The same Subject continued.

Dear Bet,

What I wrote in my former, was on a Supposition that you had too much Reason to be uneasy at your Husband's Conduct.

I will now pursue the Subject, and put the Case that you have no Proof that he is guilty, but your Surmizes, or, perhaps, the busy Whisperings of officious Make-debates.In this Case, take care, my Betsey, that you don’t, by the Violence of your Passions, precipitate him on the Course you dread, and that you alienate not, by unjust Suspicions, his Affections from you; for then perhaps he will be ready indeed to place them somewhere else, where you may not so easily draw him off; for he will, may be, think, as to you (if he be devoid of superior Considerations) that he may as well deserve your Suspicions, as be tiezed with them without deserving them.

I know it is a most shocking thing to a sober young Woman, to think herself obliged to share those Affections which ought to be all her own, with a vile Prostitute, besides the Danger, which is not small, of being intirely circumvented in her Husband's Love, and perhaps have only his Indifference, if not Contempt, instead of it. But, my Dear, at the worst, comfort yourself that you are not the guilty Person, for one Day he will, perhaps, fatally find his Error. And consider, besides, my Betsey, that your Case, from an unfaithful Husband, is not near so bad as his would be from an unfaithful Wife: For, Child, he cannot make the Progeny of a Bastard Race succeed to his and your Estate or Chattels, in Injury of your lawful Children. If any such he should have, the Law of the Land brands them:Whereas a naughty Wife often makes the Children of another Man, Heirs of her Husband's Estate and Fortune, in Injury of his own Children or Family. So, tho’ the Crime may be equal in other Respects, yet this makes the Injury of the Woman to the Man, greater than his can be to her.