1. LOVE.--Let it ever be remembered that love is one of the most
sacred elements of our nature, and the most dangerous with which
to tamper. It is a very beautiful and delicately contrived faculty,
producing the most delightful results, but easily thrown out of
repair--like a tender plant, the delicate fibers of which incline
gradually to entwine themselves around its beloved one, uniting two
willing hearts by a thousand endearing ties, and making of "twain one
flesh": but they are easily torn asunder, and then adieu to the joys
of connubial bliss!
2. COURTING BY THE QUARTER.--This courting by the quarter, "here a
little and there a little," is one of the greatest evils of the day.
This getting a little in love with Julia, and then a little with
Eliza, and a little more with Mary,--this fashionable flirtation
and coquetry of both sexes--is ruinous to the domestic affections;
besides, effectually preventing the formation of true connubial love.
I consider this dissipation of the affections one of the greatest
sins against Heaven, ourselves, and the one trifled with, that can be
committed.
3. FRITTERING AWAY AFFECTIONS.--Young men commence courting long
before they think of marrying, and where they entertain no thoughts of
marriage. They fritter away their own affections, and pride themselves
on their conquests over the female heart; triumphing in having so
nicely fooled them. They pursue this sinful course so far as to drive
their pitiable victims, one after another, from respectable society,
who, becoming disgraced, retaliate by heaping upon them all the
indignities and impositions which the fertile imagination of woman can
invent or execute.
4. COURTING WITHOUT INTENDING TO MARRY.--Nearly all this wide-spread
crime and suffering connected with public and private licentiousness
and prostitution, has its origin in these unmeaning courtships--this
premature love--this blighting of the affections, and every young
man who courts without intending to marry, is throwing himself or his
sweet-heart into _this hell upon earth._ And most of the blame rests
on young men, because they take the liberty of paying their addresses
to the ladies and discontinuing them, at pleasure, and thereby mainly
cause this vice.
5. SETTING THEIR CAPS.--True, young ladies sometimes "set their caps,"
sometimes court very hard by their bewitching smiles and affectionate
manners; by the natural language of love, or that backward reclining
and affectionate roll of the head which expresses it; by their soft
and persuasive accents; by their low dresses, artificial forms,
and many other unnatural and affected ways and means of attracting
attention and exciting love; but women never court till they have been
in love and experienced its interruption, till their first and most
tender fibres of love have been frost-bitten by disappointment. It is
surely a sad condition of society.
[Illustration: MOTHERHOOD.]
6. TRAMPLING THE AFFECTIONS OF WOMEN.--But man is a self-privileged
character. He may not only violate the laws of his own social nature
with impunity, but he may even trample upon the affections of woman.
He may even carry this sinful indulgence to almost any length, and yet
be caressed and smiled tenderly upon by woman; aye, even by virtuous
woman. He may call out, only to blast the glowing affections of one
young lady after another, and yet his addresses be cordially welcomed
by others. Surely a gentleman is at perfect liberty to pay his
addresses, not only to a lady, but even to the ladies, although he
does not once entertain the thought of marrying his sweet-heart, or,
rather his victim. O, man, how depraved! O, woman, how strangely blind
to your own rights and interests!
7. AN INFALLIBLE SIGN.--An infallible sign that a young man's
intentions are improper, is his trying to excite your passions. If he
loves you, he will never appeal to that feeling, because he respects
you too much for that. And the woman who allows a man to take
advantage of her just to compel him to marry her, is lost and
heartless in the last degree, and utterly destitute of moral principle
as well as virtue. A woman's riches is her virtue, that gone she has
lost all.
8. THE BEGINNING OF LICENTIOUSNESS.--Man it seldom drives from
society. Do what he may, woman, aye, virtuous and even pious woman
rarely excludes him from her list of visitors. But where is the point
of propriety?--immoral transgression should exclude either sex from
respectable society. Is it that one false step which now constitutes
the boundary between virtue and vice? Or rather, the discovery of that
false step? Certainly not! but it is all that leads to, and precedes
and induces it. It is this courting without marrying. This is the
beginning of licentiousness, as well as its main, procuring cause, and
therefore infinitely worse than its consummation merely.
9. SEARING THE SOCIAL AFFECTIONS.--He has seared his social affections
so deeply, so thoroughly, so effectually, that when, at last, he
wishes to marry, he is incapable of loving. He marries, but is
necessarily cold-hearted towards his wife, which of course renders her
wretched, if not jealous, and reverses the faculties of both towards
each other; making both most miserable for life. This induces
contention and mutual recrimination, if not unfaithfulness, and
imbitters the marriage relations through life; and well it may.
10. UNHAPPY MARRIAGES.--This very cause, besides inducing most of that
unblushing public and private prostitution already alluded to, renders
a large proportion of the marriages of the present day unhappy. Good
people mourn over the result, but do not once dream of its cause. They
even pray for moral reform, yet do the very things that increase the
evil.
11. WEEPING OVER HER FALLEN SON.--Do you see yonder godly mother,
weeping over her fallen son, and remonstrating with him in tones of a
mother's tenderness and importunity? That very mother prevented that
very son marrying the girl he dearly loved, because she was poor, and
this interruption of his love was the direct and procuring cause of
his ruin; for, if she had allowed him to marry this beloved one, he
never would have thought of giving his "strength unto strange
women." True, the mother ruined her son ignorantly, but none the less
effectually.
12. SEDUCTION AND RUIN.--That son next courts another virtuous
fair one, engages her affections, and ruins her, or else leaves her
broken-hearted, so that she is the more easily ruined by others, and
thus prepares the way for her becoming an inmate of a house "whose
steps take hold on hell." His heart is now indifferent, he is ready
for anything.
13. THE RIGHT PRINCIPLE.--I say then, with emphasis, that no man
should ever pay his addresses to any woman, until he has made his
selection, not even to aid him in making that choice. He should first
make his selection intellectually, and love afterward. He should go
about the matter coolly and with judgment, just as he would undertake
any other important matter. No man or woman, when blinded by love, is
in a fit state to judge advantageously as to what he or she requires,
or who is adapted to his or her wants.
14. CHOOSING FIRST AND LOVING AFTERWARDS.--I know, indeed, that this
doctrine of choosing first and loving afterward, of excluding love
from the councils, and of choosing by and with the consent of the
intellect and moral sentiments, is entirely at variance with the
feelings of the young and the customs of society; but, for its
correctness, I appeal to the common-sense--not to the experience, for
so few try this plan. Is not this the only proper method, and the one
most likely to result happily? Try it.
15. THE YOUNG WOMAN'S CAUTION.--And, especially, let no young lady
ever once think of bestowing her affections till she is certain they
will not be broken off--that is, until the match is fully agreed upon,
but rather let her keep her heart whole till she bestows it for life.
This requisition is as much more important, and its violation as much
more disastrous to woman than to man, as her social faculties are
stronger than his.
16. A BURNT CHILD DREADS THE FIRE.--As a "burnt child dreads the
fire," and the more it is burnt, the greater the dread: so your
affections, once interrupted, will recoil from a second love, and
distrust all mankind. No! you cannot be too choice of your love--that
pivot on which turn your destinies for life and future happiness.
[Illustration: AFTER THE ENGAGEMENT.]
* * * * *