Page:The Truth about Marriage.djvu/154

 begin. Each begins to see in the other faults that were never suspected.

Possibly politeness is forgotten and the real roughness of soul stands out in all its ugliness. Possibly life glides along smoothly and little attention is paid to the rocks.

But almost universally the joys of the honeymoon time disappear. Life becomes more or less commonplace and sometimes, as faults in one of the other develop, vexatious.

Now I have tried to picture fairly the course of many marriages. It is true, as my questioner says, that many a marriage that began with a flourish ends as a fiasco. It is also true that in many marriages, if actual conflicts and quarrels do not develop, a critical spirit does; and oftentimes the best that follows the honeymoon is a tame friendship, rather pale after the vivid honeymoon.

But the beautiful honeymoon ought to be a delightful portal to an even happier married life. That is the ideal. The joys of the honeymoon too often pall because they are apt to be so largely animal and mere animal delight must sooner or later come to an end.

What I am arguing to prove is that true marriage is not animal, but it is of the spirit. Because so many people entering marriage are animal in their