Letter writing.—If you should correspond with a young man, be interesting, sensible, cautious and sincere. You should never put in a letter to a young man, what you would object to your mother’s reading. You would be surprised to know how many young men compare their letters from young women. If you will remember this and consider the possible consequence, you will be cautious what you put in a letter.
Ethics of the engaged.—Thus far we have studied the ethics of young women in their relation to young men, as friends only. Friendship may assume a more serious nature and ripen into love. Love is the strongest and at the same time the weakest, the most fickle; the most far-sighted and the blindest; the wisest and sometimes the most foolish, of human attributes. Love should listen to the voice of reason, judgment and will. That experience, called love, that makes courtship so delightful and beautiful, marriage desirable and sacred, that harmonizes differences, blends personalities, and makes the two one, is the child of the sex life. When the sex life is normal, the two having lived virtuous lives, love will be pure and intense. If one, or both have misused their sex life, lust, the child of sensuality, may be easily mistaken for love. Harmony, happiness and heaven will reign in the home where both have been pure before marriage and remain true to each other after marriage. Where one or both break their marriage vows the bond of love is broken. The deed may never be confessed, but the estrangement will be felt. Lust is responsible for most unfortunate marriages, domestic inharmonies and divorces. Lust on the part of one, and love on the part of the other, can never make a happy marriage. Pure love on the part of both is the only thing that can stand the inevitable tests of marriage.
Some advice.—Shun sudden emotions, cultivate sincerity, covet neither beauty nor wealth, be true to the best that is within you; don’t be in a hurry to become engaged; the first chance may not be the best; wait for the coming of your prince. Until he comes, don’t trifle with your affections or the affections of a gentleman friend by making marriage engagements. This is dangerous, as well as a very great sin. When you have found your prince, you should not postpone marriage by a long engagement. It is not necessary or wise to wait until you are as well equipped for housekeeping as your parents now are.
Long engagements.—If your prince is healthy, industrious, economical and has a few hundred ahead; or if he has a good education and a good position, with the other qualities, he can make a living for his family. If either of these conditions exists, a long engagement should be avoided. If either of these conditions does not exist a definite engagement with a man would be unwise.
Hasty marriages.—The other extreme of hasty marriage is to be condemned. If marriage takes place when one or both are immature, the offspring must suffer. If an engagement follows a very brief acquaintance, disagreeable qualities may be discovered later, to be followed by a broken engagement. Hasty and brief engagements often terminate in the divorce courts.
Closing advice.—When friendship has ripened into love, the vital question being asked and answered; fraternal relations established between the families; and the engagement is a blissful reality, what then should be the rules governing the young woman’s ethics? Inflexible rules would be difficult to give. Much depends upon the man to whom she is engaged and the length of the engagement. During the pending engagement both should remember that they are not married, and hence there are liberties in the married life that are not theirs until the civil phase of marriage has completed their oneness. All embracing and sitting in each other’s lap should be entirely avoided. Pictures, showbills and post cards have taught in recent years some very vicious lessons to the youth. An occasional good-by kiss between the engaged, at the close of a call, just before parting, unaccompanied by an embrace should result in no harm to either.
She should be frank, sincere and earnest, versatile, entertaining and affectionate, but very discreet. If she follows these simple and essential rules, she and her prince will be all the happier during their pending engagement and will respect and love each other all the more through life.
CHAPTER XXX
THE WRONGED GIRL
Why most girls go wrong.—In my talk on a young woman’s ethics, I endeavored to give you such information and advice, regarding your association with young men, as would safeguard your character. Few girls have been as well informed by their mothers in these matters as they should have been. As a result of ignorance, many girls, even out of our best homes, annually fall. Were all girls taught by their mothers along this important line and could they see the tragic consequence of going wrong, it is evident that very few young women would ever go astray.
Few women go wrong from choice.—It should be said, in justice to fallen women, that but few would have gone wrong, had it not been for the seductive wiles of designing men. Man is woman’s natural protector. Women naturally trust men, and look to them for protection. The young man who lives a pure life, maintained by noble, pure ideas, is a safe guardian of a young woman’s virtue. Unfortunately such young men are the exceptions and not the rule. Most young men receive their first lessons in matters of sex from ignorant, sinful men. From their early teens their highest ideas of manhood involve the ruin of some girl. The training that most boys and young men receive leads naturally to these perverted ideas. As a result of this false training the natural feelings of being a friend, a champion, a protector of a girl’s honor and virtue are gradually transformed into the sentiments of a libertine. Such young men are found in all grades of society. They cultivate the acquaintance of innocent, unsuspecting girls, make love to them, win their confidence and affections, set dates for early marriage, then practice their seductive methods with vows of marriage oft repeated, pluck the lily of virtue and leave their victims to suffer endless remorse, while they gloat over their successes, go unwhipped and lose no social prestige.