ey of Homer we find Ulysses declaring
himself to be the son of a concubine, which he would probably not have
done, had any degree of infamy been annexed to it. In some cases,
however, polygamy was allowed in Greece, from a mistaken notion that it
would increase population. The Athenians, once thinking the number of
their citizens diminished, decreed that it should be lawful for a man to
have children by another woman as well as by his wife; besides this,
particular instances occur of some who have transgressed the law of
monogamy. Euripides is said to have had two wives, who, by their
constant disagreement, gave him a dislike to the whole sex; a
supposition which receives some weight from these lines of his in
Andromache:

ne'er will I commend
More beds, more wives than one, nor children curs'd
With double mothers, banes and plagues of life.

Socrates too had two wives, but the poor culprit
had as much reason to repent of his temerity
as Euripides.

[3] Monogamy is having only one wife.

EUNUCHS.

As the appetite towards the other sex is one of the strongest and most
ungovernable in our nature; as it intrudes itself more than any other
into our thoughts, and frequently diverts them from every other purpose
or employment; it may, at first, on this account, have been reckoned
criminal when it interfered with worship and devotion; and emasculation
was made use of in order to get rid of it, which may, perhaps, have been
the origin of Eunuchs. But however this be, it is certain, that there
were men of various religions who made themselves incapable of
procreation on a religious account, as we are told that the priests of
Cybele constantly castrated themselves; and by our Saviour, that there
are eunuchs who make themselves such for the kingdom of heaven's sake.

GIRLS SOLD AT AUCTION.

The ancient Assyrians seem more thoroughly to have settled and digested
the affairs of marriage, than any of their cotemporaries. Once in every
year they assembled together all the girls that were marriageable, when
the public crier put them up to sale, one after another. For her whose
figure was agreeable, and whose beauty was attracting, the rich strove
against each other, who should give the highest price; which price was
put into a public stock, and distributed in portions to those whom
nobody would accept without a reward. After the most beautiful were
disposed of, these were also put up by the crier, and