The national era. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1847-1860, 1858-01-07
: TOM The CHRISTIAN Inquirer,
N A r RIA G E,

Marriage and love blending into life make
we admit, the true domestic union. This is a
tyath but also it is the highest truth; and though
zthe highest truth has its roots everywhere in
common existence, rarely do we see it in the
tower, except in poetry, although we constantly
have it in the fruit, when we have but little
attended to it in the blossom. Suppose two PEG.
pie come together, and do not love each other,
then they are two liars, two hypocrites two OF
the most guilty perjurers which falsehood and
fraud have any room for in their definitions
suppose there is q mutual mistake in the case :
suppose there was o feeling which they mistook
for love; then they had better cultioate love, or
st least such liking as would still give validity
TO their union, truth to their home, and the con.
sciousness OF honest parentage to their children
1hen as to lone ITSELF it is as hard TO define az
poetry. But takeit without definition-,ake il
as intuition, as an instinct, as sentiment
or as an idea-it has many varieties and forms
Love in youth is not the same ing, in mode
at least, that it is in mashood and womanhood
Othelio's love IS not Romeo's; Julet's is no,
that OF DesdemoDa. Nor is that of the mature
husband like that of the bridegroom, or thai
.of the aged like that of the mature. And So
" . apprehenc, < - "i5u the vile. IT,, aru,,,.
husband aud wife will hardly care, in the quiet
OF the most happy moments, to review early
letters-not even recent ones-yet, iu the mex;
weeks separation, they will write as passion.
ateiy to each other as they often did in the first
uneasines5 of absence. Aud so it goes on with
years. In youth, the passion of the soul goes
into the passion of the senses in age, the pas.
sion OF the senses goes into the passion Of the
soul and old people seem still to think that
they are IN the hey-day of their original ecstacy.
We have seen matrimonial Venus of seventy
wnfph fOr har Rapa11ot Ad1n., &c c.
rs fifteen might lave looked for twenty; and.
having intruded on their meeting, we felt as
awkward-almost as much out of place-as If
It had been an interruption of a youthful fete a
tete. No account is therefore 10 be taken of
mere moods. What is most to be thought of
Is, prlncipie--not changes Of the mind, but the
mind itself. 1t is a fair demand, that parties
should know their own minds. If both con
sciousiy deceive, they are liars to each other and
to society; if one alone falsifes, then is he or
she guilty of dark crime to the individual and
to society.
But whatever may be decided on this matter
by the inward or the spiritual ethics of life, it
IS certain that there should be an understood
relation of the sexes. Without regulated and
ordained relation of the sexes, society must be.
come as vast system of coucubinage; for
what Is the great difference between one tempo.
rdry arrangement and another-one for day,
or another that may be broken in a month +?
NO temporary element can be admitted into
the idea of marriage, without bringing it essen
TALLY within the limits of q merely sensual CO.
habltation, or of modified prostitution. We
do not say that this could ever actually be the
case-we are only referring to tendency.
Daring the purest ages of Rome, there had not
been, so it is said, divorce for five centuries
In the worst days of Rome, there were those
whose homes were still sanctueries of chastity
and truth. But in any condition of nation.
that marriage is to be inviolate and perpetual,
is the only idea which can consecrate domestic
life; and just as the idea is inwardly earnest
in faith, and outwardly real in duty, will home
be noble and society be great. Pure mothers
are the nurses of heroes; and nations degener-
ate when homes become corrupt.
Marriage is no more created By law than is
property. Marriage is not the contriyance of
legislators it is not the invention of priests-it
is the method of Nature; aud though all legis-
lators Of all ages, and all presthoods of all re-
igions, should have marked it with their sane.
ton, it was only asserting to what Primal and
Sacred Power had already constituted. There
is discipline in it; there 10 an influence on the
heart to those who feel its sanctity, which chas-
tens desire, which checks passion, and which,
by purifying sense into affection, by multiplying
1t into many interests, gives it divine eleva-
ton and expansiveness. But it is in the int.
rior of the soul it does its hottest work. although
society has the best of its results.