The Emporia news. [volume] (Emporia, Kan.) 1859-1881, 1869-06-18
WEIL.AssoRTED MARRIAGES.

Rev. DIR. I4amson, of BroOkline, Mass,
enters his earnest protest through the
Boston Reflector, against the prevalent
doctrine that the great majority of mod
ern marriages are ill-assorted and I'M
happy. He regards this opinion as not
only false, but deeply pernicious, tend
ing to produce the very state of things
which it asserts to be so very common.
He says that in the course of his long
ministry of about thirty years, he has
been brought into relations of compare
tive intimacy with at least four hundred
families, and among all these he can
scarcely count dozen ill-assorted mar
riages. On the contrary, in considering
with how little care marriages are often
contracted. his habitual wonder has
been why there has not been more I'M
happy marriages than really exist. In
accounting for the prevalence of the
opinion which he condemns as false
and pernicious, DIR. Lamson suggests
that in most cases it is the result of in
consideration and because a single
case of unhappy marriage, within ones
circle of acquaintance, so overtops and
oveFshadowS the multitude of happy
unions.
Another reason might have been Civ
en- for the prevalence of this opinion,
VIZ. Few people, in estimating the
happiness of married couple. make
due allowance for human imperfectioR.
No two human beings can be brought
into the intimate relationship of hus-
band and wife without the occasional
development of something discordant.
Only perfect, absolutely sinless persons,
could live absolutely perfect lives to-
gether: and snch men aud women can
never be found in this world and as in
10. n :.
ing, absolutely perfect marriages can
never be realized either in this world or
in that which is TO come. But are not
the vast majority of married persons
quite as happy as an equal number of
unmarried ones? Nav, more. are not
the great majority of married people as
happy in their married state as they
would be unmarried? And still more,
are they not as happy with each other
as they would be with ANYBODY else
By change of partners they might get
rid of some one or more causes of die
turbance between them-some consti-
tutional defects or infirmities, or some
disagreeable cherished habits; but they
would find in other parties other causes
of disturbance quite as serious, though
of an entirely different kind so that,
after all, it might be very difficult to
say OH which side there was the great
est amount of happiness or misery. The
fact is. that men and women are sus-
ceptible of only given amount of con-
tentment and happiness in any condi-
ton of life and, marry whom they will,
they can never exceed their capacity for
enjoyment. Many people are foolish
enough to imagine that marriage is the
sovereign cure for all the disquietudes
and miseries of life and when they get
married, and yet find their favorite
panacea does not work perfectly, they
jump to the conclusion that it is because
their marriage was not true one that
it was ill-assorted, and therefore an un-
happy one; whereas the trouble is, that
both husband and wife are human
neither divine nor angelic--and have,
like all other human beings, more or less
of sinful infrmity about them.