THE SCIENCE OF HAPPINESS 



marital happiness depends more upon the permanency 

 than upon the intensity of mutual affection. 



That union is not a true success in which the lovers 

 do not feel, after say fifteen or twenty years of wedded 

 association, vastly more of mutual dependence, mutual 

 confidence, mutual love in the broadest and best sense 

 of the word, than they felt when they went to the mar- 

 riage altar. For now, after these years of association, 

 it is no longer true that for each of these associates 

 there are many affinities of equal value. Now it has 

 come to pass that the years of mutual dependence have 

 so welded and blended the two natures into mutual har- 

 mony that each is the one and best affinity for the other 

 among all the multitudes. Now is the dream of 

 the idealist, the vision of the romancer, justified. 

 Now may we with reason speak of the two lovers as 

 having each for the other an affinity that is all-com- 

 passing, all compelling, and upon the continued fruition 

 of which the best chance for happiness of the two lives 

 surely depends. 



But he who would attain this consummation must 

 understand that the time for the use of mature and 

 sober judgment does not end with the final selection of 

 a helpmate. The die is not necessarily cast beyond 

 recall for good or ill when the marriage ceremony has 

 been consummated. There is nothing even in the wisest 

 selection that insures against possible conjugal disas- 

 ter; and, on the other hand, there may be elements of 

 possible success even in a very unwise choice. In 

 either case, very much depends upon the environing 



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