ine guidance in such a crisis;
how much more important that you solicit it! It is easier for a man to
find an appropriate wife than for a woman to find a good husband. This
is a matter of arithmetic, as I showed in former discourse. Statistics
show that in Massachusetts and New York States women have a majority
of hundreds of thousands. Why this is we leave others to surmise. It
would seem that woman is a favorite with the Lord, and that therefore
He has made more of that kind. From the order of the creation in
paradise it is evident that woman is an improved edition of man. But
whatever be the reason for it, the fact is certain that she who
selects a husband has a smaller number of people to select from than
he who selects a wife. Therefore a woman ought to be especially
careful in her choice of life-time companionship. She cannot afford to
make a mistake. If a man err in his selection he can spend his
evenings at the club, and dull his sensibilities by tobacco-smoke; but
woman has no club-room for refuge, and would find it difficult to
habituate herself to cigars. If a woman make a bad job of marital
selection, the probability is that nothing but a funeral can relieve
it. Divorce cases in court may interest the public, but the
love-letters of a married couple are poor reading, except for those
who write them. Pray God that you be delivered from irrevocable
mistake!

PARTNERS TO AVOID.

Avoid affiance with a despiser of the Christian religion, whatever
else he may have or may not have. I do not say he must needs be a
religious man, for Paul says the unbelieving husband is sanctified by
the wife; but marriage with a man who hates the Christian religion
will insure you a life of wretchedness. He will caricature your habit
of kneeling in prayer. He will speak depreciatingly of Christ. He will
wound all the most sacred feelings of your soul. He will put your home
under the anathema of the Lord God Almighty. In addition to the
anguish with which he will fill your life, there is great danger that
he will despoil your hope of heaven, and make your marriage relation
an infinite and eternal disaster. If you have made such engagement,
your first duty is to break it. My word may come just in time to save
your soul.

HUSBANDS SELDOM REFORM.

Further, do not unite in marriage with a man of bad habits in the idea
of reforming him. If now, under the restraint of your present
acquaintance, he will not give up his bad habits,