but on they go. They may never have seen each other. But the two
pilgrims who started at the two cradles are nearing. After eighteen,
twenty, or thirty years, the two come within sight. At the first
glance they may feel a dislike, and they may slacken their step; yet
something that the world calls fate, and that religion calls
Providence, urges them on and on. They must meet. They come near
enough to join hands in social acquaintance, after awhile to join
hands in friendship, after awhile to join hearts. The delegate from
the one cradle comes up the east aisle of the church with her father.
The delegate from the other cradle comes up the west aisle of the
church. The two long journeys end at the snow-drift of the bridal
veil. The two chains made out of many years are forged together by the
golden link which the groom puts upon the third finger of the left
hand. One on earth, may they be one in heaven!
But there are so many exceptions to the general rule of natural
affinity that only those are safe who pray for a heavenly hand to lead
them. Because they depended on themselves and not on God there are
thousands of women every year going to the slaughter. In India women
leap on the funeral pyre of a dead husband. We have a worse spectacle
than that in America--women innumerable leaping on the funeral pyre of
a living husband.