Ashtabula telegraph. (Ashtabula, Ohio) 1874-1880, 1874-03-21
SOCIAL LIFE.
Love and Marriage.

''The time will come" said lady,
the other day, "when the interest of
story or novel will turn out on
something besides love and matri-
mony!"
"ihen the time will come" " retort-
ed another, "when stories and nov
els will no longer be read. Sheer at
love and matrimony as much as you
please; they are the centrifugal and
centrepetal powers of the social
world; the powers which keep men
and women in their natural orbits.
Destroy one, and they will fly off in
tangents; whittier no soul can tell.
Sever the other, and they fall to-
gether in an undistinguishable mass;
chaos has come again. Love came
into the world with Adam and Eve,
in Eden matrimony being its natural
consequence. There the rite was
performed by God himself, who
gave that woman to man. 1t was
not good for Adam to be alone, so
he was given companion; not an
other man, but a woman; a compli-
ment, for they were one fesh,'
"rheirs was the first love story.
All the stories that have been writ
ten since, are but changes rung on
the same string"
Here are all the elements furnish
ed by the Creator and Author OF all.
The birth, the love, the marriage,
the temptation, the sin; the clinglng
together through good report and
evil report, while breasting the un-
known world; what novelist has i'm
agined more than this ? What nov
elist can?
"Yet you tell me that this old,
old story, conceived in Heaven, act
ed out upon earth, and new to each
generation that is born, and lives
and dies, will one day cease to be
the absorbing topic of our dreams
and imagnings, that youth will
cease to hang over it with moist
eyes and palpitatlng heart, and old
age no longer flush and futter at its
recollection and recital"
"Woe to us when this shall hap
pen! When the love story ceases to
be told in it's simplicity, or with all
the embellishments that can be ad.
ded to the first telling, with its pa
thos and devotion, the novel and
the romance will not be written, for
we shall need no story at all" @
"All that is very well to talk about
and theorize on, but how many mar
riages do you suppose take place of
love; the pure, unadulterated article;
in this society of which we form
part ?" ....
The lady could not answer; nor
can l. There is hardly a man or
woman who has not vanity enough
to believe he or she can be loved for
himself or herself alone, no matter
what his or her surroundings; but
love is protean in its phases, and has
as many counterfeits one of the most |
common of which is gratified by
vanity. This is a very frail chain
you must allow with which to cou-
pie pair, but one has no idea, how
many pairs are coupled with it. To |
be sure the links may wear thin, and
if there is much friction and the |
couples pull in opposite directions a
time may come when there will be |
forcible separation, POSSIBLY by the |
aid of the law when she will fall on |
one side and he on the other, and
one or the ether will be damaged |
thereby.
Again, some women, and quite as
many men, taking marriage as .
matter of course sort of a thing, and
having been thrown much in others
society, by mere force of propin-
guilty, come together. They get
accustomed to each other, and con-
clude to pass their days as "two
hearts that beat as one" the hustle
and preparation and idea. of being
once in their lives, and probably
only once, the cynosure of all
ewes adds very much to their inter-
ests in the occasion and of each
other.
Sweet cake, sweet wine, sweet kisses,
And SO the deed was done,
Now for life's woes and blisses,
The welded two are one"
But love in society, in the fashion
able world,-how much of it is there
in the wedding accounts we see set
forth IN such glaring capitals in the
papers? More than you or I wot
off, and quite as much according to
the individuals as in any other circle.
Here it requires more costly adjuncts
that is all. He must have houses
andbonds in prospective; shey ear.
Fl@gSs and tS#sl4 FAs Asss gU4 !