The young husband may imagine that he only takes a wife to add to his own felicity; taking no account of the possibility of meeting a disposition and temper which may, without caution, mar and blight his own. Women are not angels, although in their ministrations they make a near approach to them. Women, no more than men, are free from human infirmities; the newly-married man must therefore calculate upon the necessity of amendment in his wife as well as of that necessity in himself. The process, however, as well as the result of the process, will yield a rich reward. At a minister's festival meeting "Our Wives" was one of the toasts. One of the brethren, whose wife had a temper of her own, on being sportively asked if he would drink it, exclaimed, "Aye, heartily; Mine brings me to my knees in prayer a dizzen times a day, an' nane o' you can say the same o' yours." If even bad matrimonial bargains have so much influence in disciplining character, how much more may be learned from a happy marriage! Without it a man or woman is "Scarce half made up." The enjoyments of celibacy, whatever they may be, are narrow in their range, and belong to only a portion of our nature; and whatever the excellences of the bachelor's character, he can never attain to a perfected manhood so long as such a large and important part of his nature as the affections for the gratification of which marriage provides, is unexercised and undeveloped. There are in his nature latent capabilities, both of enjoyment and affection, which find no expression. He is lacking in moral symmetry. The motives from which he keeps himself free from marriage responsibilities may be worthy of the highest respect, but this does not hinder his character from being less disciplined than it might have been. "For indeed I know Of no more subtle master under heaven Than is the maiden passion for a maid, Not only to keep down the base in man, But teach high thoughts and amiable words, And love of truth, and all that makes a man." On both sides marriage brings into play some of the purest and loftiest feelings of which our nature is capable. The feeling of identity of interest implied in the marriage relation--the mutual confidence which is the natural result--the tender, chivalrous regard of the husband for his wife as one who has given herself to him--the devotion and respect of the wife for the husband as one to whom she has given herself--their mutual love attracted first by the qualities seen or imagined by each in the other, and afterwards strengthened by the consciousness of being that object's best beloved--these feelings exert a purifying, refining, elevating influence, and are more akin to the religious than any other feelings. Love, like all things here, is education. It renders us wise by expanding the soul and stimulating the mental powers.