It would be natural to suppose that the churches would give the subject special attention, the world’s morality being more dependent upon proper marriage than all other influences combined, religion itself not excepted. Well, the church does something in this direction. It does a great deal, but not one-thousandth part of what is necessary. A pastor of no matter what denomination gladly welcomes the opportunity, which, nevertheless, is seldom made by himself, to urge upon young people the seriousness of the marriage relation, the necessity of affection, constancy and forbearance, and to show them to the best of his ability glowing pictures of the final results of conjugal faithfulness. But constant warnings, such as are given against a great many sins of less serious influence upon the world, are seldom heard in churches. Homilies on the subject of marriage are ordered by some denominations to be delivered once in three months. If they were heard once in three days their injunctions would be none too frequent for the necessities of the great mass of people who are most interested in the marriage relation, or, at least, most curious about it. A happy wife, happy during and after half a lifetime spent in wedlock which did not escape the usual number of family troubles and sorrows, said once to me that the trouble with marriage was that conjugal impulse and conjugal sense were the scarcest faculties of the feminine nature. I would not dare quote this if it were not said by a woman instead of a man. Desiring at times to raise expectant brides to the highest sense of their coming responsibilities and privileges, but reluctant to put her own heart upon her sleeve, she tried to find something in print to give them by way of counsel and admonition, but she did not succeed. Novels about love and marriage can be found by the thousands. How many of them are of any value at all for purposes of instruction and forewarning? I leave the answer to women who most read novels. From those who are mothers I have never been able to obtain the names of a half dozen. There seems to be such a thing as inheritance by sex. Woman was for thousands of years the slave or the plaything of man, and she is unconsciously but terribly avenging herself for the wrongs done her by the ruder sex. The best she could hope for in earlier days, the best that many of her sex now dare hope for, is home, protection and kind treatment. The kindness may be that the man shows to his horse or his dog, perhaps to his friend, but the fact that the woman is to be legally his equal, the appreciation of this, is as rare as the resolve of the woman herself to make herself equal to the position.