Whereas many babbling women slander and scandalize their neighbors, for which their poor husbands are often involved in chargeable and vexatious suits, and cast in great damages; be it therefore enacted, That in actions of slander, occasioned by the wife, after judgment passed for the damages, the woman shall be punished by ducking; and if the slander be so enormous as to be adjudged at greater damages than five hundred pounds of tobacco, then the woman to suffer ducking for each five hundred pounds of tobacco adjudged against the husband, if he refuses to pay the tobacco.
THE PHILOSOPHY OF TROUBLE-SEEKING.
Adversity Has So Many Pleasant Uses That Most of the World's Inhabitants Appear to be
Unable to Wait Until It Comes to Them.
A very large proportion of the inhabitants of earth appear to take no stock in that cheerful assurance, given in the Book of Job, that "Man is born unto trouble, as the sparks fly upward." They believe that man cannot have trouble unless he looks for it.
"Seek and ye shall find" is their motto, and they seek trouble because they are philosophers. Apparently Shakespeare was of their ilk, for he said:
Sweet are the uses of adversity,
Which like the toad, ugly and venomous,
Wears yet a precious jewel in his head;
And this our life, exempt from public haunt,
Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks,
Sermons in stones, and good in everything.
Here are some advantages of adversity as pointed out by Punch:
You wear out your clothes.
You are not troubled with visitors.