SHOULD EARLY ENGAGEMENTS BE PERMITTED?

Star (Christchurch), Issue 5698, 17 October 1896, Page 3

SHOULD EARLY ENGAGEMENTS BE PERMITTED?

(Tit Bits.) The question as to the advisability of allowing a young couple to become engaged, -when there is no prospect of their .being in a position to marry for some years, is one which is often put to me, said a clergyman to the writer of this article, and one which I usually answer in the affirmative. Of the reasons why I believe in early engagements, the chief one is the influence which such a contract will have on the lives of the young people, just at the time, 00, when their characters are forming, and when it is most necessary to mingle with the natural giddiness of youth a little of the seriousness of life. On the man especially, such an influence will have great effect, for it provides the necessary object, the something to hope and work for, to attain which he will exert himself to the utmost. With some natures the thirst for fame or riches is sufficient to bring out the best that is in them ; but in the majority, a knowledge that they are working for the girl they love is a stronger incentive than any other. I have had several instances in my own parish, and in one case it was very noticeable. The young man was a clerk in his fathers' business, and though steady and careful with his work, yet showed such a lack of enterprise or interest in it, that his father despaired of his ever becoming fit to ■take entire control of the firm. Some six months after I became acquainted with liirn, however, the youth fell in love. The parents of the young lady consented to the engagement, and, in addition, promised that when his father gavo him a partnership, they should be married. The effect was almost magical : the youth, during the succeeding twelve months, developed unsuspected ability, and showed such capacity and energy for business, that his delighted parent made him a partner at the end of that period, thus enabling the happy • lonple to become united much sooner than they had dared to expect. The husband is now one of the leading men in his native town, and is expected to stand for Parliament at the next election. Occasionally it happens that while allowing the young people to meet as usual, the parents of the lady refuse to permit uny definite engagement, until the prospects of the lover are materially improved. This, I i-venbtfei^uißkxisiwTOi^rfo^in^iievcasft,

of a young man, it is from the very fact that his sweetheart already belongs to him in a sense, that most of his energy is derived. I Disappointment in a love affair works | sad havoc in the life of anyone possessed of an excitable temperament, as the following incident, confided to me by the chief actor in it, shows. A young man, of good position, having fallen in love, applied to the lady's father for his consent to the engagement. The latter gentleman, however, having heard rumours that the suitor was in the habit of associating with a rather wild set, ordered him out of the house, and forbade his daughter to think of him. The result was that the youth, who had been weak rather than really vicious, went to the bad utterly, from sheer despair. Had the engagement been sanctioned, how different might that man's life have become, with the influence of the . girl he loved to help him. Of course, this is an extreme case, but others have come under my notice where a like repulse has brought about almost as bitter an ending. I have frequently heard it uirged as an argument against early engagements that young people do not know their own minds ; but, in my opinion, this objection would be better used in favour of the question, for, surely, the closer association which the engagement permits, extended over two or perhaps three years, is the best possible test as to the suitability of the couple to go through life together.