The Anaconda standard. [volume] (Anaconda, Mont.) 1889-1970, 1899-04-10
MOTIVES FOR MARRIAGE.
Reasons That Induce Women to Test
Nuptial Experiment..


Nuptial Experiment..
From the Chicago Chronicle.
Marriage will never go out of fashion,
in suite of the strenuous efforts of the
bachelor maid and the new woman to
relegate it to oblivion.
The motives for which women marry
are as numerous as the sands of the sea,
or-as the women. Our easy assumption
Is that each one of every engaged couple
Is sin love- with the "other one" That is,
the parties are drawn together by some
mysterious psychic attraction, more or
less strong. In truth, this inner personal
attraction is not always present, either in
both parties to an engagement, or even
with one of the pair. Accident, propinqu-
ty trhing circumstances, social or family
pressure, some slight airy nothing decides
the question between marriage or no mar
riage for the woman, so slight that it is as
If women were always waiting on the
brink of this new experience, and very
light touch called them to fall into or
wander into, or drift into it, according to
their several temperaments.
1t is evident that, as nature expects wo-
man to marry, when the time comes she
provides the way. 1t is the next step in
the womans life. and with the hour the
opportunity comes to take it.
The curious point is the final determin-
ing motive in each case. Noting the num-
Der and variety of these, one is tempted
to comment that a woman's motive for
marriage is generally too high or too low;
the desire to secure a living; the wish to
escape from uncomfortable surroundings;
the wish for money to spend. for ease,
position, fine clothes or jewels; to secure
leisure or travel: the fear of being an "old
maid" to secure the liberty of married
woman; desperation or sheer Indifference;
weak yielding to a man will. as ex-
pressed in his persistency; surprise; the
fear of losing a friend or of making enc
miles, a yielding to the wishes or eXpec-
tations of family or friends: pure reck-
lessness or a reaction from disappointed
hopes in other directions; often, alas! be-
cause the woman is fitted for nothing
else and must take whatever chance Of
fers; often, alas and alas! because she
does not know how Ito make living any
other way
A little higher and the motive rises out
of self. The woman feels that she should
take the burden of her support from those
who are unwilling or unable to bear it, or
she wishes for means to help those who
have befriended her, whether parents or
friends; she may feel wish to help the
man, make him more comfortable or his
life happier or himself better. She may
feel ability to do good still greater to 9TH
ers in the offered position. Marriage may
mean care, responsibility, self-sacrihce or
self denial, yet she may take all these as
a duty and a means of the performance of
some large deed. But while these motives
are more worthy of respect than the first
class they are just as foolish and just as
misleading.
But from all of these motives women
marry, and when one considers how little
of any human or reasonable or sensible
thought enters into any of them, one is
surprised that there are not more ship
wrecked women in the world than there
are.