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Show ! Dorothy Dix Talks FOREWARNED IS FOREARMED Ky nOROTIIV !JlX. 'he- Work! 'a Inchest PnitJ Woman Writer ! t Little Mary Thompson has married that handaorao, lazy, no-nccount dissipated dis-sipated Smith boy, In npllc of the prayer, tears and ontraatlos of her father and raothor, nnd In the face of nil Hielr warnings that she was wreck-lag wreck-lag her life by choosing such a man for a husband. Arthur Jones has eloped with his mother's protty housemaid, and his jfc family, who had built all of their hopes jf and ambitions on him, arc hoartbrok-f hoartbrok-f on. h These are familiar bits of gossip I that we all thresh ovor every day of our lives. And wo always say what Idiots Mary and Arthur are, and pity f: tbelr poor parents wonder how such fool marriages ever come about. The parents say they don't know, that they never dreamed of such ai thing as Mary and Arthur marrying, I and that Heaven Is their witness that they did. and said, everything on earth that they could to prevent their poor, misguided children from making marriages mar-riages that any sane person could see was bound to end In disaster, but what can you do with a headstrong girl and boy who think they are In love? And the parents aro sincere In their protestations of guiltlessness. They I never suspect that they hnd any hand In making the matches that bring mis-cry mis-cry and probably divorce upon their children. They would bo horrified If you would charge them with ' being partlccps crlmlnls before the fact of almost every unsuitable marriage. Yet luis jn nouung muru, nor iuss, umn uiu soldemn truth. There is nothing In life moro curious cur-ious than the attitude that parents tnko towards their children's marriage. Theoretically, everybody knows that every boy and girl Is cut off of the same boll of humanity, and are of the sarao warp and woof. Also that certain cer-tain basic principles govern the relationship re-lationship between tho sexes. a Thero has been no chance in tho things that attract men and women to each othor since the law of nature was first laid down. A pretty face, an eye with a come-hither look in it, u winning win-ning way and a glib tonguo, tho strange and mysterious way of a man with a maid have always been and always will bo tho material out of which matches are made. Propinquity has also never failed to get in Its fatal work slnco Greatgrandfather-Adam popped tho question ques-tion to Grcat-grandmothor-Eve because be-cause they were thrown so much together to-gether in a lonely garden where they wore tho only two young people. All parents know these bromidic facts. More; they have experienced them In their own person, and yet they act as if their own children were entirely en-tirely different from all tho other children chil-dren of men, and therefore, not subject sub-ject to tho temptation to which any other girl and boy might yield. They take the position that while other young people's hearts may be made of highly inflammable tinder, their chlldrens' hearts aro coated in asbestos, and that while other young people may be foolisii ignorant of tho world, credulous and confiding, their own children are wise and farseeing, and of ripe and mnture judgment. Furthermore, they are convinced that their own children aro entiroly too young to think of marrying, although other people's children of the same age aro already married. Therefore, a father and mother see no harm in letting their children plaj around with all sorts of girls and boys whom thoy would never let them think of marrying. Thero 1b Billy Smith. Such a lovable lov-able kind of scrapegrace, but absolutely abso-lutely not worth the powdor and load It would take to kill him. Ncvor sticks to n Job two consecutive monthB at a time. Sits around home and strums a ukelclo while his poor old rnothor takes In boarders to support him. No particular harm in him but Just worthless, worth-less, tho kind of a man who will be a worse curse to his wife than an ener-1 getic porch ciimbor would be. But i nandsome as n picture, and wi..i a fascination fas-cination about him that makes everybody every-body have a surface liking for film, no matter how much they Inwardly despise de-spise him. Father and mother give bin uie n.n of their house. Ho is there morning, noon and night. He and Mary read together and dance together, and ho helps hor drive her can, lor he Is handy in all sorts of nonessential ways. Father Fa-ther and mother raise no objection because be-cause it seems to them that no girl could be fool enough to want to marry him, and then comes a day when ho and Mary appear before them hand in hand and tell them that they have decided de-cided to get married. Father and mother have fits all over the place, but it avails them nothing. Mary goes on and marries the man she has fallen In love with, but whom she never would have fallen in love association with such an undesirable partner. Perhaps father and mother aro conscientiously con-scientiously opposed to the marriage of cousins, but they invite a beautiful and alluring young girl to come and make her home with them. Their son Is thrown continually In her society in a dangerous intimacy that gives her all the right to the tenderness and familiarity a man bestows on his sister, sis-ter, yet with tho added olement of sex attraction in It. Son and cousin go about unchaper-oned. unchaper-oned. Cousin pours son's coffee for him in the morning and dimples at him across the breakfast table. Cousin Cou-sin notices when son come home tired at night, fetches a pillow for his head and "poor things" him. Son begins to think how dreadful it would be if he didn't have cousin always across tho breakfast table, and cousin feels that life would bo empty without him to do things for, so they announced to tho scandalized parents that they are go Ing to be married. And the scandalized parents say they never thought of such a thing when they brought tho girl to livo there. Why didn't thoy? They have brought two young people together in the most favorable situation for lovemaklng that human ingenuity can suggest. Practically Prac-tically any woman who is not a hunch back can win any man If she can get him at close range. Cortainly any woman can Imagine herself in love with any man whose physical comfort she looks out for. Put two people of opposite sex together in the same house, and you inevitably set them to thinking of having a homo of their own. They become a habit and a necessity ne-cessity to each other, and that is the strongest bond that nature can forge. If parents wish to prevent unsuitable unsuit-able marriages of their children they will have to learn to lock the stable door beforo the horse is stolon, not wait until after the horse is gone. Then it is too late. The only way to break up an undesirable match is to 1 keep young people from falling in love with the wrong people. Fathers and mothers should look upon every young man who comes to their house as a possible husband for their daughters, and every young woman wo-man their sons know as a potential wife. Parents should lot no young man visit rogularly at their house, whom they would not be willing to see Marry or Sallle marry, if Marry or Sallie should desiro. Whenever a young man begins to hang around Man' or Sadie with any degree of steadiness, it is father's bounden duty to hunt up his record and find out whether he would make a welcomo son-in-law or not, not to wait until Mary or Sadie has fallen in love with him before he ascertains what sort of a chap he is. It is not so easy to safeguard a boy's matrimonial happiness as it is a girl's, but no woman who has a grain of sense in hor head should ever have a pretty servant girl, or a pretty nursery nur-sery governess, or take a protty relative rela-tive to stay in her house without she is willing to welcomo that pretty girl into tho family circle. For it is on the cards that she will have to do it, whether whe-ther she desires to or not. Nowhere else in the world is there so much truth in the old adage that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure as there is In matrimony. |