e
street. It is always a mistake to talk too much. Words are poison when
silence is golden. You cannot make a mistake by leaving the husband
alone if he is at fault. Time is a wonderful physician; she will heal
almost any wound. Your tact, your silence, your seeming fear (in other
words, your method "of going about it in the right spirit and in the
right way"), and an opportunity to think it over, will make him ashamed
of himself. He will want to crawl back into your good graces and the
lesson will be a long remembered one to him,--if, and this is
tremendously important--the wife does not glory in her triumph and nag
him about it. The temptation to err is great and there are few young
wives who can resist it. Keep silent, however. Don't refer to it and you
will win more than you know. Blessed is she who can forget what is not
worth remembering.
You will have averted the first quarrel and, inasmuch as the "first
quarrel" is an historic event in every married woman's experience, it
may be worthy of a little further consideration.
THE FIRST QUARREL.--Some women become weak in a crisis and spoil their
own chances of success, despite the fact that circumstances may have
been working in their favor. Some women meet a crisis bravely and do
exactly the right thing at the right time but falter and fail after the
crisis has passed. Take, for example, the incident we have just
narrated. When a husband brings into the home a sample of his real self,
for the first time, it is not really an unexpected event, though it may
be an unpleasant shock to the young wife; and she must not render it an
important incident by mismanagement. Nevertheless, it is in itself a
momentous occasion, and it may prove to be the moment of destiny. The
spirit of the lover has been the dominant spirit so far, the atmosphere
of the honeymoon has continued, there has been no friction, no quarrel.
To-night the husband has carried a business _grouch_ into the home, his
militant impulses are just below the surface, the slightest unfortunate
word, the least lack of tact, a failure to "sense" the situation
correctly, will explode the mine and wreck a dream. Deep down in the
man's heart he does not want a quarrel but the brute in him will fight
if the environment invites it. It takes two to quarrel. Silence on the
part of the wife, therefore, is the only solution of the problem. If the
first quarrel never takes place the second will never have to be
dreaded. Sil
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