few of these crossing elements
would be averted by less prolonged engagements. There are those, I am
aware, who maintain that early and long continued engagements are
desirable. Applied to those cases where the parties reside near one
another, and are placed under similar influences, this doctrine may be
true. The earliest attachments are sometimes most happy and permanent.
But how often does it occur, that the condition and character of two
individuals become completely changed, in a few short years. Suppose a
young man to leave a farm, and take up his abode in a city, as a
merchant, or to commence a course of study with a view to a liberal
profession. The girl, who, as a child, won his affections, has not, as a
young woman, improved in her tastes, and character, like himself. His
choice of a companion, if now to be made, would fall on one quite unlike
her. There is something of this evil often attendant on protracted
engagements. The affections may be biased by enlarged intercourse with
the world. There are innumerable perils that beset a long acquaintance
of this nature. The safe avoiding of them all comes usually from short
engagements, from those in which the character and tastes of the parties
are much the same at marriage as at the moment of the first decided
intimacy.

There is one topic more which I cannot pass over in this connection. It
is that of Spiritual Sympathy. How many are there, who never exchange
one thought or feeling upon religion, until after their marriage. It is
not until they are constrained to do it, in the bitterness of
bereavement perhaps, that they communicate with one another on this
momentous subject. Were it not wiser to weave a chaplet early, to their
joint remembrance of Christ, rather than hang the first consecrated
wreath on the tomb? How would it assuage their mingling tears, could
they sorrow, "not as those without hope," but in the long cherished
spirit of a common faith and submission. They are musing on future joys.
With what heightened charms and new anticipations would they enter the
marriage state, if they had pledged their united hearts, before the
Eternal One. They would then feel, that the bond which joined them was
not one of a few fleeting years, but imperishable as their cemented
souls. Shall they, can they, maintain a midnight silence upon all
Heavenly themes, until "the evil days" overtake them?

Chapter XIII.

TRIALS OF WOMAN; AND HER SOLACE.

An ancient