Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1922-04-04
Matrimonial Courage

A N Omaha minister confded to friend
n the other day-whence this report
that whenever he unites a, couple in
the holy bonds of wedIock these days he
looks at the groom and says to himself:
"Sir, you are sportsman"
Meaning of course, that the groom Is TAX
ing a chance.
Sidestepping the rather obvious rejoinder
that there were two parties to the contract
taking chance, we come to the conclusion
that probably every generation in the past
has had the same idea about the one i'm
mediately behind it. From this we conclude
that the same will be true of the next gen
Grafton, and the next.
The mature generation inevitably is
shocked by the precocity of its offspring.
AS matter of fact, civilization has made
things pretty easy for the generation now
getting married. We complain good deal
and bitterly Of economic problems; but they
are no great matter, IL one side Of the part
nership will work and the other not spend
too much. That. is to say, the problems al
most always are manufactured within the
partnership and not outside Of it.
Slip your imagination into reverse a mo-
ment and consider matrinony, or what took
its place. among our distant ancestors.
Take the cave-man. To begin with, he had
to win his bride in sort OF free-for-all
elimination tournament if she was much of
4 bride. Not with roses and bonbons did he
WOO her. Probably he consulted her not very
seriously about it. He had trouble enough on
his hairy hands with Kid Bearcat and K. o.
Bigtooth. Any little differences Of taste be-
tween himself and the bride-elect could be
smoothed out with club, once he had dis
posed of these more husky and less con-
scientious DIRECTORS.
After marriage, the husband and father
had to protect his spouse and family against
murderous outlaws of his own kind, and
beasts such as the modern man sees mainly
when suffering from delirium tremens.
It took courage to take a wife in those
days, yet the paleolithic bridegroom prob
ably never thought Of it, courage being in
stinctive with him-if he were to live and
do we'll.
Turn back even fifty years, to the period
following the War Between the States. 1t
took nerve to marry then. The country was
,lisorganized and crawling with outlaws and
he average citizen was about two jumps
ahead of the sheriff and six dol lars removed
from the bread-line with no bread-line.
Yet men and women did marry then
and got away with it.
The pioneers Of our own American history
exhibited venturous hardihood that re-
garded calmly the prospect of marrying ONE
day. and setting out the next into the un
railroaded wilderness with an ak, rifle, z
bundle of bedding, some copper cooking
ensils and maybe luxury like clock Oh
cow. ...>
And they got by with it, too-and die
well.
The main trouble today is the exasperat
ing expectation of the young of the species
to be taken care of when they decide to ge
married. They want to start, not for them
selves but where the "old folks left off
They want all the fruits of work and self
denial without the work and self-denial
And that is why, coddled in the feather
bed of modern civilization, the modern boy
and girls fancy it takes great deal of nerv
to wed and "face the problems of 1ife.'