The Doctor should also have observed that my address was made to the young clergy, and such as are only upon entering into holy orders, nine in ten of whom may be supposed to be neither husbands nor fathers. He should also have remembered that our universities are full of clergy, who are obliged to live unmarried, that they may have proper leisure and freedom to attend their studies without impediment from worldly cares. And therefore, if I pointed at such a dedication of the clergy to the service of God, as _husbands_ and _fathers_ cannot enter into, yet the matter is not blameable, because here are so many that have not yet entered into this state, but are at liberty to devote themselves wholly to the service of the gospel. And therefore if to such as these, I can so represent the weight, the duties, the heavenly nature of the priesthood, as to prevent or extinguish in them all thoughts and desires of being thus married to the world, what hurt have I done them, or the married clergy, or the gospel of Jesus Christ? * _Celibacy_, when entered into from a principle of divine love, from a heart burning with the desire of living wholly to God, is a state that gives wings to all our endeavours, and fits the soul for the highest growth of every virtue: and if he that is consecrated to the service of the altar, feels not such an ascent of his soul towards heaven, as to have no wish, but that his _whole body_, _soul_, and _spirit_, may be presented to God in its utmost degree of purity, he has his lamp much less kindled, than many of the laity, both men and women have had, in all ages of the church. Custom has too great a power over our judgments, and reconciles us to any thing; but if a Christian, who lived when Christianity was in its glory, when the first apologists for it, appealed to the numbers of both sexes, devoted to a single life, as an invincible proof of the power and divinity of the gospel; if a Christian of those days was now to come into the world, he would be more shocked at Reverend Doctors making love to women, than at seeing a monk in his cell, kissing a wooden crucifix.