The Lancaster gazette. [volume] (Lancaster, Ohio) 1863-1886, 1869-11-25
Married at Home.
by HENRY WARD BrEcuER.

We have been provoked not 4
lew times, after watching for the
opening OF some new, or iavofite
rose, to find that a worm bad Ia.
ken the same fancy, and having
made good meal off from the bud,
the blossom was spoiled, and the
worm was no better than .if he had
eaten q cabbage-leaf. 1t is the
samo with fruit Wasps have the
eye Of a pomolcgist. They take
the ripe side OF the fnest pear
IL like ma9ner, If the apple or pear
fall to the ground, do ants. They
leave to you the knurly, and
take 10 themselves the mellow and
luscious.
In human life, too, the faifest
deeds arc liable to be gnawed, and
the geutlest customs are eaten out
by ostentation and selfishness.
What scene on earth is fairer
than a wedding in house2 There
arc no weddings like homo we'd
dings. The church is we'll enough
tor those who cannot do better.
But to a child, no cathedral can be
like that chief and foremost church
OF the heart, tho fathers housel
| This is the church within tho
church There where the dauQh.
ter was reared, and taught in all
womanIy grace, and equipped
with houscwifely habits, ought
she TO be married. Around her are
all the tender associations Of child
hood. of love and happiness. Her
new life should date from the nest
in which her old life was bred.
When, as in Europe, marriage
is regarded as sacrament, and as
requiring. at least in a moral point
Of view, the special grace Of which
the priest is held to be the divine
depository, to make it sacred and
safe, we can understand why
young applicants for domestic life
happiness should repair TO the
church. And when for centuries,
generation after generation have
been married in the village church,
we can understand how thousand
associations would surround that
charmed spot, and make it sacred
10 love, as it is to devotion.
But in America there are no such
reasons for resorting to the church.
And if there is an act in ones
whole life that belongs to home it
is marriage. If one has no homo
there is good reason why, next to
that, she should repair to church.
But we never could understand
the feeling that leads child ten-
derby reared in an ample mansion,
surrounded by endeared objects,
to leave the roof under which her
life has been spent and repair for
the marriage service to that un-
, homeIko place, church. 1t is
true that to q devout nature the
associations connected with Q
church are many and precious.
But they are not domestic. They
are solemn, away from common
life, almost the antitbesis Of that
8 social and summery atmosphere in
, which two hearts ripen into mar
riage.
Without upcbaritableness,i it may
; be feared that too many persons
have regard to the chow, the bril-
liant impression made upon the
admiriDg public. If so, the most
sacred act of life is bribed by van
: isy, to serve in its mongrel service.
But these censures are not to ap-
ply to the houselcss creatures that
! in marriage seeka home; nor to
, those of big hearts and small
, houses, who have troops OF friends
without rooms to receive them;
nor, in. short, to any whose hearts
do not bound at the name Of home,
!, as the dearest and most sacred
place on earth. Happy are they
who are married under the roof
where they were born, and who,
when in their own house, can see
the smoke from their fathers
house, the home Of childhood, the
:, paradise of memory
= --. =. nosu. NNnnA