Passion lies dead; it is a flame that burns out quickly.The most beautiful face in the world grows indifferent to us when we have sat opposite it every morning at breakfast, every evening at supper, for a brief year or two.Passion is the seed.Love grows from it, a tender sapling, beautiful to look upon, but wondrous frail, easily broken, easily trampled on during those first years of wedded life.
Only by much nursing, by long caring-for, watered with tears, shall it grow into a sturdy tree, defiant of the winds, 'neath which Darby and Joan shall sit sheltered in old age.
They had commonsense, brave hearts.Darby had expected too much.
Darby had not made allowance for human nature which he ought to have done, seeing how much he had of it himself.Joan knows he did not mean it.Joan has a nasty temper; she admits it.Joan will try, Darby will try.They kiss again with tears.It is a workaday world;Darby and Joan will take it as it is, will do their best.A little kindness, a little clasping of the hands before night comes.
[Many ways of Love]
Youth deems it heresy, but I sometimes wonder if our English speaking way is quite the best.I discussed the subject once with an old French lady.The English reader forms his idea of French life from the French novel; it leads to mistaken notions.There are French Darbys, French Joans, many thousands of them.
"Believe me," said my old French friend, "your English way is wrong;our way is not perfect, but it is the better, I am sure.You leave it entirely to the young people.What do they know of life, of themselves, even.He falls in love with a pretty face.She--he danced so well! he was so agreeable that day of the picnic! If marriage were only for a month or so; could be ended without harm when the passion was burnt out.Ah, yes! then perhaps you would be right.I loved at eighteen, madly--nearly broke my heart.I meet him occasionally now.My dear"--her hair was silvery white, and Iwas only thirty-five; she always called me "my dear"; it is pleasant at thirty-five to be talked to as a child."He was a perfect brute, handsome he had been, yes, but all that was changed.He was as stupid as an ox.I never see his poor frightened-looking wife without shuddering thinking of what I have escaped.They told me all that, but I looked only at his face, and did not believe them.They forced me into marriage with the kindest man that ever lived.I did not love him then, but I loved him for thirty years; was it not better?""But, my dear friend," I answered; "that poor, frightened-looking wife of your first love! Her marriage also was, I take it, the result of parental choosing.The love marriage, I admit, as often as not turns out sadly.The children choose ill.Parents also choose ill.I fear there is no sure receipt for the happy marriage.""You are arguing from bad examples," answered my silver-haired friend; "it is the system that I am defending.A young girl is no judge of character.She is easily deceived, is wishful to be deceived.As I have said, she does not even know herself.She imagines the mood of the moment will remain with her.Only those who have watched over her with loving insight from her infancy know her real temperament.
"The young man is blinded by his passion.Nature knows nothing of marriage, of companionship.She has only one aim.That accomplished, she is indifferent to the future of those she has joined together.I would have parents think only of their children's happiness, giving to worldly considerations their true value, but nothing beyond, choosing for their children with loving care, with sense of their great responsibility."[Which is it?]
"I fear our young people would not be contented with our choosing," Isuggested.
"Are they so contented with their own, the honeymoon over?" she responded with a smile.
We agreed it was a difficult problem viewed from any point.
But I still think it would be better were we to heap less ridicule upon the institution.Matrimony cannot be "holy" and ridiculous at the same time.We have been familiar with it long enough to make up our minds in which light to regard it.