TO THOSE ABOUT TO MARRY.

New Zealand Mail, 24 September 1902, Page 27

TO THOSE ABOUT TO MARRY.

wiftv years ago. marriage was a much JfcUvart*n* event than it seems to ab the preseat time. Then it engifi many months of anxious prepara. Son One thing in which our forefathers were generally more wise than we seem to bo is that tney were more insistent upon an ample marriage setSment for the wife. Nowadays the tendency is to dispense with the marriage settlement. We do not refer to the wealthier classes who always make an adequate provision; nor do we. so much refer to the upper middle classes, though the tendency with them is chiefly to regard the income of the husband and to subordinate the provision made for the wife. Wo refer mostly to the lower middle classes, w ho since they cannot give their wives real estate or investments, often neglect to make any provision at all. To meot such cases as these, life _• insurance came into existence. By its aid a husband, for an annual premium, can render his wife’s position hardly loss secure than if he had endowed her with a separate estate. , The annual outlay to secure an ample protection is so small that all except th“ lowest classes can afford a policy adequate to their station in lite. But, unfortunately, the ohief consideration in marriage nowadays oentres upon the furnishing of the house and the adornment of the person. The simple tastes of fifty years ago have been educated by the aesthetic movement to the love of everything beautiful and expensive. 'A thousand and one amusements and superfluities absorb a husband's income. Tho summer holidav must bo taken, whatever duty is neglected. A regular weekly or monthly visit must be paid to the theatre or some other nlace of amusement to relieve the monotony of suburban life. These ex poises too often result in the husband remaining uninsured. The life insurance premium, small though it is, cannot be afforded. After all is said r. excuse, a man’s chief duty remains that he ought to,provide for his wife in case he should die. He takes her from a iiouso where perhaps she has k =o-.vn no want, or from a situation « herein she has long earned her own livj g and enjoyed a certain amolint of comfort, a husband has no moral rigln t-o expect her to sacrifice her indepen ’- nee without first ensuring that at his death slie will be provided for to the best of bis ability; that she will not tv V-ft to the world’s pity or to commence a struggle for existence for which marriage has probably unfitted her for both in body and inclination. It is not pertinent, therefore, for a man about to marry to argue—as so many argue— -t hat the expenses of marriage prohibit the expense of an insurance policy. The two things are not comparable. The life insurance policy is an absolute necessity. If a man cannot afford to insure he cannot really afford to marry. If anyone should think that these views arc strained, let him reflect what his position would be with regard to the marriago of his own merrv-hearted daughter. Would he suffer her to leave his home, of which she would be the life and soul, to marry a man who may one day die and leave her unprotected and penniless, to live a life of misery and Want? His opinions would coincide with ours. Ho would stipulate that before his daughter marries she must be provided for by a policy of insurance; he would think that tho man who dared tako her without first insuring was wanting in a sense of his responsibilities, not only in this hut in all other matters. He would be. Reverse tlie position, and when a man is about to marry, let him be iust and fair to another man’s 1 daughter, particularly as sho is the one he professes to regard beforo all the world. Besides, this insurance can be had at nn extra cost if a man will benefit himself in old age by taking an endowment policy.