class="x-ebookmaker-pageno" title="(p. 16)"/> we propose to travel on is the right one when we come to crossroads in life. A certain amount of probability ought to make us take either one or the other, for not to resolve is to resolve. In reference to such questions as marriage versus celibacy, the choice of a wife, the choice of a profession, and many others, there must be a certain venture of faith, and in this unintelligible world there is a rashness which is not always folly.

There are, of course, many persons who, if they married, would be guilty of great imprudence, not to say of downright crime. When, however, two lovers—we emphasise the word—have sufficient means, are of a suitable age, and are conscious of no moral, intellectual, or physical impediment, let them marry. It is the advice of some very wise men. Benjamin Franklin wrote to a young friend upon his marriage: "I am glad you are married, and congratulate you most cordially upon it. You are now in the way of becoming a useful citizen, and you have escaped the unnatural state of celibacy for life—the fate of many here who never intended it, but who, having too long postponed the change of their condition, find at length that it is too late to think of it, and so live all their lives in a situation that greatly lessens a man's value. An old volume of a set of books bears not the value of its proportion to the set. What think you of the odd half of a pair of scissors? It can't well cut anything—it may possibly serve to scrape a trencher!"

Dr. Johnson says: "Marriage is the best state for man in general; and every man is a worse man in proportion as he is unfit for the married state." Of marriage Luther observed: "The utmost blessing that God can confer on a man is the possession of a good and pious wife, with whom he may live in peace and tranquillity, to whom he may confide his whole possessions, even his life and welfare." And again he said: "To rise betimes and to marry young are what no man ever repents of doing." Shakespeare would not "admit impediments to the marriage of true minds."

The cares and troubles of married life are many, but are those of single life few? The bachelor has no one on whom in all cases he can rely. As a rule his expenses are as great as those of a married man, his life less useful, and certainly it is less cheerful. "What a life to lead!" exclaims Cobbett. "No one to talk to without going from home, or without getting some one to come to you; no friend to sit and talk to, pleasant evenings to pass! Nobody to share with you your sorrows or your pleasures; no soul having a common interest with you; all around you taking care of themselves and no care of you! Then as to gratifications, from which you will hardly abstain altogether—are they generally of little expense? and are they attended with no trouble, no vexation, no disappointment, no jealousy even? and are they never followed by shame and remorse? To me no being in this world appears so wretched as an old bachelor. Those circumstances, those changes in his person and in his mind, which in the husband increase rather than diminish the attentions to him, produce all the want of feeling attendant on disgust; and he beholds in the conduct of the mercenary crowd that surround him little besides an eager desire to profit from that event the approach of which nature makes a subject of sorrow with him."

And yet it would be very wrong to hasten young men in this matter, for however miserable an old bachelor may be, he is far more happy than either a bad husband or the husband of a bad wife. What is one man's meat may be another man's poison. To some persons we might say, "If you marry you do well, but if you marry not you do better." In the case of others marriage may have decidedly the advantage. Like most other things marriage is good or bad according to the use or abuse we make of it. The applause that is usually given to persons on entering the matrimonial stage is, to say the least, premature. Let us wait to see how they will play their parts.

And here we must protest against the foolish and cowardly ridicule that is sometimes bestowed upon elderly men and women who, using the liberty of a free country, have abstained from marrying. Certainly some of them could give reasons for spending their lives outside the temple of Hymen that are far more honourable than the motives which induced their foolish detractors to rush in. Some have never found their other selves, or circumstances prevented the junction of these selves. And which is more honourable—a life of loneliness or a loveless marriage? There are others who have laid down their hopes of wedded bliss for the sake of accomplishing some good work, or for the sake of a father, mother, sister, or brother. In such cases celibacy is an honourable and may be a praiseworthy state.

To make "old maid" a term of reproach has mischievous results, and causes many an ill-assorted marriage. Girls have been hurried into marriage by the dread of being so stigmatized who have repented the step to their dying day. The sacredness of marriage and the serious responsibilities it brings are either ignored altogether or but lightly considered when marriage is represented as the only profession for women. There is no truth in Brigham Young's doctrine that only a woman sealed to a man in marriage can possibly be saved.

Let mothers teach their daughters that although a well-assorted marriage based upon mutual love and esteem may be the happiest calling for a woman, yet that marriage brings its peculiar trials as well as special joys, and that it is quite possible for a woman to be both useful and happy, although youth be fled, and the crowning joys of life—wife and motherhood—have passed her by or been voluntarily surrendered.

But this fact that celibacy has many consolations need not prevent the conclusion that as a rule married life is to be preferred.

"Jeanie," said an old Cameronian to his daughter, who was asking his permission to marry—"Jeanie, it's a very solemn thing to get married."

"I ken that, father," said the sensible lassie, "but it's a great deal solemner to be single."

Marriages are made in heaven: matrimony in itself is good, but there are fools who turn every blessing into a curse, like the man who said, "This is a good rope, I'll hang myself with it."