nefs, but have been so far present to your thoughts, as to have checked that unguarded licentiousness, by which I have fuffered fo much, and inspired you in its place with an habitual olicitude about the effects and tendency of what you did or faid. This very much resembles the cafe of all fins of inconfideration; and, amongst the foremost of these, that of inconfiderate flander. Information communicated for the real purpofe of warning, or cautioning, is not flander. Indiscriminate praise is the opposite of flander, but it is the oppofite extreme; and, however it may affect to be thought excefs of candour, is commonly the effufion of a frivolous understanding, or proceeds from a fettled contempt of all moral diftinctions. VOL. I. MORAL MORAL PHILOSOPHY. BOOK III. PART III. OF RELATIVE DUTIES WHICH RESULT FROM THE CONSTITUTION OF THE SEXES. "HE conftitution of the fexes is the foun THE Collateral to the fubject of marriage, are fornication, feduction, adultery, inceft, polygamy, divorce. Confequential to marriage, is the relation and reciprocal duty of parent and child. We will treat of these subjects in the following order: firft, of the public use of marriage inftitutions; secondly, of the fubjects collateral to marriage, in the order in which we have here proposed them; thirdly, of marriage itfelf; and laftly, of the relation and reciprocal duties of parents and children. CHAP. I. OF THE PUBLIC USE OF MARRIAGE INSTI THE TUTIONS. HE public ufe of marriage inftitutions confifts in their promoting the following beneficial effects: 1. The private comfort of individuals, efpecially of the female fex. It may be true, that all are not interested in this reafon nevertheless, it is a reafon to all for abftaining from any conduct which tends in its general confequence to obftruct marriage; for whatever promotes the happiness of the majority is binding upon the whole. 2. The production of the greatest number of healthy children, their better education, and the making of due provision for their fettlement in life. 3. The peace of human fociety, in cutting off a principal fource of contention, by affigning one or more women to one man, and protect |