Marriage she had but little considered, as it is in itself. What are the genuine principles of that relation, and what conduct with respect to it is prescribed to rational beings by their duty, she had not hitherto investigated. But she was not backward to inquire what are the precepts of duty in her own particular case. She knew herself to be young; she was sensible of the daily enlargement of her knowledge: every day contributed to rectify some error, or confirm some truth. These benefits she owed to her situation, which, whatever were its evils, gave her as much freedom from restraint as is consistent with the state of human affairs. Her poverty fettered her exertions, and circumscribed her pleasures. Poverty, therefore, was an evil, and the reverse of poverty was to be desired. But riches were not barren of constraint, and its advantages might be purchased at too dear a rate. Allowing that the wife is enriched by marriage, how humiliating were the conditions annexed to it in the present case! The company of one with whom we have no sympathy, nor sentiments in common, is, of all species of solitude, the most loathsome and dreary. The nuptial life is attended with peculiar aggravations, since the tie is infrangible, and the choice of a more suitable companion, if such a one should offer, is for ever precluded. The hardships of wealth are not incompensated by some benefits; but these benefits, false and hollow as they are, cannot be obtained by marriage. Her acceptance of Balfour would merely aggravate her indigence. Now she was at least mistress of the product of her own labour. Her tasks were toilsome, but the profits, though slender, were sure, and she administered her little property in what manner she pleased. Marriage would annihilate this, power. Henceforth she would he bereft even of personal freedom. So far from possessing property, she herself would become the property of another. She was not unaware of the consequences flowing from differences of capacity, and that power, to whomsoever legally granted, will be exercised by the most addressful; but she derived no encouragement from these considerations. She would not stoop to gain her end by the hateful arts of the sycophant, and was too wise to place an unbounded reliance on the influence of truth. The character, likewise, of this man, sufficiently exempted him from either of those influences.