Marriage Securities.

1. Seek Each Other's Happiness.—A selfish marriage that seeks only its own happiness defeats itself. Happiness is a fire that will not burn long on one stick.

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2. Do Not Marry Suddenly.—It can always be done till it is done, if it is a proper thing to do.

3. Marry in Your Own Grade in Society.—It is painful to be always apologizing for any one. It is more painful to be apologized for.

4. Do Not Marry Downward.—It is hard enough to advance in the quality of life without being loaded with clay heavier than your own. It will be sufficiently difficult to keep your children up to your best level without having to correct a bias in their blood.

5. Do Not Sell Yourself.—It matters not whether the price be money or position.

6. Do Not Throw Yourself Away.—You will not receive too much, even if you are paid full price.

7. Seek the Advice of Your Parents.—Your parents are your best friends. They will make more sacrifice for you than any other mortals. They are elevated above selfishness concerning you. If they differ from you concerning your choice, it is because they must.

8. Do Not Marry to Please Any Third Party.—You must do the living and enduring.

9. Do Not Marry to Spite Anybody.—It would add wretchedness to folly.

10. Do Not Marry Because Someone Else May Seek the Same Hand.—One glove may not fit all hands equally well.

11. Do Not Marry to Get Rid of Anybody.—The coward who shot himself to escape from being drafted was insane.

12. Do Not Marry Merely for the Impulse of Love.—Love is a principle as well as an emotion. So far as it is a sentiment it is a blind guide. It does not wait to test the presence of exalted character in its object before breaking out into a flame. Shavings make a hot fire, but hard coal is better for the Winter.

13. Do Not Marry Without Love.—A body without a soul soon becomes offensive.

14. Test Carefully the Effect of Protracted Association.—If familiarity breeds contempt before marriage it will afterward.

15. Test Carefully the Effect of Protracted Separation.—True love will defy both time and space.

16. Consider Carefully the right of your children under the laws of heredity. It is doubtful whether you have a right to increase the number of invalids and cripples.

17. Do Not Marry Simply Because You Have Promised to Do So.—If a seam opens between you now it will widen into a gulf. It is less offensive to retract a mistaken promise than to perjure your soul before the altar. Your intended spouse has a right to absolute integrity.