that her elevation and her
happiness, her education and usefulness, are objects of deep concern.
We have seen that the legislation of Heaven provides for the
gratification of the early longing of the soul for companionship in
making marriage honorable and love the holiest of instincts.
It is fashionable to talk against an early love. It is wrong thus to
do. "Youth longeth for a kindred spirit, and yearneth for a heart that
can commune with his own. He meditateth night and day, doting on the
image of his fancy." It is the tendency of an early love to inspire
youth with grand aspirations and lofty aims. "They that love early,
shall become like-minded, and the tempter shall touch them not. They
shall grow up, leaning on each other, as the olive and the vine."
It is only when love is scorned, when passion takes its place, when
man forgets that the idol of his heart is a probationer of earth like
himself, that it is his duty to be chary of her soul, feeling that it
is his jewel. It is only when a man ceases to be a man, and becomes a
beast, that he can consent, even in thought, to despoil woman of her
virtue; to trample upon the sacred instincts of her nobler nature.
A real woman will delight to make herself worthy of love. In the
advancement of her mind, quite as much as in the adornment of her
person, she strives to make herself beautiful as well as lovable. If
she forgets her duty, and consents to seem to be what she is not, so
that her admirer finds that the appearance which charmed him was not
real, then the future of that woman is dark indeed. Her husband will
discover, when too late, that "the harp and the voice may thrill him,
sound may enchant his ear, but, by and by, the hand will wither, and
the sweet notes turn to discord; the eye, so brilliant at even, may be
red with sorrow in the morning; and the sylph-like form of elegance
must writhe in the crampings of pain."
Naturally the man and woman will recognize the rule of God in the
choice of their vocation. He will go abroad, and she will stay at
home. He will earn the bread, and she will make it. He will build the
house, and she will keep it. The difference between their spheres of
labor seems naturally to be this: one is external, the other internal;
one active, the other passive. He has to go and seek out his path;
hers usually lies close under her feet. Yet, if life is meant to be a
worthy one, each must resolutely be trod.
"When the man wants weight,
|