Time and tide, which come to all once in our lives, as the poet
says, and which must be taken at their flood to lead to fortune,
came at length to Amelie de Repentigny.
It came suddenly and in an unlooked-for hour, the great question of
questions to her as to every woman.
The hour of birth and the hour of death are in God's hand, but the
hour when a woman, yielding to the strong enfolding arm of a man who
loves her, falters forth an avowal of her love, and plights her
troth, and vows to be one with him till death, God leaves that
question to be decided by her own heart. His blessing rests upon
her choice, if pure love guides and reason enlightens affection.
His curse infallibly follows every faithless pledge where no heart
is, every union that is not the marriage of love and truth. These
alone can be married, and where these are absent there is no
marriage at all in the face of Heaven, and but the simulation of one
on earth, an unequal yoking, which, if man will not sunder, God will
at last, where there is neither marriage nor giving in marriage, but
all are as his angels.
Pages:
556
557
558
559
560
561
562
563
564
565
566
567
568
569
570
571
572
573
574
575
576
577
578
579
580