'My dear boy: young as you are, I have conceived a friendship and affection for you, which perhaps inflict as severe a pang, at the present moment, as any one of the distressing circumstances that occasion my flight. Had I wealth to leave, I would endeavour to secure you from the baneful effects of poverty; as it is, accept all that I have to give, my best wishes, my dearest love, and a little good advice. Though your understanding is greatly above your years, yet you cannot have experience and knowledge enough of sorrow to conceive what my feelings are: but if hereafter you should remember me, and if at that most serious moment when you enter on the marriage state you should wish for a friend like me to advise with, let this letter supply my place. The miseries I have endured, by my mistakes on the subject, are so strongly imprinted on my mind, that I can think of nothing else; and, inapplicable as it may seem to your present course of thought, I cannot persuade myself but that it is the most interesting of all topics, upon which I could write to you.
'Of the wisdom of entering into the marriage state, and of the virtue of the institution, I have lately begun to entertain the most serious doubts. Whether they are well founded, or are the consequences of my own mistakes of conduct, I dare not at this moment determine: but, while the present forms of society exist, should you arrive at manhood the probability is that you will marry. If then you should ever think of marriage, think of it as a duty; and not merely as the means of self gratification, or the indulgence of some childish and irrational passion, which irrational people dignify with the name of love. Let the affection you conceive for woman be founded on the qualities of her mind.
'But above all things first examine yourself, whether you can endure opposition without anger; and next put the woman you intend to marry to the same test; for, unless you are mutually unshaken in your resolutions on this head, if you marry you are miserable. The task of man and wife is reciprocally arduous. She should be mild, good-humoured, cheerful and tender; he cool, rational, and vigilant; without acrimony, devoid of captiousness, and free from passion. It is mutually their duty to inspect and to expostulate, but to beware how they reprove. Where gentleness and equanimity of temper are wanting, happiness never can be obtained. Believe me, my dear boy, I have never stood so low in my own opinion as when I have caught myself betrayed into petulance, and descending to passion. The combats I have maintained to overcome this weakness are inconceivable.
'Whether it be constitutional in me or habitual I cannot determine'—[Had Mr. Elford been more a philosopher, he would have known that frequent anger is merely a habit.]—'but I suspect that to this I chiefly owe my present misfortunes, as I am half persuaded there is no woman that may not be moulded into what form her husband pleases, provided he possess a superior understanding and an entire command of his temper. But Oh! how severe the task to preserve a perfect equality in despite of the ill humour, caprice, or injustice of a woman for whom you undergo a thousand difficulties, encounter continual labours, and undauntedly expose yourself to every fatigue and danger!—I blush to think I have sunk beneath the trial.—But we have both gone too far to recede: we have mutually said and done what never can be forgotten.
'As good temper is the basis of connubial felicity, means must be taken by which it may be cultivated and preserved. From the first hour of marriage, beware of too much familiarity, and of encouraging or of taking liberties. Be as circumspect in your behaviour as if a stranger were present, and dread deviating from that respect which is due from man to woman, and from woman to man, in a single state. This does not imply coldness, or formality, but the cheerful intercourse of good sense. Behave as you would to a person from whom you are happy to receive a visit, and with whose company you are delighted. Should you indulge those ebullitions of passionate fondness which lose sight of these limits, it is impossible to foretell to what they may lead. A caress neglected, or supposed to be neglected, a kiss not returned with the like warmth, or a fond pressure not answered with equal ardour, may poison a mind which applauds itself for the delicacy of its sensations.
'Do not expect to find your wife all perfection. I know the romance of lovers: they read descriptions in which the imagination has been exhausted, to depict enamoured youth superior to every terrestrial being; and they are convinced that, above all others, the object of their own particular choice has never yet been equalled. Such fanciful and silly people, when time and experience have something allayed their ardour, will often find their dainty taste offended at discovering a mole on the bosom, or a yellow shade in the neck, or any other trifling bodily blemish, which was as visible before marriage as after, had they looked with the same scrutinizing eyes. Be resolute in repelling every emotion of anger or disgust. Never permit a choleric or bitter expression to escape you; for wedded love is but too often of a tender and perishable nature, and such rude potions are its poison.
'I look back at what I have been writing, and am astonished at the subject I have chosen. But the torrent of my thoughts is irresistible: they hurry me away, and persuade me that though young, it is yet possible you may hereafter remember me, and at a time when perhaps you shall have arrived at the exercise of many of those noble virtues which are now only in the bud. I have a great affection for you, my dear nephew, and should be glad that, if you then cannot think kindly, you should at least think justly; and that you should possess some faint picture of the present state of my feelings. Could you but know all the emotions of my heart, you would bear witness to its honesty; and would own that its efforts have been strenuous, unremitted, and sincere, though unfortunate.
'Years pass quickly away: yet a little while and you will be an actor in this busy world, of which at present your knowledge is small. I am doomed never to see you more; but, while I have life and memory, I shall never forget you.