150 PLAIN FACTS FOR OLD AND YOUNG 



by different nations for the entrance of the married 

 state. The degenerating Romans fixed the ages of 

 legal marriage at thirteen for females, and fifteen for 

 males. The Grecian legislator, Lycurgus, placed the 

 ages at seventeen for the female, and thirty-seven for 

 the male. Plato fixed the ages at twenty and thirty 

 years. In Prussia, the respective ages are fifteen and 

 nineteen; in Austria, sixteen and twenty; in France, 

 sixteen and eighteen, respectively. 



Says Mayer, "In general, it may be established 

 that the normal epoch for marriage is the twentieth 

 year for women, and the twenty-fourth for men.'* 



Application of the Law of Heredity,— A mo- 

 ment's consideration of the physiology of heredity will 

 disclose a sufficient reason why marriage should be 

 deferred until the development of the body is wholly 

 complete. The matrimonial relation implies repro- 

 duction. Reproduction is effected through the union 

 of the ovum with the zoosperm. These elements, as 

 we have already seen, are complete representatives of 

 the individuals producing them. The perfection of 

 the new being, then, must be largely dependent on the 

 integrity and perfection of the sexual elements. If 

 the body is still incomplete, the reproductive elements 

 must also be incomplete; and, in consequence, the 

 progeny must be equally immature. 



Early Marriage.— The preceding paragraph con- 

 tains a sufficient reason for condemning early mar- 

 riage; that is, marriage before the ages mentioned. 

 It is probable that even the ages of twenty and twenty- 

 four are too early for those persons whose develop- 

 ment is uncommonly slow. But there are other cogent 

 reasons for discountenancing early marriages, also 

 drawn from the physiology of reproduction, to say 



