The Springdale news., 1889-12-06
CUPID'S FIRST WOUNDS.
Thoughts on the Beautiful Ex-
 periences of the Heart.
The First Love Is Merely a Preparation for Better to Come How It Af- fects and Helps Both Men
 and Women.


 for Better to Come How It Af-
 fects and Helps Both Men
 and Women.
 There are those who hold that love is simply love, and that one can love thousand times, and each time as deep- ly, truly, humanly and spiritually with the same exaltation and freshness. But l hold that there is in that first stir of the emotion by the opposite sex a turn given to life, color to our emo- tions, and @ lasting bias to our whole being that never is given again. One may love more wisely the second time, and with a more lasting devotion, but only the first love can give the abso- lute thrill of unalloyed bliss and open the world to you as q place of Joysome work and worship. You are suddenly awakened from boyhood and boyish- ness, from irresp possibility and care lessness concerning the future to feeling of marvellous responsibility. Behind you is the school, and play, and obedience, and the fathers house; ahead is the exquisite pleasure of working for and tenderly guarding a wife, and there is the new home to which your imagination summons only flowers, and song, and peace, and con- tent Your love has not yet had single jar. Here is perfect thing.
 The first love is rarely ever welded. It is not so intended. Her mission is to prepare the way for rational love and safe marriage. It is prema- ture. preliminary. in the nature of things Is temporary, and has nothing in it of the home-making. The mar ried love is economical, deliberative and practical; the first love is neither of these. It sees the world In false light, because not full light. The color of all things is no longer the red Of life's sunrise, nor is it yet the yellow of sunset; it is rose color If our first loves were often welded. the result would, without doubt. be a vast amount of misery. Marriage would. indeed, be failure. The worst of all marriages are early mar riages, and the next worst are late marriages. Those that are very early are sure to be lacking in com mon sense. The first experiences are babyish, and the result is childish quarrels. The two contend over trifes, and, as for very late mar rlages, here again there is quarrel ing over trifles, because each one has learned to have undisputed sway over personal matters. The ideal mar riage follows soon after the first love has faded and the disappointment of burst bubbles and vanished air castles has we'll healed.
 If, unfortunately, the first love ends in a speedy wedding, there is first of all the bosh and nonsense to be got rid of. l do not mean that the gush of first affection, tho overflow and flooding of spring tenderness. are in themselves nonsense, but they be- come nonsense when carried over to our work-a-day world. They have their place, but not in the family. If they get there they have to be got rid of. And the coming down from airy castles to cottages in some vast will derness," and from that to plain city flats, with a daily round of dreadful prosaic duties, is neither easy nor often successful. The chances are that the change will come as a collapse and all affection will fall flat into dis gust. Tho woman is likely first to come to the practical issue, and will either despise the spoony style of her partner, if he be young and tender. or she will play pettish part, as she was used to do with her mother
 A woman rarely. although some times takes firstl love in the serious way that the boy does She is never more different from man than at this point She is moro accustomed to affection, and to its Outbursts. While it is trae that girl who has loved often is un- fit to be true partner with one, yet 1t must be understood that a girl Is al- ways in love. Her friendships are of the same nature as love. Most girls are by nature prepared to serve as our first loves.
 A man can have only one first love; venture the surmise that a girl may have several Ia this way noble girl is able to break in and tame and render marriageable half a dozen lads. think l know one or two old maids who were peculiarly burdened in early life with lovers, but every one of them first lovers They were sens;- ble enough to comprehend this. and, instead of seizing on one of the sus- ceptible youths, marrying him out of hand, and so securing an escape from old maidism, they did what was sensi- ble and right, and are the happier for it. But they keep souvenirs of those days, and look them over with very 1rnnfla fnr1nh l,ndnnl Ah;.,l. tl.c....