounds and the operation of the poison for the space of nineteen days, and, by means of her relation of the matter, which was corroborated by other circumstances, the officers of justice and the public were informed of the whole transaction, and measures were taken for apprehending the delinquents; yet they, finding themselves discovered, fled the kingdom, and escaped the punishment due to their crime. This tragical event happened in the year 1667, and is related by Gayot Piteval, in his fifth volume of Remarkable Cases. IV. I don’t deny that many of them are vicious; but, alas! if we were to trace their slips and irregularities to their source, I fear we should find them originate in the obstinate and persevering impulse or solicitations of our sex. He, who would wish or endeavour to make all the women good, should begin with converting all the men. Nature implanted modesty in the sex, as a fence-wall to resist the attacks of appetite; and it very rarely happens, that a breach is made in this wall by force applied on the inside. V. The declamations against the women, which we read in some parts of holy writ, should be understood, as pointed and levelled at the perverse ones, as there is no doubt but there are such; and, although they should be supposed to have an eye to the sex in general, nothing could be inferred from thence; because the physicians of the soul declaim against women, as the physicians of the body declaim against fruit, which, although it is good, beautiful, and useful in itself, the abuse or excess of it is pernicious: besides this, allowance should be made for the latitude permitted to oratory of magnifying the risque, when it is used to divert or turn people from dangerous courses.