If a man and wife cannot effuse a mutual sentiment, gradually they will
grow apart. Indeed,
The demands of the emotions are at once more imperious and tyrannical,
and more fastidious and critical, than are the demands of the mind. Of
all of which, what is the moral? This:
The married pair who would live in amity, not to say in affection, must
so live as that each shall persuade the other is the sole personage under
the roof of heaven that he or she desires. Alas!
The unwritten motto of many a married couple is: The Heart Knoweth its
own Bitterness.
* * *
Marriage reveals the moods of a man.
What is an ideal marriage? That perhaps in which the man is to the woman
at once friend, husband, and lover. But some people prefer these
functions distinct.
That is a happy marriage in which a woman's husband is also her
confidant. And always,
Husband and wife should move like binary stars: revolving about a common
centre; mutually attractive; and, unless closely viewed, presenting a
single impression.
* * *
Matrimony is sometimes a terrible iconoclast. Whether it throws down the
images of false or of true gods, depends on the religion of the
worshipper.
* * *
It would be difficult, sometimes, to determine whether constancy was an
autogenous or enforced virtue.
* * *
Never play pranks with your wife, your horse, or your razor.
* * *
There is a thing which not gold nor favor nor even love can buy. Its
true name is secret; but it is content to be called Sympathy.
Accordingly,
Let no man or woman think when he or she has won wife or husband all has
been won that is necessary. For,
If sympathy cannot be gained from one quarter, it will probably be sought
in another.
* * *
At the moment of the formation of a matrimonial syndicate of two, each
member of this as yet unincorporated joint-stock company verily believes
that each has put into the concern his whole real and personal property.
Yet it is to be feared that, although
The woman, possibly, invests her whole capital, the man--often, no
doubt, unwittingly to himself--retains not a few unmatured bonds and
debentures. That is to say,
Love, it is to be feared, is often enough a bargain in which the woman
comes off second-best. For
A woman gives herself; man accepts the gift.
Rarely, if ever, does a man give himself. He cannot. His work, his
play, his politics, his friends, his club--these are matters to him
highly important.
To a woman the only highly important things are: her husband and her
home.
* * *
A woman rules until she tries to rule,--which will be an enigma to many.
Out of a wife's obedience will grow her governance; never out of her
dominance.--Those who think this sheer nonsense, are welcome to think
so. But it is worth thinking about.
* * *
A man ought to rule his wife. Granted. But he cannot do this unless he
rules himself. The Colonel of a Regiment cannot command if he himself
breaks the King's or the State's Regulations. And
An uncontrolled wife deems her husband indifferent--or weak.
The number of husbands who, though they think they rule, yet in reality
are ruled, would astonish--not their wives, but themselves.
It is customary to call the man the head of the household; yet, between
man and wife, it is a question after all whether it is not the stronger
will and the cooler judgment that should, and generally does, guide the
family, independent of sex or custom.
* * *
As in the solar spectrum, so in love: beyond and intermingled with the
visible rays of passion are numerous actinic but invisible rays of
affection, invisible to careless spectators, but known and felt by the
recipients. These, too, must be introduced if the connubial domicile is
to be warmed as well as illuminated.
* * *
The marriage tie loosens all other ties. In fact,
Neither men or women are always aware of the absoluteness of the marriage
tie: thenceforward the woman belongs not to her own people, hardly to
herself.--As to the man, well,
Often a wife will actually be jealous of the time and attention her
husband spends on things and matters unconnected with her--his work
--his play--his politics--his friends--his club.
* * *
Many are there who still believe that the marriage service, like a legal
indenture, irrevocably entails the whole estate of a human heart. In
sober truth,
There never was a married couple yet who had not to purchase their own
happiness. And
The only charms that increase in value as time goes on are the charms of
character; beside these, those of person, and even those of mind, are
weak. In short,
In marriage, as in every human relationship, it is character that avails
and prevails, naught else.
* * *
Chemists draw a distinction between a chemical and a mechanical mixture.
Moralists might discover the same in marriage.
* * *
To encircle monogamy with an ever-increasing halo of romance--that is a
problem deserving of study.
Monogamy is one of the disharmonies of life; it seems (as I have said) to
be the decree of politics rather than of nature.
But surely polygamy or polyandry would be more disharmonious still.
* * *
Marriage renders no one immune. That is to say;
Unless husband and wife both avoid infection, both can catch amatory
fevers.
* * *
The woman who has learned how to minister to a man's creature comforts
has learned much. And
It has disconcerted many a young wife to discover how important a part of
her education this is! Since
It is certainly sometimes hard to reconcile a suitor's poetic
protestations with a spouse's prosaic requisitions.
* * *
In the game of life a man may venture many stakes; a woman's fate is
determined by a single throw of the dice. Thus,
How often it happens that a young and inexperienced maid will look about
her, will weigh and consider, will pick and choose, and, when she thinks
she has found a man to her purpose, will set her cap at him will attract
him, enslave him, bring him to her feet, make him propose, accept him as
husband, give him all the sweets of engagement, regard herself and
proclaim herself his affianced bride,--all with most prudential--it may
be, most praise-worthy--motives. On a sudden, the man discovers that
this was no real attachment, but a fictitious, almost an enforced, one;
that the methods (so he thinks) were artificial, the results delusive.
What happens? The man withdraws--politely--gallantly: t'was a mistake;
he is sorry; they are unsuited; he did not know his own mind; he is
sorry;--and so on, and so forth. They separate. And, in this
concatenation of circumstances, action for breach of promise is out of
the question.--Besides, often enough, the girl, through pride or
through sheer chagrin at the indifference of the man, pretends
acquiescence.--What happens to the man? Nothing. If his senses were
stirred, he himself is heart-whole. He gave nothing; he merely received.
He proposes again to somebody else; is accepted; marries happily; rears a
family. What happens to the girl? Everything. The man gave her nothing;
she gave all--her lips, her looks, the recesses of her heart; the
premonitions of the gift of her self; for, when she leant on him, looked
up to him, clung to him, felt his strong encircling arms, was perturbed
by his ardor, she gave that which was not to give again. Such woman is
to be pitied. For, however much she may strive to make it appear that
she gave nothing, that she had all to give again, not even her own soul
will bear her witness, and sooner, or later, a subsequent lover (and such
girl accepts the first lover that offers) will find a void where he hoped
to find an inexhaustible treasure. For the woman cannot forever keep up
a fictitious affection; and languid looks, and eyes that will not
brighten, and smiles which are so evidently forced, bespeak her
sympathies elsewhere.--But, as Heine said, this is an old story often
repeated. (1) Wherefore
Let us pity women! The dice they throw are their hearts--and they have
only one throw:--when they have thrown away their hearts--Pity women!
Men have so many dice to throw: income, status, title; virility, fortune,
fame; good spirits, good connections, good looks; an air, a figure, a
soul-stirring voice; manners, breeding, force; a good name, a good bank
account. The pity o' it is that
The whole marriage question revolves about a single point:
The man wants him a woman,--a woman who shall be his and only his;
The woman wants her a head of a home. And here again, and once again, we
see the difference between the sexes:--
The one thing that the man wants is: a mate;
The one thing that a woman wants is: a head and provider of a
household.
The man's thoughts never go beyond the woman;
The woman's thoughts always and at once travel far beyond the man--to
the children, the household, the home. This is great Nature's inexorable
law. But little knows the woman, and less knows the man, that the nubile
girl is merely obeying great Nature's inexorable law.
What price woman pays for her high office! for in this implicit,
unquestioning, and unconscious obedience to Nature she performs perhaps
her highest function. On all accounts, therefore, let us
Pity women! They obey so faithfully great Nature's law, and Nature so
often plays them false--so very false, and so very often. Besides,
The woman who gives her hand without her heart finds in time that she has
made a sorry bargain--a sorrier bargain, perhaps, that the woman who
gives her heart with out her hand. For,
Passionately as a man desires a woman, the passionately-desired woman
will in time discover that, unless she gives her heart with her hand, her
gift suffers depreciation. And
Unless a woman gives her heart, how can she give her aid? Surely,
Unless a man's armor is buckled on for the strife of life by feminine
sympathy, the fight is apt to be a sorry one at best; since
A woman's true business is to back her husband: if SHE leaves him in the
lurch, there is little hope for him. For of a truth
The strongest man is handicapped in the struggle for existence unless he
knows and feels that his wife is at his side--not pushing him so much as
leaning upon him.
(1)
Ein Jungling leibt ein Madchen,
Die hat einen Andern erwahlt;
Der Andre leibt eine Andre,
Und hat sich mit Dieser vermahlt.
Das Madchen heirathet aus Arger
Den ersten, besten Mann,
Der ihr in den Weg gelaufen;
Der Jungling ist ubel dran.
Es ist alte Geschichte,
Doch bleibt sie immer neu;
Und wem sie just passieret,
Dem bricht das Herz entzwei.
--Buch der Lieder, 39.
* * *
To simulate passion for an hour is possible; to simulate a life-long
love--that is hard. For
Love is a thing unique and unalterable (in spite of its various alloys);
clip the coin, and it will not pass current. For
Ideal matrimony is founded on a mono-metallic basis: no amount of silver
will be accepted for gold. And yet,
How often M loves and N accepts the love! Poor M! Also (in the long run),
poor N!
That, indeed, is a happy marriage where M gives and wants just what N
wants and gives: where M and N just want each other. For
Give and take is the rule of a community of two, as it is of a community
of ten thousand;
The ideal (and probably impossible) industrial community is that in which
demand and supply are in exact equipoise. The same holds good in
matrimony.
In wedlock, a virtuous, has probably less force than a vicious, example.
That is to say,
A frivolous spouse is more apt to drag the couple down than is a serious
spouse apt to lead the couple up. And
Many a mate there is (both masculine and feminine) feels like a pack-mule
treading a precipitous pass.
* * *
Of every Audrey her Touchstone should be able proudly to say, "A poor. .
. . Thing, Sir, but mine own". In other words,
The homely violet deserves as tender cherishing as the rare exotic.
* * *
What portion of himself or herself any one complicated physical and
psychological human being really and truly 'conveys' to another by means
of the simple contract known as the "plighted troth" or that of a larger
deed called the called the "solemnization of matrimony", is a riddle
difficult of solution; and as to how much one may claim on the strength
of one or other of these indentures, that is a more difficult problem
still.
In no amatorial contract, probably, is it possible to include or to
enumerate all the hereditaments, messuages, or appurtenances, involved.
Certainly
How great so ever the community of interest, M and N remain for ever M
and N.
Is there not always something in the "eternal feminine" which cannot
quite coalesce with the ephemeral masculine? Probably,
Trust your wife with your purse, and seven times out of ten it will grow
heavy.
* * *
Many a woman, by man, is accepted at her face value.