“The primal marriage was founded on instinct—a purely animal attribute. As humanity developed and language grew, instinct became transformed into love. To-day with the great proportion of the human family, marriage has ceased to be a nature-guided compact between the sexes, and has become a sordid money-soiled, commercial venture. Men and women are taught from infancy, that one of the chief aims of life is to marry ‘well,’ not ‘wisely.’”—JOHN R. STEPHENSON. What shall the young wife expect to be to her husband? First his equal, but not his counterpart; his complement, not his synonym. As long as the world stands, woman must have her definite and specific work in it. So long as the home exists woman will be its recognized centre. A true woman would hardly care to exchange her delicate instinct, her deftness of finger, her versatile mind—which enables her to do the many little and great things in our everyday home-life equally well—her quick perception, her motherly all-aroundness, her sweet womanly loveliness, for any other marketable thing, or any other characteristic or capability attained by culture or training. A true woman is a woman, and she does not desire to be anything else, unless she can add it to her womanliness. If by force of circumstances she be driven out into the world to buy or sell, to scheme or plan for self or family support, she need not lose her womanly tenderness and attractiveness, nor need she barter these for a right to stand in any position which she can fill well and with propriety. She must needs, as she contemplates marriage, expect to be to the man she chooses, all that he lacks to make the two-in-one life a completed whole. If she have not the courage to attempt, and the purpose to accomplish this, she has no business to consider for a moment the marriage proposition. While similarity of tastes has much to do with happy mating, complementary accomplishments have also a large share in the true union of two lives. The woman must not only be desirous of knowing about her husband’s business, but should also seek to be capable of understanding and counselling in it. In perplexity, in trial, in prosperity, she should stand by his side, to advise, to comfort, to rejoice with him. There is a great deal of suggestiveness and significance in the estimate the Maker put upon the first wife created; namely, “an helpmeet for him,” that is, “suitable for him.” Nothing less than this should every woman be, if she is to fulfill the highest purpose of marriage.