The Newberry herald and news. (Newberry, S.C.) 1884-1903, 1888-04-19
Concerning Marriage.
New York Herald. !


bia, S. G., against the marriage Of
young people without their parents
consent strikes at grave social wrong.
1t seems that a baptist clergymen re-
Gently united thirteen-year-old He
brew girl to Christian without her
parents approval. The Hebrews re-
sent and denounce this.
Nothing does more to vitiate the sac
redness of marriage than to contract it
in a needless manner. There is no one
act within the power of man or woman
which so deeply affects personal happi-
ness and the peace Of society. And un-
less we surround marriage with its
proper safeguards and dignity, dealing
with it as holy ordinance Or a sacra-
ment, it is a burden and apt to degener-
ate into crime.
We are taught that whenever a
Young man sees a ribbon rustllng in
the wind, or young lady summons a
smile to some lads peach down cheeks,
it means marriage. This foolish phil
osophy we learn from popular novelists
aud often from popular clergymen.
What volumes Of nonsense are. talked
and written about true love and the
holy affections; stern fathers holding
their daughters for money; managing
mothers selling their childrin for gold;
pure affections ignored for gain! Par
ents have voice in what concerns
their children-health, education, COM
fort, amusements, opportunities, future;
they live, strive, slave, work; die for
their children; but in marriage-the
most important-we are taught that
the affections are holy and parental in
reference is tyranny. For young girl
to run away with some clerk, or the
young man to carry maiden from the
home where she is the centre of a king
dom of love, devotion, reverence, to
struggle with poverty, is to become the
social hero of the hour. And the world
applauds, saying with Emerson that
all the world loves lover.
When woman was secluded, held in
the restraint which prevails in eastern
countries; when even in civilized Eng
land she was only something better
than the hound, something dearer
than the horse; when her womanhood
was an Indifferent social incident and
her honor could be torn form her and
worn without reproach as a plume; we
can understand the rebellion against
domestic government which marks the
old comedies. But it should be remem-
bered that these old comedies picture
old days. Persons whom our sainted
grandfathers would laud as successful
gallant would now be thrown into a
horse pond, and the darling of Con-
greve's drawing rooms would be kicked
out of modern club. Woman is now
under no restraint-hardly the retraint
of public opinion. She sees the world
as it is. Her parents are not jailers,
but friends, wise, experienced friends,
and in nothing so sure to be wise as in
what concerns her marriage.
The South Carolina Hebrews are
right. Hasty, ill-considered marriages,
especially in spite of the fathers and
mothers will, are always selfish, gen.
orally criminal, and never come to q
good end. No happiness that the most
perfect marriage under such circum-
stances could bring would ever do
away with the memory of the wound
the parents heart was made to suffer
the wound of ingratitude. There may
have been happy runaway marriages,
and it is not well to be implicable in
dealing with mere acts of folly. But
experience justices our accepting it as a
rule that when man proposes to elope
with a girl he is a scoundrel and the
consent can only be deemed the con-
sent of fool.