ness,

6.

and attachment from the highest and holiest principle. This brings the loving couple to the throne of Grace, where the heavenly influence of Prayer is shed over the thoughts of the mind and the feelings of the heart. This enjoins mutual LOVE, CONFIDENCE, and ATTENTION, and a long train of lively graces belonging to wedlock's STRING OF PEARLS." This converts the little petty annoyances and vexations of life into aids to mutual devotion, proving them to be blessings in disguise. The pearl-oyster, by some mysterious secretion, converts the fretting grain of sand, that is forced within its shell, into a costly gem to adorn the neck of beauty. So RELIGION converts the little, irritating occurrences and trials of wedded life into pearls of priceless worth; so that each one's heart is richer for their existence.

66

The SCRIPTURES speak as follows upon the duties involved in the conjugal relation. To husbands the counsel is :"Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it, that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word, that he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish. So ought men to love their wives, as their own bodies. Let every one so love his wife even as himself." Husbands, love your wives, and be not bitter against them." "Ye husbands, give honor unto the wife, as unto the weaker vessel." To wives the Divine lesson is: "Wives submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church. Therefore, as the church is subject unto Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands, in "Let the wife see every thing." that she reverence her husband." This is God's HOUSEHOLD a charter of "womens' rights" as well as love and protection on the part of husband, and reverence and submission on the part of the wife. He

CHARTER

mens';

shall not stretch out over her the sceptre of a lordly master, nor must she crouch in servile obedience to be his slave. "Love and lordship like no fellowship." His shall be the rule of love, and her's the submission of the same confiding spirit. It is such a husband who deserves a wife. It is such "an obedient wife that commands her husband." Such are the leading duties involved in the conjugal relation a union all of whose thrilling destinies will not be opened to our view until we stand amid the solemn verities of the last great assize. There is meaning, then, deep and touching, in the sacred bonds of marriage. It is not all an irresponsible delight to make the plighted vow, to add another to earth's widely scattered homes, to become the constituted and united head of a family, and to train children that bloom like "olive plants" around the festive board. There is trial, discipline, and great responsibility here. Character, hopes and happiness are here involved. And the illustrations of this truth, all along the thoroughfares of life, are a swift witness against the inconsiderate and rash, who take a partner for life with as little sense of obligation, as they add an acre to their lands, or an article to their wardrobe.

YE WEDDED ONES! before the same altar where your connubial bands were tied, ponder the duties of this lifelong relation! Ye have made the vow to be one in interest and affection that ye may swell the number of happy HOMES, whose bright associations refresh the sinking heart of many a wanderer, and around whose altars concentre scenes such as the tongue of CICERO could not truthfully describe, or the brush of RAPHAEL paint. Ye are to make a HOME! green islet upon this sea of trouble," inviting the tossed and weary voyager of life to its crystal waters and ambrosial shades a sheltering refuge for the victim of misfortune, fleeing before the storm of adversity as a bird to its nest in the mountain-pine; a bright spot (than which earth has not

66

a

O,

a brighter) to the traveller in distant climes or the exile in lonely banishment, the earthly Bethlehem of his hopes. make it the nucleus around which a cluster of hearts, with hopes brighter than the burning seven of Pleiades, shall gather from their scattered pathways to take sweet counsel, and trim their lamps for the bridegroom's coming! Live ye as one together in all that appertains to love and duty, and your early friendship will grow and mingle with advancing years, as two trees, planted near each other, interlock their spreading branches and blend their foliage, as time rolls on.

THOU FAITHLESS HUSBAND! forgetful of the marriagevow, and looking down upon thy "second self," as the "weaker vessel" in an humbling sense, thou hast yet to learn that in much she is thy superior. In her keen perception, her common sense and sound judgment, in her refined taste and lasting fidelity, she excels thee by a lengthy stride. Thou hast more head than she, perhaps, but she hath the larger heart. Her strong affections live amid all thy coldness and neglect, as when first she became thy bride. More faithful and confiding she turns to thee with a trusting spirit when thy own base heart is treacherous as the sea. She loves on with the ardor of her early love through all the storms that gather on thy brow, and all the tempests that thunder on thy tongue, and all the alienations that rankle in thy heart. Yea, if drunkard were thy name, and thy visage blotched and ulcered till the human were wellnigh stricken out, and thy manliness were gone, and thy body sinking to decay, she would love thee still, and her warm affections would cling to thy wasting self like “ivy to the falling tower." Pattern of fidelity! Love's traitorless defender amid a wreck of hopes! Then, regard her not as the "weaker vessel in any inferiorsense. She was not "taken from thy head, to rule thee; nor from thy feet, to be trampled on and crushed; but from thy side, to be equal with thee; from beneath thine arm, to be protected; and near thy heart, to be beloved."

Protect her.

I repeat, love her. Confide in her. Think not she has too little sense to be consulted in thy business. Poor compliment to thee, if this be true, for a choice so wretched! What! have the world believe that you have chosen a fool for a partner? If not, love, cherish and honor her as thy "better half." Let the face of thy wife publish abroad thy conjugal fidelity; for it is a truthful saying, "observe the face of a wife to know the husband's character."

-

AND YE WIVES! sharers in the bliss or misery of married life; know ye for what these nuptial bands are tied? It is not that ye may flirt, or gad, or live at ease; but to counsel and comfort, reflect and toil to be a help-meet in seasons of prosperity or adversity to diminish trials and multiply joys. Listen to these quaint words of an eccentric counsellor. "There are three things which a good wife should resemble, and yet these three things she should not resemble. She should be like a town clock, keep good time and regularity she should not be like a town clock speak so loud that all the town may hear her. She should be like a snail prudent, and keep within her own house. She should not be like a snail, carry all she has upon her back. She should be like an echo-speak when spoken to. She should not be like an echo, determined always to have the last word." Practice upon the spirit of this advice, and let the wedded life be seasoned with love, cheerfulness and content, making the best of the little ills and vexations of the domestic circle, and ossibly the unfeeling, unloving husbands many not be so cruel after all. Let home be cheered by your smiles, and made joyous by the exercise of glad affections; let your husbands find in you confiding and unwavering spirits; let the duties of your respective spheres be discharged in good faith and cheerily; and HOME will be the spot dearer than all others to your toiling partners, hailed at the close of each wearisome day as the worn and jaded trav

eller hails the oasis of the desert. Take heed to your demeanor; for it hath been said that "a man's best fortune, or his worst, is his wife."

HUSBAND AND WIFE! To-day a thousand endearments may promise, long, long years of this chosen union. Not a brier may spring in your path, nor a cloud gather in your sky, nor a sorrow reign in your hearts. But to-morrow your cup of joy may lay dashed in scattered fragments at your feet. The tie that now unites you may be severed, and the grave close over your perished joys. Love, as ardent as yours, has been disappointed and crushed in a single hour. Hopes, fairer than the rose of Sharon, in the richness of early bloom, have been blasted by death. I have seen the youthful bride, the pride and flower of her sex, and the joy and crown of her devoted spouse, committed to the dust within a single year after she laid her young heart upon the altar of love. I have seen the young husband, in the glory of his growing manhood, and in the unabated. ardor of his "first love," fall as a flourishing cedar on the sides of Lebanon, and be no more. Thus the dearest relatives are unspared by the fell destroyer. Ponder the truth, and let it stimulate you to discharge with promptness your mutual obligations, that no regrets may wring the heart, when the loved object of your affection is consigned to the grave. Sad and bitter are those regrets that often rend the hearts of the living at the graves of the departed. The remembrance of some unkind word, some heartless neglect, some duty disregarded, often pierces the soul with many sorrows. Be watchful-be affectionate-be kind—be faithful — be

true.