Hamilton's morals were the morals of his day,--a day when aristocrats
were libertines, receiving as little censure from society as from their
own consciences. His Scotch foundations had religious shoots in their
grassy crevices, but religion in a great mind like Hamilton's is an
emotional incident, one of several passions which act independently of
each other. He avoided temptation, not because he desired to shun a
torment of conscience or an accounting with his Almighty,--to Whom he
was devoted,--but because he was satisfied with the woman he had married
and would have sacrificed his ambitions rather than deliberately cause
her unhappiness. Had she been jealous and eloquent, it is more than
probable that his haughty intolerance of restraint would have driven him
to assert the pleasure of his will, but she was only amused at his
occasional divagations, and had no thought of looking for meanings which
might terrify her. He was quite conscious of his good fortune and too
well balanced to risk its loss. So Mrs. Croix might be driven to rest
her hopes on a trick of chance or a _coup de theatre_.
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