There is much that may be said in favor, and much in disproval, of these several views. The great uprising of our own people, both North and South, during the late civil conflict, the long and patient endurance they exhibited, and the innumerable feats of great personal valor that they performed, sufficiently prove that early marriages, which are common in this country, and a national devotion for many years to the arts of peace, do not necessarily deprive a race of its most vigorous manhood. In our own instance, the conflict over, and the best blood of the country spilled, we were yet ready, if need had been, to defend our rights against the world. As for becoming overstocked, there is for us no danger of this for many long years to come. Our fertile prairies, and the long reaches of arable land lying between the mountain ranges of the far West, are destined to cradle untold millions; and if to these we add the parched but still irrigable plains of the extreme Southwest, we see that our country is still in its infancy. If older nations had but followed the example of the Irish, the English, and the modern Jews, all over-crowding would be more than met by emigration, the peaceful transfer of colonists meeting the exigencies of the case far better than the former eruptions of northern hordes, thinned by disease, famine, and the sword. Is it said, that contrary to the doctrines of physiologists and to the precepts of Scripture, a purely ascetic life is the only normal one? Acton has adverted to the fact, as he calls it, “that the intellectual qualities are usually in an inverse ratio to the sexual appetites. It would almost seem,” he continues, “as if the two were incompatible; the exercise of the one annihilating the other.”[29] With Thales, he would reply to those who ask when men should love, “A young man, not yet—an old man, not at all;” and he styles Lord Bacon the still wiser Englishman, quoting from him the following passages: “You may observe that amongst all the great and worthy persons whereof the memory remaineth, either ancient or recent, there is not one who hath been transported to the mad degree of love; which shows that great spirits and great business do keep out this weak passion. By how much more ought men to beware of this passion, which loseth not only other things, but itself. He that hath preferred Helena hath quitted the gifts of Juno and Pallas, for whosoever esteemeth too much of amorous affection quitteth both riches and wisdom. They do best who, if they cannot but admit love, yet make it keep quarter, and sever it wholly from their serious affairs and actions of life; for if it check once with business, it troubleth men’s fortunes, and maketh men that they can be no ways true to their own ends.”