1. FIRST LOVE.--This is the most important direction of all. The
first love experiences a tenderness, a purity and unreservedness, an
exquisiteness, a devotedness, and a poetry belonging to no subsequent
attachment. "Love, like life, has no second spring." Though a
second attachment may be accompanied by high moral feeling, and to a
devotedness to the object loved; yet, let love be checked or
blighted in its first pure emotion, and the beauty of its spring is
irrecoverably withered and lost. This does not mean the simple love of
children in the first attachment they call love, but rather the mature
intelligent love of those of suitable age.
[Illustration: MUSICAL CULTURE LESSON.]
2. FREE FROM TEMPTATIONS.--As long as his heart is bound up in its
first bundle of love and devotedness--as long as his affections
remain reciprocated and uninterrupted--so long temptations cannot take
effect. This heart is callous to the charms of others, and the very
idea of bestowing his affections upon another is abhorrent. Much more
so is animal indulgence, which is morally impossible.
3. SECOND LOVE NOT CONSTANT.--But let this first love be broken off,
and the flood-gates of passion are raised. Temptations now flow
in upon him. He casts a lustful eye upon every passing female,
and indulges unchaste imaginations and feelings. Although his
conscientiousness or intellect may prevent actual indulgence, yet
temptations now take effect, and render him liable to err; whereas
before they had no power to awaken improper thoughts or feelings. Thus
many young men find their ruin.
4. LEGAL MARRIAGE.--What would any woman give for merely a nominal
or legal husband, just to live with and provide for her, but who
entertained not one spark of love for her, or whose affections were
bestowed upon another? How absurd, how preposterous the doctrine
that the obligations of marriage derive their sacredness from legal
enactments and injunctions! How it literally profanes this holy of
holies, and drags down this heaven-born institution from its original,
divine elevation, to the level of a merely human device. Who will dare
to advocate the human institution of marriage without the warm heart
of a devoted and loving companion!
5. LEGISLATION.--But no human legislation can so guard this
institution but that it may be broken in spirit, though, perhaps,
acceded to in form; for, it is the heart which this institution
requires. There must be true and devoted affection, or marriage is a
farce and a failure.
6. THE MARRIAGE CEREMONY AND THE LAW GOVERNING MARRIAGE are for the
protection of the individual, yet a man and woman may be married by
law and yet unmarried in spirit. The law may tie together, and no
marriage be consummated. Marriage therefore is Divine, and "whom God
hath joined together let no man put asunder." A right marriage means a
right state of the heart. A careful study of this work will be a great
help to both the unmarried and the married.
7. DESERTION AND DIVORCE.--For a young man to court a young woman,
and excite her love till her affections are riveted, and then (from
sinister motives, such as, to marry one richer, or more handsome), to
leave her, and try elsewhere, is the very same crime as to divorce
her from all that she holds dear on earth--to root up and pull out her
imbedded affections, and to tear her from her rightful husband. First
love is always constant. The second love brings uncertainty--too often
desertions before marriage and divorces after marriage.
8. THE COQUET.--The young woman to play the coquet, and sport with the
sincere affections of an honest and devoted young man, is one of the
highest crimes that human nature can commit. Better murder him in body
too, as she does in soul and morals, and it is the result of previous
disappointment, never the outcome of a sincere first love.
9. ONE MARRIAGE. One evidence that second marriages are contrary
to the laws of our social nature, is the fact that almost all
step-parents and step-children disagree. Now, what law has been
broken, to induce this penalty? The law of marriage; and this is one
of the ways in which the breach punishes itself. It is much more in
accordance with our natural feelings, especially those of mothers,
that children should be brought up by their own parent.
10. SECOND MARRIAGE.--Another proof of this point is, that second
marriage is more a matter of business. "I'll give you a home, if
you'll take care of my children." "It's a bargain," is the way most
second matches are made. There is little of the poetry of first-love,
and little of the coyness and shrinking diffidence which characterize
the first attachment. Still these remarks apply almost equally to a
second attachment, as to second marriage.
11. THE CONCLUSION OF THE WHOLE MATTER.--Let this portion be read
and pondered, and also the one entitled, "Marry your First Love if
possible," which assigns the cause, and points out the only remedy, of
licentiousness. As long as the main cause of this vice exists, and
is aggravated by purse-proud, high-born, aristocratic parents and
friends, and even by the virtuous and religious, just so long, and
exactly in the same ratio will this blighting Sirocco blast the
fairest flowers of female innocence and lovliness, and blight our
noblest specimens of manliness. No sin of our land is greater.
[Illustration]
[Illustration: A CLASSIC FRIEZE.]
[Illustration: HOW MANY YOUNG GIRLS ARE RUINED.]
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