ispensable? I am not advocating the practice of marrying in
childhood. It takes sometime for the affections toward an individual to
ripen and become settled. This is a matter involving too high
responsibilities to justify haste. The consequences, speaking
generally, are not confined to this life; they extend to eternity.

[11] Some of the topics of this section have been anticipated, in
part, in a previous chapter; but their importance entitles them
to a farther consideration.

[12] I know this principle is sometimes disputed. A late English
writer, in a Treatise on Happiness, at page 251 of Vol. II,
maintains the contrary. He quotes from Lord Bacon, that
'Unmarried men are the best friends, best masters, and best
servants,' and that 'The best _works_, and of greatest merit for
the public, have proceeded from unmarried or childless men.' He
also introduces Jeremy Taylor, as saying that 'Celibacy, like a
fly in the heart of an apple, dwells in perpetual sweetness.'

In commenting upon these remarks, this writer says, 'One half of
the most eminent persons that have ever lived in the world of
science and literature, have remained unmarried,' and 'in the
connubial state, too frequently, the sympathies are connected
within the family circle, while there is little generosity or
philanthropy beyond.' And lastly, that 'Unmarried men possess
many natural excellences, which if not engrossed by a family will
be directed towards their fellow creatures.'

Now it is admitted that many eminent men, especially in science
and literature, have been bachelors; and that among them were
Newton and Locke. But this only proves that while thousands and
tens of thousands of their fellow beings spent their lives in
insignificance, for want of a definite object to live for, these
men, having an _object_ before them, _accomplished_ something.
And if you could induce _one_ single man in a _thousand_, nay,
one in ten thousand, to make a similar use of his exemption from
the cares of a family, much might be expected from celibacy; or
at least, the results of their labors might be a partial
compensation to society for the evil tendency of their example.
For marriage cannot be denied to be an institution of God, and
indispensable to the existence of society. An