The laws of Sparta required a man to marry when he became of age; if he did not, he was liable to prosecution. The salutary effect of this was seen in the superior morality of the Spartans over the other people of Greece. The morality of the people of Ireland is one of the brightest gems in the crown of the “loved Island of Sorrow”; the practice of early marriage among the Irish contributes, in a great measure, to this angelic virtue of chastity. The pernicious practice of marrying late in life, which prevails generally among Frenchmen, is one of the chief causes of the licentiousness of that gay and gallant nation. Unfortunately, a tendency towards late marriage has been gradually growing among the American people, especially in our large cities. This is one of the most dangerous and disheartening signs of the times. It arises from the love of luxury and display which has overspread the land and destroyed that republican simplicity of life and manners which was once the glory and strength of this nation.
Fathers are unwilling that their daughters should marry young men who are not rich, forgetting that they themselves were poor when they married, and that their wealth has been amassed by long years of constant toil. Such fathers should remember the answer of Themistocles, when asked whether he would choose to marry his daughter to a poor man of merit, or to a worthless man of an estate: “I would prefer a man without an estate to an estate without a man.” Daughters are unwilling to abandon a life of idleness and luxury in their father’s house to share the fortunes of young men who, though poor in person, are rich in worth, and have that within them which will command success. Such daughters should remember that a young lady once refused to marry a young man on account of his poverty, whose death was mourned by two continents—the noble philanthropist, George Peabody. When the late Emperor of France was living in poverty in London, he fell in love with a lady of rank and beauty, and solicited her hand. The lady, who regarded him as a mere political dreamer, rejected his suit, when he uttered this prophetic remark: “Madame, you have refused a crown.” Few young ladies have an opportunity of “refusing a crown,” but, in refusing young men of talent, industry, and virtue, on account of their present poverty, to accept worthless young men of fortune, they frequently refuse a life of domestic peace and happiness for one of splendid misery.
The ancient philosophers very wisely defined marriage to be a remedy provided by Providence for the safety and preservation of youth. We all require sympathy and love, and where can there be sympathy so perfect and love so enchanting as that which a true wife feels for her husband? Chateaubriand, in his magnificent work, The Genius of Christianity, gives us a sweet and affecting description of the Christian husband and wife: “The wife of a Christian is not a mere mortal: she is an extraordinary, a mysterious, an angelic being; she is flesh of her husband’s flesh, and bone of his bone. By his union with her, he only takes back a portion of his substance. His soul as well as his body is imperfect without his wife. He possesses strength; she has beauty. He encounters afflictions, and the partner of his life is there to soothe him. Without woman, he would be rude, unpolished, solitary. Woman suspends around him the flowers of life, like those honeysuckles of the forest which adorn the trunk of the oak with their perfumed garlands.”
Well might the great poet of domestic bliss exclaim of marriage:
“Such a sacred and homefelt delight,
Such sober certainty of waking bliss,
I never heard till now.”
All readers will recall the exquisite description of the married life of Albert and Alexandrina in A Sister’s Story; their charming home at Castellamare, on the Bay of Naples; the soft air and brilliant skies of Italy; excursions among the lovely islands of the bay; pious pilgrimages to holy shrines; their summer trip to the East; their winter in Venice, followed by the declining health of Albert; their return to France; and the saintly death of Albert at the early age of twenty-four.
Our American Catholic youth owe a duty to their church and their country which they neglect with criminal indifference. What become of the many young men of brilliant promise who each year leave our Catholic colleges laden with honors? Why are their voices never heard after commencement day? Why is their graduation thesis their last literary composition? It is because the seed of learning planted in their minds at college, like the seed of the husbandman in the Gospel which fell among thorns, is choked with the riches and pleasures of life, and yields no fruit.
No better example can be offered for the imitation of American Catholic young men than that of Montalembert, the great orator of France.[213] Even in his schoolboy days, his aim was high and beautiful: he scorned all folly and idleness. When he was only seventeen, he solemnly selected as his motto through life, “God and Liberty,” to which he remained faithful until death. A young man of brilliant intellect, vivid imagination, and noble ambition, he determined to play a man’s part in the world, and earnestly longed for the time to commence his glorious work. He wasted not the golden days of youth amid the gay frivolities of fashionable amusement, for he vehemently denied that youth was the time which should be devoted to the pleasures of society. He contended that youth should be given up with ardor to study or to preparation for a profession. “Ah!” he exclaims, “when one has paid one’s tribute to one’s country; when it is possible to appear in society crowned with the laurels of debate, or of the battle-field, or at least of universal wisdom; when one is sure of commanding respect and admiration everywhere—then it is the time to like society, and enter it with satisfaction. I can imagine Pitt or Fox coming out of the House of Commons, where they had struck their adversaries dumb by their eloquence, and enjoying a dinner party.”
This admirable advice from one who so worthily won his way in the world and in society should be carefully considered by the youth of America, who too frequently rush into society half educated, and wholly unfit for the duties and responsibilities of the world. An early marriage is the best beginning for those not called to the ecclesiastical or religious state. It gives at once an object and an aim to life. It fixes the heart, and keeps it warm and bright, preventing it from running to waste. It is a holy state, established by God as the ordinary means for the happiness and salvation of the greatest number of the faithful. As a rule, it is the safest state for persons living an ordinary life, and for many it is the only one which is safe. As there is no rule, however, without exceptions, we do not intend to deny that there are many exceptions to this rule. Numbers of persons, especially among the devout female sex, are called to a single life in the world either by inclination or necessity, and are both better and more happy in that state than they would be in any other. The reasons which we have presented in favor of marriage and of early marriage apply, therefore, only generally and not universally to persons in all the ranks and conditions of society, and have their more especial force in relation to those who live in what is called “the world,” but most especially in reference to young men.