The Wedding Guest: A Friend of the Bride and Bridegroom. VariousЧитать онлайн книгу.
horizon; and the truths of life, divested of all romance, in bitterness and pain rise before them. Unfitted for duties which must be fulfilled, physically incapacitated for the responsibilities of life—mere school-girls in many instances—the chains they have assumed become cables of iron, whose heavy weight crushes into the heart, erasing for ever the footprints of affection, and leaving instead the black marks of deadly hate. Then comes the struggle for supremacy. Man in his might and power asserts his will, while woman, unknowing her sin, unguided by the divine light of love, neglects, abandons her home; then come ruin, despair, and death. God help those mistaken ones, who have thus hurried into union, ignorant of each other's prejudices, opinions, and dispositions, when too late they discover there is not, nor ever can be, affinity between souls wide as the poles asunder.
Notwithstanding these miserable unions, we must consider marriage divine in its origin, and alone calculated to make life blessed. Who can imagine a more blissful state of existence than two united by the law of God and love, mutually sustaining each other in the jostlings of life; together weathering its storms, or basking beneath its clear skies; hand in hand, lovingly, truthfully, they pass onward. This is marriage as God instituted it, as it ever should be, as Moore beautifully says—
"There's a bliss beyond all that the minstrel has told,
When two that are linked in one heavenly tie,
With heart never changing and brow never cold,
Love on through all ills, and love on till they die!"
To attain this bliss, this union of the soul, as well as of hands, it is necessary that much should be changed. Girls must not think, as soon as emancipated from nursery control, that they are qualified to become wives and mothers. If woman would become the true companion of man, she must not only cultivate her intellect, but strive to control her impulses and subdue her temper, so that while yielding gently, gracefully, to what appears, at the time, perhaps, a harsh requirement, she may feel within the "calm which passeth all understanding." There must be a mutual forbearance, no fierce wrestling to rule. If there is to be submission, let the wife show how meekly Omnipotent love suffereth all things. Purity, innocence, and holy beauty invest such a love with a halo of glory.
Man, mistake not then thy mate, and hereafter, bitterly repenting, exclaim at the curse of marriage. No, no, with prudent foresight, avoid the ball-room belle—seek thy twin soul among the pure-hearted, the meek, the true. Like must mate with like; the kingly eagle pairs not with the owl, nor the lion with the jackal. Neither must woman rush blindly, heedlessly, into the noose, fancying the sunny hues, the lightning glances of her first admirer, true prismatic colours. She must first chemically analyze them to be sure they are not reflected light alone, from her own imagination. That frightsome word to many, "old maid," ought not to exercise any influence over her firmly balanced mind; better far, however, lead a single life, than form a sinful alliance, that can only result in misery and wretchedness. Some of the purest and best women that ever lived, have belonged to that much decried, contemned sisterhood.
Wed not, merely to fly from an opprobrious epithet; assume not the holy name of wife, to one who brings trueness of heart, wealth of affection, whilst you have nought to offer in return but cold respect. Your first love already lavished on another: believe me, respect, esteem, are but poor, weak talismans to ward off life's trials. Rise superior to all puerile fancies; bear nobly the odium of old maidism, if such be thy fate, and if, like Sir Walter Scott's lovely creation, Rebecca, you are separated by an impassable gulf from your heart's chosen, or have met and suffered by the false and treacherous, take not any chance Waverley who may cross your path. Like the high-souled Jewess, resolve to live on singly, and strive with the means God has given you, to benefit, to comfort your suffering sisters.
Would man and woman give to this all-important subject, so vital to their life-long happiness, the consideration it requires, we should not so often meet with men broken in spirit—memento mori legibly written on their countenances; with women prematurely old—unloving wives, careless husbands. Meditate long before you assume ties to endure to your life's end, mayhaps to eternity. Pause even on the altar-stone, if only there thou seest thy error; for a union of hands, without hearts, is a sin against high heaven. Remember,
"There are two angels that attend, unseen; Each one of us; and in great books record Our good and evil deeds. He who writes down The good ones, after every action, closes His volume; and ascends with it to God; The other keeps his dreadful day-book open Till sunset, that we may repent; which doing, The record of the action fades away, And leaves a line of white across the page."
THE BRIDE'S SISTER.
OH, sister, darling, though I smile, the tears are in my heart,
And I will strive to keep them there, or hide them if they start;
I know you've seen our mother's glance ofttimes so full of woe,
The grief-sob rises to the lips that bid her first-born go.
It is not that she doubts his love to whom thou'st given thine—
The fear that he may coldly look upon his clasping vine;
But, oh, she feels however loved and cherished as his wife,
Though calm her lily may float down upon the stream of life;
Yet, by her own glad married years, she knows that clouds will stray,
And tears will sometimes fill thy cup, though kissed by love away;
And she will not be near her flower to lay it on her breast—
'Tis thus—'tis thus the young birds fly, and leave the lonely nest!
Oh, sister, darling, I shall miss thy footfall on the stair,
Beside my own, when good-words have followed good-night prayer;
And miss thee from our pleasant room, and miss thee when I sleep,
And feel no more thy twining arms and soft breath on my cheek.
And I shall gaze with tearful eyes upon thy vacant chair—
Sweet sister, wherefore, wherefore go, 'tis more than I can bear!
Forgive me, Lizzie, do not weep—I'm strong again, and calm,
"Our Father" for my aching heart will send a spirit-balm.
Now let me bind this snowy veil amid thy silken hair,
The white moss-rose and orange buds upon thy bosom fair;
How beautiful you are to-night! Does love such charms impart?
An angel's wing methinks has stirred the waters of your heart;
So holy seem its outlets blue where sparkle yet the tears,
Like stars that tremble in the sky when not a cloud appears.
Art ready now? The evening wanes; the guests will soon be here,
And the glad bridegroom waits his own. God bless thee, sister dear!
LOVE vs. HEALTH.
ABOUT a mile from one of the Berkshire villages, and separated from it by the Housatonic, is one of the loveliest sites in all our old county. It is on an exhausted farm of rocky, irregular, grazing ground, with a meadow of rich alluvial soil. The river, which so nearly surrounds it as to make it a peninsula "in little," doubles around a narrow tongue of land, called the "ox-bow"—a bit of the meadow so smooth, so fantastic in its shape, so secluded, so adorned by its fringe of willows, clematises, grape-vines, and all our water-loving shrubs, that it suggests to every one, who ever read a fairy tale, a scene for the revels of elves and fairies. Yet no Oberon—no Titania dwelt there; but long ago, where there are now some ruinous remains of old houses, and an uncouth new one, stood the first frame house of the lower valley of the Housatonic. It was inhabited by the last Indian who maintained the dignity of a Chief, and from him passed to the first missionary to the tribe. There Kirkland, the