And now we can begin about marriage. But, as the post is going, I shall not be able to say all that I want to in this letter.
Marriage is the aim and end of all sensible girls, because it is the meaning of life. No single existence can be complete, however full of interests it may be. It is unfinished, and its pleasures at best are but pis-allers. You agree with me on this point, so we need not argue. But marriage in this country is for life, unless it is broken by divorce, which, no matter how the law may be simplified, and altered presently, must always remain as a stain upon a woman and a thing to be faced only in the last extremity. So, Caroline dear, when you marry you must
realize that it is for life, and it is therefore a very serious step, and not to be taken lightly. The rushing into unions without sufficient thought is the main cause of much of the modern unhappiness. How can you expect to spend peaceful, blissful years with a man whom you have taken casually just because you liked chaffing with him and dancing with him, or playing golf? Think of the hours you must spend with him when these things will be impossible, and if you have no other tastes in common you will find yourself terribly bored. In one of my books I once wrote this maxim: “It is better to marry the life you like, because after a while the man does not matter!” It was a very cynical sentence, but unfortunately true. It is only in the rarest cases that “after a while” either individual really matters to the other. They have at best become habits; they are friendly and jolly, and if “the life” is what they both like all rubs along smoothly enough. But love—that exquisite essence which turned the world into Paradise—is a thing flown away.
Now, Caroline, I want yours to be one of those rare cases where love endures for a long time, and even when it alters into friendship continues in perfect sympathy.