e herself chiefly. We take
it that the great majority of women marry the men that they choose. If
they do not do so, they should do so. They may have been unwise and vain
enough to have been pleased and tickled by the flattery of a fool. When
they have married him, they find him, as Dr. Gregory wrote to his
daughters, "the most intractable of husbands; led by his passions and
caprices, and incapable of hearing the voice of reason." A woman's
vanity may be hurt when she finds that she has a husband for whom she
has to blush and tremble every time he opens his lips. She may be
annoyed at his clownish jealousy, his mulish obstinacy, his incapability
of being managed, led, or driven; but she must reflect that there was a
time when a little wisdom and reflection on her own part would have
prevented her from delivering her heart and her person to so unworthy a
creature.

Women who have wicked husbands are much more to be pitied: In early life
the wives themselves are innocent; and, from the nature of things, their
innocence is based upon ignorance. Here the value of the almost
intuitive wisdom and perception of the gentler sex comes into full play.
During courtship, when this perception is in its full power and vigor,
it should be freely exercised. Scandal and common report, in themselves
to be avoided, are useful in this.

Women should choose men of character and of unspotted name. It is a very
old and true remark--but one may as well repeat what is old and trite
when that which is new would be but feeble repetition at the best--that
a good son generally makes a good husband; a wise companion in a walk
may turn out a judicious companion through life. The wild attempt to
reform a rake, or to marry a man of a "gay" life, in the hope that he
will sow "his wild oats," is always dangerous, and should never be
attempted. A woman who has a sense of religion herself should never
attach herself to a man who has none. The choice of a husband is really
of the greatest consequence to human happiness, and should never be made
without the greatest care and circumspection. No sudden caprice, no
effect of coquetry, no sally of passion, should be dignified by the name
of love. "Marriage," says the apostle, "is honorable in all;"' but the
kind of marriage which is so is that which is based upon genuine love,
not upon fancy or caprice; which is founded on the inclination of
nature, on honorable views, cemented by a similarity of tastes, and