1. Do not love her because she goes to the altar with her head full
of book learning, her hands of no earthly use, save for the piano
and brush; because she has no conception of the duties and
responsibilities of a wife; because she hates housework, hates its
everlasting routine and ever recurring duties; because she hates
children and will adopt every means to evade motherhood; because she
loves her ease, loves to have her will supreme, loves, oh how well, to
be free to go and come, to let the days slip idly by, to be absolved
from all responsibility, to live without labor, without care? Will you
love her selfish, shirking, calculating nature after twenty years of
close companionship?
2. Do you love him because he is a man, and therefore, no matter how
weak mentally, morally or physically he may be, he has vested in him
the power to save you from the ignominy of an old maid's existence?
Because you would rather be Mrs. Nobody, than make the effort to be
Miss Somebody? because you have a great empty place in your head and
heart that nothing but a man can fill? because you feel you cannot
live without him? God grant the time may never come when you cannot
live with him.
3. Do you love her because she is a thoroughly womanly woman; for
her tender sympathetic nature; for the jewels of her life, which are
absolute purity of mind and heart; for the sweet sincerity of her
disposition; for her loving, charitable thought; for her strength
of character? because she is pitiful to the sinful, tender to the
sorrowful, capable, self-reliant, modest, true-hearted? in brief,
because she is the embodiment of all womanly virtues?
4. Do you love him because he is a manly man; because the living and
operating principle of his life is a tender reverence for all women;
because his love is the overflow of the best part of his nature;
because he has never soiled his soul with an unholy act or his
lips with an oath; because mentally he is a man among men; because
physically he stands head and shoulders above the masses; because
morally he is far beyond suspicion, in his thought, word or deed?
because his earnest manly consecrated life is a mighty power on God's
side?
5. But there always has been and always will be unhappy marriages
until men learn what husbandhood means; how to care for that tenderly
matured, delicately constituted being, that he takes into his care
and keeping. That if her wonderful adjusted organism is overtaxed
and overburdened, her happiness, which is largely dependent upon her
health, is destroyed.
6. Until men give the women they marry the undivided love of their
heart; until constancy is the key-note of a life which speaks
eloquently of clean thoughts and clean hearts.
7. Until men and women recognize that self-control in a man, and
modesty in a woman, will bring a mutual respect that years of wedded
life will only strengthen. Until they recognize that love is the
purest and holiest of all things known to humanity, will marriage
continue to bring unhappiness and discontent, instead of that comfort
and restful peace which all loyal souls have a right to expect and
enjoy.
8. Be sensible and marry a sensible, honest and industrious companion,
and happiness through life will be your reward.
[Illustration: A CALLER.]
[Illustration]
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