PRECAUTIONARY HINTS.
He that proposes to marry, and wishes to enjoy happiness in that state,
should choose a wife descended from honest parents, she being chaste,
well bred, and of good manners. For if a woman has good qualities, she
has portion enough. That of Alcmena, in Plautus, is much to the purpose,
where he brings in a young woman speaking thus:—
“I take not that to be my dowry, which
The vulgar sort do wealth and honour call:
That all my wishes terminate in this,—
I’ll obey my husband, and be chaste withal:
To have God’s fear, and beauty, in my mind,
To do those good who are virtuously inclined.”
And undoubtedly she was right, for such a wife is more precious than
rubies.
It is assuredly the duty of parents to be very careful in training up
their children in the ways of virtue, and to have a due regard for their
honour and reputation: and more especially to young women, when grown up
to be marriageable. Parental authority in most cases ought to be obeyed
by children; but when an undue severity is exercised by parents in
attempting to thwart the affections of a son or daughter, and compel the
one or the other to violently snap asunder the tenderest ties, then that
authority becomes questionable; and except for the most weighty reasons,
ought not to be exercised. Alas! what numerous lamentable illustrations
of undue parental authority in regard to the affections of their
children are constantly occurring—sons leaving the parental abode,
rushing into the haunts of vice and dissipation, and wrecking their fair
prospects on the numerous shoals and quicksands which are so fatal to
the unwary—daughters flying from the domestic assylum, which ought to
shelter them from every storm, and subjecting themselves to perhaps a
far worse condition than that they are fleeing from, in being exposed to
the attacks of the human wolves who are nightly prowling in the streets
of our large cities, in search of the defenceless females who are
wandering about homeless and disconsolate. And when these victims of
parental severity have fallen into the pit which has been dug for them,
probably the parents, too late, repent of their severity, which has
brought an indelible stain upon their family. Parents, be cautious of
thwarting the affection of your children.
Vicious indulgence is certain to produce its legitimate results, and
bring down ruin upon the man or woman who is addicted to the same. Cast
your eyes upon the blighted wrecks of what was once female beauty, but
now loathsome to behold, notwithstanding the adventitious aid of paint,
and all the adjuncts of tawdry finery that may be put on to hide the
miserable wrecks of humanity. Traverse the streets in our large cities,
and though illuminated by the glare of gaslight, numbers with unblushing
fronts meet you at almost every step. These are the victims of vicious
indulgence. Ask any of these to tell you whether she feels herself happy
in the “gay” life she is pursuing; and if she is sincere, she will
answer you with a heart-breaking sigh that she is far from being
happy—that she is most miserable—that she remembers a happier
time—remembrances which she attempts to stifle by quaffing liquid slow
poison at the gin-palace. She had a home once—and she remembers her
mother—dead a long time ago—and oh, agony! she remembers the day when
her own foot first turned into the path of guilt. Peradventure she was
the victim of some base libertine, and was decoyed away from virtue’s
path by a deceptive tale; or, probably, she may have willingly swerved
from that chaste and virtuous life which is the brightest adornment in
female attire. Whatever was the cause there she is—a miserable wreck of
humanity! Better, far better, that she had died; that the grass had
grown rank over her corpse as it mouldered away in the portion of ground
allotted to the pauper dead. Thus it is with the wretched female who
gives way to vicious indulgence.—The once gay courtezan eventually is
bereft of all splendour; no devoted admirer rushes to her aid; she
coughs her way through life; and sinks into an early grave—perhaps a
watery grave. Beware, young women, of the siren tempter! Deviate not in
the least from the paths of virtue! Chastity is your brightest
adornment, and that once sullied, your fair fame is irretrievably
damaged.
The baneful effects of giving way to vicious indulgence may probably
not, in every case, be so serious to the male portion of the creation as
to that of the female, yet there are numerous instances of the libertine
and debauchee having had to pay the penalty of their misdeeds by an
emaciated frame, a broken constitution, and an early death. How many
young men have commenced the struggle of life with fair fame and bright
prospects, with business habits which gave them buoyant hopes of gaining
an independence, who, giving way to vicious indulgence, have ruined
their health, blighted their fair fame, and become bankrupts in every
thing that belongs to the man of honour and integrity. Young man, beware
of giving way to vicious indulgence!
Love is a passion of the human soul; and when properly under control, it
is capable of affording the greatest amount of happiness; but, like
other passions of the heart, when uncontrolled, or wrongly directed, it
entails great misery on those who experience it. This may be the case
with that love which is called forth by family relationship and intimate
friendship, as well as that intense love which is felt by the opposite
sex, man for woman, woman for man.
Various are the means which the libertine and debauchee adopt to gratify
their sensual appetite. Some will follow the “strange woman”—the street
harlot to her den of infamy and shame; others will attempt to allure the
simple trusting maiden by promises, oaths as false and deceitful as ever
were uttered by the arch enemy of our souls:—and by these means the
trusting and confiding are lured to commit the sin which society
condemns in the female, but which is treated with lenity and forbearance
in regard to the male transgressor.
Examine the first of these two cases. “A young man deficient in
understanding,” seeks the company of unfortunate women, and exhausts his
precious vigour and stamina in criminal pleasure. The period of youth is
the heyday of nature, and the healthful development of all the resources
of strength in our nature is the glory of our youth. It is a most
lamentable spectacle to behold, in the streets of the metropolis, and
large towns, such numbers of men, young in years, but through sensual
gratification, broken down in strength, emaciated in body, and
apparently worn-out decrepid old men. And alas! how numerous are the
allurements spread to entrap the unwary, and cause them to enter on a
vicious course of life. “The lips of a strange woman drop as a
honey-comb, and her mouth is smoother than oil.” Every attraction which
beauty can borrow from art is employed; prostitution wears various kinds
of guises to accomplish its object, but is most dangerous when decked
out the fairest, and sports the best. And, therefore, the wise teacher
before quoted, very appropriately remarks, “Lust not after her beauty in
thine heart; neither let her take thee with her eye-lids.” The
disastrous consequences of such “pleasures,” are as certain as they are
terrible. The sweetness of the honey never provides an antidote for the
sting. Such a course most frequently ruins the prospects of success in
life—“a man is brought to a piece of bread;” “it ruins the health,”—“thy
flesh and thy body are consumed, till a dart strike through thy liver.”
And along with property and health goes the character, for “the name of
the wicked shall rot,” and their end is shrouded in gloom; their “feet
go down to death, and their steps take hold on hell.”