haracter,
would be doubly exaggerated. The children of selfish parents would be
thieves; those of spendthrifts, beggars; those of crotchety parents,
monomaniacs; those born of sensual parents, beastly debauchees. A few
generations of such a degenerating process would either exterminate
the race or drive it back to Darwin's ancestral ape.

It must not be inferred, from our strictures upon the theory mentioned,
that we would advocate the opposite course, that is, the contraction
of marriage by individuals of wholly dissimilar tastes, aims, and
temperaments. Such alliances would doubtless be quite as wretched in
their results as those of an opposite character. It is with this as
with nearly all other subjects; the true course lies between the two
extremes. Parties who are negotiating a life partnership should be
careful to assure themselves that there exists a sufficient degree of
congeniality of temperament to make such close and continued
association agreeable.

Disparity of Age.--Both nature and custom seem to indicate that the
husband should be a little older than the wife. Several reasons might
be given for this; but we need not mention them. When, however, the
difference of ages reaches such an extreme as thirty, forty, even fifty
or more years, nature is abused, good taste is offended, and even
morality is shocked. Such ill-sorted alliances are disastrous to both
parties, and scarcely more to one than the other. An old man who forms
a union with a young girl scarce out of her teens--or even younger--can
scarcely have any very elevated motive for his action, and he certainly
exposes himself to the greatest risk of sudden death, while insuring
his premature decay. A king once characterized such a course as "the
pleasantest form of suicide." It is doubtless suicidal, but we suspect
there are some phases of such an unnatural union which are not very
enjoyable.

One reason of the great danger of such marriages to the old is the
exhaustive effects of the sexual act. As previously noted, in some
animals it causes immediate death. Dr. Acton makes the following
pertinent remarks:--

"So serious, indeed, is the paroxysm of the nervous system produced
by the sexual spasm, that its immediate effect is not always unattended
with danger, and men with weak hearts have died in the act. Every now
and then we learn that men are found dead on the night of their wedding."

"However exceptional these cases are, they are warnings,