l cases rely. When he quits his home, he carries
with him cares that are unknown to the married man. If, indeed, like the
common soldier, he have merely a lodging-place, and a bundle of clothes,
given in charge to some one, he may be at his ease; but if he possess
any thing of a home, he is never sure of its safety; and this
uncertainty is a great enemy to cheerfulness. And as to _efficiency_ in
life, how is the bachelor to equal the married man? In the case of
farmers and tradesmen, the latter have so clearly the advantage over the
former, that one need hardly insist upon the point; but it is, and must
be, the same in all the situations of life. To provide for a wife and
children is the greatest of all possible spurs to exertion. Many a man,
naturally prone to idleness, has become active and industrious when he
saw children growing up about him; many a dull sluggard has become, if
not a bright man, at least a bustling man, when roused to exertion by
his love. Dryden's account of the change wrought in CYMON, is only a
strong case of the kind. And, indeed, if a man will not exert himself
for the sake of a wife and children, he can have no exertion in him; or
he must be deaf to all the dictates of nature.

215. Perhaps the world never exhibited a more striking proof of the
truth of this doctrine than that which is exhibited in me; and I am sure
that every one will say, without any hesitation, that a fourth part of
the labours I have performed, never would have been performed, _if I had
not been a married man_. In the first place, they could not; for I
should, all the early part of my life, have been rambling and roving
about as most bachelors are. I should have had _no home_ that I cared a
straw about, and should have wasted the far greater part of my time. The
great affair of home being _settled_, having the home secured, I had
leisure to employ my mind on things which it delighted in. I got rid at
once of all cares, all _anxieties_, and had only to provide for the very
moderate wants of that home. But the children began to come. They
sharpened my industry: they spurred me on. To be sure, I had other and
strong motives: I wrote for fame, and was urged forward by
ill-treatment, and by the desire to triumph over my enemies; but, after
all, a very large part of my _nearly a hundred volumes_ may be fairly
ascribed to the wife and children.

216. I might have done _something_; but, perhaps, not a _thousandth_
part of what I