her,
according to the best Calculation, came in three Years and about three
Quarters to Seven hundred forty four Pounds, seven Shillings and nine
Pence. After this I resolv'd never to marry more, and found I had been
a Gainer by my Marriages, and the Damages granted me for the Abuses of
my Bed, (all Charges deducted) eight thousand three hundred Pounds
within a Trifle.

'I come now to shew the good Effects of the Love of Money on the Lives
of Men towards rendring them honest, sober, and religious. When I was
a young Man, I had a Mind to make the best of my Wits, and
over-reached a Country Chap in a Parcel of unsound Goods; to whom,
upon his upbraiding, and threatning to expose me for it, I returned
the Equivalent of his Loss; and upon his good Advice, wherein he
clearly demonstrated the Folly of such Artifices, which can never end
but in Shame, and the Ruin of all Correspondence, I never after
transgressed. Can your Courtiers, who take Bribes, or your Lawyers or
Physicians in their Practice, or even the Divines who intermeddle in
worldly Affairs, boast of making but one Slip in their Lives, and of
such a thorough and lasting Reformation? Since my coming into the
World I do not remember I was ever overtaken in Drink, save nine
times, one at the Christening of my first Child, thrice at our City
Feasts, and five times at driving of Bargains. My Reformation I can
attribute to nothing so much as the Love and Esteem of Money, for I
found my self to be extravagant in my Drink, and apt to turn
Projector, and make rash Bargains. As for Women, I never knew any,
except my Wives: For my Reader must know, and it is what he may
confide in as an excellent Recipe, That the Love of Business and Money
is the greatest Mortifier of inordinate Desires imaginable, as
employing the Mind continually in the careful Oversight of what one
has, in the eager Quest after more, in looking after the Negligences
and Deceits of Servants, in the due Entring and Stating of Accounts,
in hunting after Chaps, and in the exact Knowledge of the State of
Markets; which Things whoever thoroughly attends, will find enough and
enough to employ his Thoughts on every Moment of the Day; So that I
cannot call to Mind, that in all the Time I was a Husband, which, off
and on, was about twelve Years, I ever once thought of my Wives but in
Bed. And, lastly, for Religion, I have ever been a constant Ch