POOR MARRIAGES.

New Zealand Herald, Volume VII, Issue 2004, 21 June 1870, Page 4

POOR MARRIAGES.

To marry if you are poor it- looked upon by society in general as nothing loss than a crime, nor is it to be wondered that the ordinary part of society shonld so look upon marriage ; but it is not confined to the ordinary part, for tho extraordinary part of society upholds < exactly the same theory : iiiul what I mean by the extraordinary part of society is, "the pious people of society," for indeed they arc ] extraordinary; they go hand in hand with ( society to suit their own purpose, but de.id againit it when it does not happer.tofullinwith their own ideas. Hut in order to to illustrate more fully what I mean, I will introduce , to your notice characters from both these sections. Firstly, then, from the extraordinary portion, let me introduce the KeT. { Preacher l'areon, and Mistress Minister, both , truly godlv people, and universally looked upon as the "(alt of the earth." The Kev. Mr. l'areon, » distinguished mea-ber of the Church of England, who preaches sermons, is indefatigable in visiting the lick, reads his Bible with meditation aud prayer, and exhorts all good people to do tho same; looks upon dancing and many of thu innocent amusements of society, as handiworks of thedevil, not because he can lind anything against them in the Bible (for there is nothing in the Biblo tlmt I am aware of against such amusements as a quiet dance), but simply because it dots «ot ugree with his own ideas. Well this same clergyman has a daughter, a good daughter, a pretty daughter, she unfortunately comes to the age of eighteen, and still more unfortunately, falls in love. The subject of her atlectioni is a gentleman, but of limited means ; he comes to her father, and declares himself, and then follows a scene; the rev. gentleman is horrified, amazed, altogether taken back, wonders that anyone calling himself a gentleman should forget himself so far, and presume to thiuk of marriage with Mis daughter, without, at least, some prospects ("prospects" with him means nothing lefi than £500 a-ycar). What would society say ? Hβ dismisses him, hopes ho will see the propriety of withdrawing himself altogether from the society of his daughter ; in fact he forbids him the house. Ihe young man makes his exit, and the front door is slammed. The good man enters hi» study, and riugs the bell for his daughter j she comes, and scene Xo. 2 occurs, lie need not tell her how distressed he is, he is sorry the should not hare confided more in him, ic, &c.; he tells her he h:is forbidden her lover tho house, and hopes she will think no more of him. lie chills her purest and best feelings, perhaps breaks her heart, but then he must do so for the sake of society, lie forgets, however, that he has taught her to read her Bible, that she has read such passages as, '" It is not good for man to be alone," " Male and female created he them." "If a man desire a wife he desireth a good thing," " Let the younger women marry." He foraet« he has taught her what J\ilh i,\ and that if we have faith, real faith, we can want for nothing, temporal or spiritual. lie 7,0w gives the same meaning to faith that society in general does, if not in words at least in actions, namely, that it should be applied simply to spiritual things ; at any rate, as regards marriage, you must bow to facts, not-faith. He also forgets that fulling in lore is a spontaneous necessity of love and nature, implanted by God himself in the best of characters. But we will now leave our parsjn and his pretty daughter, and pass on to Mrs. Minister ; she is a clergyman's widow, the has u son, an only ion, who having come to years of discretion", tins ha 1 the indiscretion, to fall in love with a poor girl ; lie is determined to marry her, consequently declares his intentions to his mothtr, au«l she having heard them, declares /«/• intentions to him, which intentions are, that if he marries with no better prospects she will no more acknowledge him, cut him oil'without a penny, and have nothing more to do with him. Say farther, she goes to the parents of the poor girl, and by artifices peculiar to tbe extraordinary part of society, gets the engagement broken oil', and what it the consequence, that the youug man is broken off too, broken oil" from the narrow path into the broad, from the path of virtue to that of vice, his affections are seared, his good tastes checked, Ins desire to dogooJ stopped, he finds no consolation in his home, anil turns to the world to find it—lie becomes restless, then dissipated, and too often rushes into ori ne itself. But we will take an example from the ordinary portion of society, and turn our attention te tlir Misses Vicarage ; now these are two orphan young ladies, they don't remember their mother for she died when thev were infants, and their father, a respected *c!cri»Tmau, has now been dead some months ; they consequently have been taken in churye b*v their uncle, a gentleman of the military professions, and one who respects society and all its fashions, aud thus in « remarkably short time the two young ladies have become well versed in all the antics and manoeuvres with which tociety abounds ; they are indeed charming girls, and are brought out into the fashionable world with all the blandishments that society can bestow upon them. Thanks to their guardian, nothing so paltry as love, or duty, tver enters their hearts, lieverßtless thev declare they love balls, theatres, and consequently make it their dutyWo attend one or oilier of these amusements every night. Their habiU are fashionable, breakfasting" at linlf-pust eleven, diuin; at six, mid going to bed in Their spare time thev spend as fashionable young ladits know how to spend it, reading sensational novel?, promenading in public tlioroughfare>|with young men equally fa:~hionable with themselves", who carrv spicy nobby stick", wear their hats on one tide, amlsmukc no end of cignrs. But tin chief recreation of the Missc> Vicarage is \ playing the game of "kill," which game, in order that my readers may understand, 1 will explain to them. The game of " kill "is a game played by fashionable young ladies entirely by the feet and features. The grand object is to allure young men to propose to them, just " for tho fun of throwing them over," and this is looked upon by society, as a useful nnd harmless way ibr young ladies to spend their time ; and so thought the Misse« Vicarage, and so much so that the eldest, a handsome, elegant girl, and one who played the game with great proficiency, managed by a dexterous display of her sparklin;/ eves and 2»etty ankles combined with an immoderate amount of small talk, to allure to the length of a proposal as many as nine young men in nearly that number of weeks; uhe is now an old muid, living in the country— restless, selfis/i, discontented. Her (sister, however, was more fortunate, for after living a life of single bliss for 41) years, she married her coachman and retired to America. What conclusion then, are we to come to, when wo seo such, or similar characters, every day pass before us in society 't Why this : that the greater part, at any rate, of the younger portion of society is made up of either the broken hearted, of which I hope and believe there are few, the wild and dissipated, or the empty-headed, flighty, fickle, fashionworshipping, pleasure-loving, eicite»ient-ieek-ing, young people; and who are we to blame ? The yeung people themselves ? Undoubtedly they are not free from it, but by far the greater portion of blame is to be laid at the door of society itself, and that very society, which, though ever ready to agitate meetings, excite congregations, build houses for poor unfortunate fallen humanity, is still unwilling, by its power, by its influence, to promote to encourage, to help to carry out that law, the observance of which, would not only do away with a vast amount of the vice and crime, of society itself, but also would check and prevent the occurrence of a fur greater amount of misery and wretchedness among their poorer fellow creatures, and thus would he done uway with the necessity for their self-applauded charily which they are so fond of trumpeting tu the world. Society is unwilling, I repeat, to observe itself, and despise* mikl looks down upon those that do observe that 1 iw ordained by God himself, and looked for by nature—(lie law of marriage. Uncle Tour. ,