Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1889-10-13
POOR MARRIED MEN.
Bessie Bramble Takes Up Their Side
of the Marriage Problem and
GIVES THEM BUT COLD COMFORT.
Aspiring Benedicts Should Study the
Worlds History and
KNOW FAIR WOMAN AS SHE REALLY Is
rwR1TTEN FOR THE DIsPATcH.I

| WRITTEN FOR THE DIsPATcH.I
A correspondent, evidently in good, sober
earnest, has sent us letter of praise for
what he is pleased to call our ''scathing
criticism of men before and after marriage, ="
but he ardently urges US ''to give the other
view of that important subject as well, be-
cause the side presented against the dear
brethren may mislead many young minds
who are candidates for matrimonial sweet
meats" He then goes on and requests us
to write another article on the same subject,
and ego for" the women, and show how the
average young lady assumes the character
of an angel before marriage, and STRAINS
every nerve and faculty to appear kind
loving, bright, intelligent, thoughtful
and appreciative-a model lover and
sweetheart, and candidate as a
model wife" He ardently asks
us to discourse upon the millions of poor
men vino have been cheated, deceived, de-
frauded out of all they had counted upon,
hoped for, dreamed about, and labored for,
when they sought to obtain intelligent.
| thinking, appreciative helpmeets and COM
panions, and find instead after marriage,
that they have been beguiled by arttul
creatures, who relapse into their natural
stupidity, and who are wholly untitled to be
the companions of the men they have won
! by power of fascination and artifice.
| Well, really the picture presented Is
pathetic.
Millions of poor men being cheated and
defrauded with their eyes wide open in the
| light OF the nineteenth century, with the
whole experience of the worlds history be-
fore them since the celebrated scene in the
af II ofo oof4 4haf fron
| of knowledge, and then beguiled Adam to
eat the apple likewise. Despite of their
claim to superior sense, wisdom, judgment,
| logic, and brains, millions OF men are de-
ceived into marrying by lot of silly,
stupid women, away OF from
THE PATTERN IDEAL WIFE.
Think of it. With that plain story of the
first marriage-with the obvious moral at
Christian pulpit in the world for over /, 800
years; with the history of Samson and
Delilah; of Bathsheba, who held power over
David, and who gave to Solomon his crown;
| of Athaliah, who pushed her way to the
throne of the kingdom of Judah; of Jezebel,
who converted Ahab to the worship of Baal
| with all of these and more of Biblical
lawful examples drummed into mems ears
| for centuries, they have not grown wiser as
to the ways Of women. With the history of
Helen, who through her wiles laid proud
old Troy in ashes; of Cleopatra, who, as the
poet SAYS lost Marc Antony the world;
with Aspasia, who held the great Pericles
tied to her apron strings; with Messalina,
who ruled Claudius to his shame-by her
charm of person and power of mind-mav
with even the more modern instances of the
beguiling powers of Madame de Maintenon,
Madame de Montespau, Madame de Pom
padour, who ruled kings and made and
marred mems fortunes, with the picture of
the miseries of Milton, caused by his wife's
tantrums, the woes of John Wesley over his
wife's temper, and many other good men
| who have wedGed vixens and scolds-w1th
| all these examples and many more in his
tory, with the writings of the ancients, and
the press of the present teeming with
diatribes against women and their wiles,
with all the knowledge to be obtained
everywhere around them among friends,
neighbors, in society, and in the divorce
courts fully before their eyes and within
their knowledge, yet, notwithstanding
| millions of men who claim for themselves
reason, intelligence and common sense go
on marrying Xantippes, and Jezebels, and
| Messalinas, and Mrs. Wesleys, and then
they moan and groan and claim to have
been cheated, and deceived, and defrauded
out of their ideal wives.
BUL WHO Is TO BLAME?
As matter of course they will say, as
did Adam of old, 1.-THE woman whom Thou
| gavest to be with me she gave me of the
tree of knowledge and did eat" But the
fact is they fell blindly into love with the
stupid, thoughtless, irrational beings. :"
who, by beguiling smiles, winning ways
and artful deceptions, capture their hearts
and fill their fancy-and marry them in hot
haste. Then, as the old saw goes,
they repent at leisure. There is Just
| one little piece of consolation for them-if
/ it can be called such-and that is: If they
believe marriages are made in heaven, they
can accept their unhappiness in matrimony
as a means of discipline to teach them such
degree of patience and long suffering as
will win them shining crowns hereafter.
Socrates, with calm endurance, accepted, it
is said, the sharpness of Xantippe's tongue
as an incentive to fortitude and philosophy.
Mrs. Wesley's vixenish temper seems not to
have had bad effect upon the good John,
who became more sanity, more earnest
more bent upon the spread of piety than
ever as the years passed on. Perhaps he
needed just such manipulations of wrath to
keep him on the straight path to the estab-
| llShment OF MetnoQlSm.
1t may be said here, however, that when
history is consulted, 1t will be found that
none of these renowned beguilers, infamous
characters and notorious scolds were as
black as they have been painted. Bother
Talmage calls her who gave the mighty
Samson into the power Of the Philistines
the Infamous Delilah." But she herself
was citizen Of Philistia and doubtless a
red-hot hater of its enemies. Employed by
the Philistines to aid them, and conscious
of her power, she bv stratagem and wiles
despoiled Samson of his strength and de-
livered him into the hands of her country
men. Her woman's wit was more than a
match for the tremendous power ofthe man,
who with simply the jawbone of an ass had
| killed a thousand men. Charlotte Corday
delivered France from the tyrant Marat by
stratagem and murder. Brutus killed
Cesar in behalf of his country. In them
these crimes are called patriotism-the
| highest Roman virtue-so as Delilah deliv-
cred her country from an enemy so formida-
BILE that he could, single-handed and alone,
slay a thousand Philistines at one time, it
seems plain that she can, at least, be cred
tied with patriotism and superior mental
powers.
CLEOPATRA WAS PATRIOTIC.
Even Cleopatra with all her sins was true
to the interests of her country and people,
while Marc Antony was sorry and igno-
minious traitor. Milton, as can be learned by
his life, was an ugly man to live with, and