Since so much of the romance here following is truth, veritable truth,
it is to be regretted that any error of historical character was
suffered to assume importance in the narrative. Yet this is so often the
case in works of this kind, that it is not remarkable here. More
surprising is it that truth was so carefully and conscientiously guarded
and preserved.
In conflicting statements, it is difficult to determine the precise year
of the marriage of Mr. Edwards, whether before or after the death of
"Eliza Wharton," although it may have been long before, even as one of
his biographers has it, and that recklessness and extravagance may have
lifted him to a too fearful height from the calm Eden of love and
honor, till he at length compromised the influence of both to baser
avarice.
That he married Frances Ogden, of Elizabeth-town, New Jersey, for his
first wife, is the fact, and the date given is 1769. Yet the ciphers may
be questioned, I think, as it would make him but nineteen years of age
at the time of the event, besides other considerations which make it
appear more doubtful still.
He was, however, as has been already stated, the eleventh and youngest
child of Rev. Jonathan Edwards, and was born in Northampton,
Massachusetts, _Sabbath_. His biographer has been particularly faithful
in thus recording it, as if the hallowed influences of the Sabbath upon
birth have a bearing on subsequent life, and were in his case either
strikingly marked or missed.
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