LETTER TO A YOUNG MAN.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume VIII, Issue 39, 26 September 1891, Page 413

LETTER TO A YOUNG MAN.

My Dear Esslemont, —I only returned from Neversuch this afternoon, and found your note awaiting me at the Club, where I had unfortunately omitted to leave instructions for forwarding letters in my absence. lam not in any way surprised to hear that you are in love, and, indeed, this is a complaint that all healthy young men of your age should be chronically troubled with—teething in childhood, love in youth, indigestion in middle life, and gout for old age. But why connect your present attack unnecessarily with matrimony? Marriage and suicide are, I admit, equally infallible cures for the disease ; but then are these remedies not somewhat too complete in their operation ? What is it that principally attracts yon towards Miss S ? Her beauty ?—that is evanescent. Her character ? —it needs verification. Her individuality ?—a quality much apt to become troublesome later. There are psychcial periods when every woman not absolutely repulsive is more or less attractive to individual members of the other sex. There are other periods also when the imagination is less ecstatic, and the judgment more temperate. Fascinating women are exceedingly plentiful, and you cannot possibly, of course, contrive to marry them all. Pause, then, before you make a definite choice. Young ladies nowadays—in our particular sphere of life—regard marriage purely as a profession. All their attractions are artistically suggested previous to the legal ratification of the contract, and it is only afterwards that the blemishes are geneially revealed. Subdued love, active respect, and mutual consideration are the three ideal ingredients of happy married life. 1 invariably suspect ardent admiration—it is a passion, and therefore transient. You may flirt persistently, but with average good fortune you can only marry once. A good wife is the best gift the Fates can bestow ; but a young man like yourself, with wealth, title, and leisure cannot reasonably expect such a privilege. You are too desirable not to be deceived. Besides, the very conditions of your life are sufficient to demoralise even the very best of

women. Continual frivolity, constant glorification, no interest but that of the pursuit of pleasure, praise, and popularity. Do you not perceive that these things are inconsistent with the happiness of home ? They depend exclusively on external circumstances, and, therefore, the very instant you and your wife retire into private life you must necessarily become the hopeless victims of ennui. To be happy in matrimony your mutual interests should be centred at home and not abroad, and this is a condition which the luxury of your surroundings does not permit of. Of Miss S I admit I know but very little. She is pretty, apparently amiable, and chatters and chaffs much as other girls do of her age and social sphere. That she is occupied in trying to secure, not only a husband, but, commercially speaking, a substantial one, there cannot be any question for doubt whatever. Nor can it either be denied that you would precisely be—also from a commercial point of view—the kind of husband most adapted to her taste. But balance well the happiness you anticipate in the near future with the possibility of annoyances ata period a little more remote. fou will give her a permanent and prominent position in life, and you will also secure for her the enjoyment of innumerable luxuries Will she eventually utilise your wealth to attract the envy of other women, and even the admiration of other men? Will not the position which you may give her be in itself an almost incessant source of temptation ? Will not the inevitable abatement in your active affection after marriage, in her experience, increase the pressure of this temptation? It is, I presume, in my capacity of a man of the world that you seek my advice. Well, then, I warn you seriously to consider both carefully and judiciously before you take so definite a step. All is not gold that glitters, and every woman we love is not necessarily lovable ; indeed, but too

often it is our own disordered imagination that endows them with those identical qualities which we most particularly admire. Experience daily teaches me that if it is good for poor men to marry, it is infinitely better for rich men to remain single. A poor man can only secure love in his youth—a rich man may purchase it whenever he so pleases.— Truth.