154 PLAIN FACTS FOR OLD AND YOUNG 



born of sensual parents, beastly debauchees. A few 

 generations of such a degenerating process would 

 either exterminate the race, or drive it back to Dar- 

 win's ancestral ape. 



It must not be inferred from our strictures upon the 

 theory mentioned, that we would advocate the oppo- 

 site course, that is, the contraction of marriage by indi- 

 viduals of wholly dissimilar tastes, aims, and tempera- 

 ments. Such alliances would doubtless be quite as 

 wretched in their results as those of an opposite char- 

 acter. It is with this as with nearly all other subjects ; 

 the true course lies between the two extremes. Parties 

 who are negotiating a life partnership should be care- 

 ful to assure themselves that there exists a sufficient 

 degree of congeniality of temperament to make such 

 close and continued association agreeable. 



Disparity of Age.— Both nature and custom seem 

 to indicate that the husband should be a little older than 

 the wife. Several reasons might be given for this, 

 but we need not mention them. When, however, the 

 difference of ages reaches such an extreme as thirty, 

 forty, even fifty or more years, nature is abused, good 

 taste is offended, and even morality is shocked. Ill- 

 sorted alliances are disastrous to both parties, and 

 scarcely more to one than the other. 



Unions of an opposite character to those just con- 

 sidered, wherein a young man marries a woman much 

 older than himself, are more rare than those of the 

 other class. They are, perhaps, less deplorable in 

 their physical effects, but still highly reprehensible. 

 They are seldom i^rompted by pure motives, and can 

 be productive of no good. Children resulting from 

 such unions are notably weak, unbalanced, and sorry 

 specimens of humanity. 



