might after
he had been set up a few years, and by his diligence and frugality,
joined to a small expense in house-keeping, had increased both his stock
in trade and the trade itself; then he would be able to look forward
boldly, and would have some pretence for insisting on a fortune, when he
could make out his improvements in trade, and show that he was both
able to maintain a wife, and able to live without her. When a young
tradesman in Holland or Germany goes a-courting, I am told the first
question the young woman asks of him, or perhaps her friends for her,
is, 'Are you able to pay the charges?' that is to say, in English, 'Are
you able to keep a wife when you have got her?' The question is a little
Gothic indeed, and would be but a kind of gross way of receiving a lover
here, according to our English good breeding; but there is a great deal
of reason in the inquiry, that must be confessed; and he that is not
able to _pay the charges_, should never begin the journey; for, be the
wife what she will, the very state of life that naturally attends the
marrying a woman, brings with it an expense so very considerable, that a
tradesman ought to consider very well of it before he engages.

But it is to be observed, too, that abundance of young tradesmen,
especially in England, not only marry early, but by the so marrying they
are obliged to take up with much less fortunes in their haste, than when
they allow themselves longer time of consideration. As it stands now,
generally speaking, the wife and the shop make their first show
together; but how few of these early marriages succeed--how hard such a
tradesman finds it to stand, and support the weight that attends it--I
appeal to the experience of those, who having taken this wrong step, and
being with difficulty got over it, are yet good judges of that
particular circumstance in others that come after them.[22]

I know it is a common cry that is raised against the woman, when her
husband fails in business, namely, that it is the wife has ruined him;
it is true, in some particular cases it may be so, but in general it is
wrong placed--they may say marrying has ruined the man, when they cannot
say his wife has done it, for the woman was not in fault, but her
husband.

When a tradesman marries, there are necessary consequences, I mean of
expenses, which the wife ought not be charged with, and cannot be made
accountable for--such as, first, furnishing the house; and let th