Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1890-02-02
AGE OF THE GROOM.
Bessie Bramble'S Idea of When Men
Should Take Their Brides.
LUCK In LEISURE A GOOD ADAGE.
Lessons From the Lives of Great Men Of This
and Other Times.
WHEN MAY WEDS BLEAK DECEMBER
rwR1rrrN ToR rHE p1sPArcH.I

|
there appears to be no concern manifested az
to the other party in the transaction of mar
riage, it would seem as if the "beloved
brethren" had either been neglected or over
looked. 1t may, perhaps, have been fore
gone conclusion-as we gather from the
many given opinions upon the matter OF the
brides age--that man has all seasons for his
own in marriage; that he can safely and
happily marry whether young and green,
staid and middle-aged, or old and well
stricken in years, as he is SO constantly doing
in daily experience.
A wise man of old made answer to the
question of when man should marry: "a
young man not yet, an elder man not at all;
and Socrates, more famous as philosopher,
said out of the depths of his experience:
''Let man take which course he will, be
will be sure TO repent" The sonorous DR..
johnson, who married a widow older than
himself and, as described homely no
bojy-giVes comfort and courage to his
fellow men by telling them that Marriage
is the best state for men in general, and
every man is a worse man in pro-
portion, as he is unfit for
the married state, and that though matri-
mony may have some pains, celibacy has few
| pleasures" He, moreover, adds that "mar-
riage is the strictest tie of perpetual friend
ship, and there can be no friendship with
out confidence, and no confidence without
integrity, aud he must expect to be wretched
who pays to riches or beauty that regard
which only virtue can claim"
SOME QUESTIONABLE EVIDENCE.
Johnson's marriage at q seems to have
been his first streak of luck, for with his
wife he received small fortune, and found
in her fond and faithful companion and
friend. Addison, however, has said sweeter
and more charming things of marriage than
even johnson, but he did not marry until
over 40, and then, as related, his marriage
of rank and wealth proved to be, as Thack-
cray calls it, "a splendid and dismal union, 4"
or in other words, failure. Lord Bacon
has written learnedly on the married and
single state, and his remarks that "wife and
children are discipline to humanity, " that
''he that hath wife and children hath given
hostages to fortune, for they are impediments
to great enterprises either of virtue or
mischief" and that unmarried men are
best friends, best masters, best servants, but
not best subjects" are often quoted as most
reasonable and profound. But as he de-
ferred marriage until the age of 46 and
then married woman beneath him in rank
for the purpose alone of securing her money,
of which the law gave him every penny, it
is plain that his views were not founded
upon, or modified much by, his own per-
sonal experience.
Millions marriage at the age of 35 to a
bright young wife whom he treated so
harshly that she left him and went home to
her parents, gave the text for his Essays on
Divorce" in which he showed not only the
mettle of his mind, but his low opinion of
women as we'll. That he was a tyrant in
his own house, and inspired the hatred of
his wives and daughters seems plain from
history, but that he rather enjoyed the
marriage state, where he could rule and
reign and put all things under his feet, is
proved by the fact that he married three
times.
PLEASING TESTIMONY.
John Stuart Mill, the eminent philosopher
and writer on political economy, was not
married until be was A, when he welded
widow Of about the same age, or perhaps
older. His married life was an exceedingly
happy one, as he himself records, and per-
haps no greater praise for helpfulness, sweet
noble qualities of head and heart has any
woman ever received from the written
words of her husband than did the wife of
John Stuart Mill. Lord Beaconsfeld,
who cut such a large figure in
English politics within the last half
century, married when he was "a,
and the proof that his welded life was full
of love, constancy, friendship and all that
goes to make a union as near to the ideal of
happiness as human lives can get is fur
nished by his own testimony as to his in
debtedness to her for inspiration and her
worth as wife and faithfulness as a friend.
Gladstone, one of his most brilliant cotem-
poraries in Parliament, entered the holy
estate of matrimony at 80, and his married
life, of which the world hears much, is a
success far beyond the common. Robert
Browning became the husband of Elizabeth
Barrett at the age Of 80, while she was seven
years older; and yet theirs was marriage
of true minds and poetic souls, and, as all
accounts go, an exceptionally happy one.
Shakespeare married at 10, and his ex-
perience would go far to prove that early
marriages are not desirable. Dickens and
Thackeray both became benedicts at the age
Of 26, and their homes are not such pictures
of domestic felicity as will redeem their
SIN OF OMISSION.
When we survey the history of the men
of our country to find in them a sort of idea
as to the age at which men should marry,
we are met at the outset with the remarkable
fact that in their biographical sketches, as
given in the standard works, their mar
riage or their wives have not been consid- |
cred worthy of mention. Even Emerson,
nf fho nat tad nf Il
ophers and authors, is written up without a |
word to indicate that he had ever had wife |
to divide his sorrows or double his joys, or a |
home, where he had to get up in the morn |
ing and light the fire. Longfellow, who, if |
we remember correctly, was married twice, |
is not credited with wife and family, al |
though the dates of his graduation and of |
his trip to Europe are duly given. Haw-
thorne. whose married life, as chronicled by |
his children and friends, was an ideally |
happy one, has neither his marriage |
nor his wife recorded in the stand |
ard book of reference, though the
date of the publication of his books is given,
and the fact that franklin Pierce was |
most valuable friend is set forth. Oliver
Wendell Holmes and James Russell |
Lowell, it may also be inferred, married
since their wives, or even the fact
that they married at all, find no mention in
their biographical sketches. Although
Charles Sumner, Ben Butler and other men
of Massachusetts, are supposed to have been
yet In the record of their lives is
found no mention Of any such small oc-
currence. Considering these omissions. it is
no wonder there is such howl in the
Plymouth Rock State over ''the forgotten
SOME EXAMPLES LEFT Us,
However, for the instruction and example
Of the young men Of to-day it is we'll to
know that Washington did not rush into
at the gushing sentimental age,
but waited until he was 90, and then ju-
married a woman with an i'm
mense fortune, with whom be passed a most
nleasant and hanpv life tTMer,ho - .s oD- |