salliance_ on a girl is still worse. In the
first place, it ought to be so; for she has to sin against the natural
instinct of a good woman, which is always to marry above herself, an
instinct which is, both physiologically and socially, noble. For a
woman is less than a woman who does not consider the consequence of
marriage, and provide in every way possible to her the best father for
her offspring. And if she marries beneath herself socially, the almost
certain presumption is that the social status of her husband is the
measure of his intellectual abilities, and of his personal refinement
also. And when a woman considers herself only in her marriage, and has
no care for the circumstances to which she may doom her unborn
children, she is an incarnation of animal selfishness.

Without stopping to analyze the sources of its disapproval, this is
undoubtedly an instinctive motive for the persistent cold shouldering
which society gives girls who degrade themselves by a _mesalliance_.
It is obvious to every one that she has sinned against herself, her
family, her class, and the highest instincts of her sex. Women have
no pardon for such sinners; for they see not only the present wrong,
they look forward also to the possible children of such a union. They
understand that they will have to suffer all the limitations of
poverty when they ought to have had all the advantages of wealth. They
may possibly inherit their father's vulgar tastes and tendencies, or
they may have to endure the misery of fine tastes without any
opportunity to gratify them. For this premeditated sin against
motherhood and against posterity, good women find it hard to tolerate
the offender; for they know that a woman's honor is in her husband,
and that her social station and her social life is determined by his.

When a girl is guilty of a _mesalliance_, it is sometimes said in
extenuation that "she has married a man of noble disposition; and it
is better to marry a poor, ignorant man, with a noble disposition,
than a rich man who is selfish and vicious." If the alternative was a
positive one, yes, but there is no need to make a choice between these
characters. Men of refined habits and manners and good education may
also have noble dispositions; and poor, ill-bred men have not always
noble ones; at any rate, a good woman will always find in her own
class just as good men as she will find in a class below her own.

All this danger is evident to parents.