Nor should any of us, who have been a little more favored with this world's goods, refuse to recognize good in those not possessed of equal possessions. I care not how tenderly the favored son of a wealthy home may have been reared; with what care and precision his mental and moral development may have been guarded and watched; what hopes may be centered in him: I will match his worth any hour of the day with a girl from a plainer home and of lesser advantages. "But her social position?" the proud mother asks. Social station? What is social station? So long as a girl is respectable, so long as she is good, so long as she is a loving, tender, and true woman, by what social standard can she be measured? What right have we to apply superficial standards to worth and character? What comparison can a social standard bear to the highest standard of morality, to good womanhood, to the best wifehood, to the truest conception of motherhood? Is the girl in an office less of a woman than the girl who rides in her carriage? Is she less capable of making a good wife? Why do we marry? To please society? To uphold social standards as false as they are mythical? False pride has made enough trouble in this world without letting it bring grief into our homes. Let the young men of this country be sufficiently broad-minded not to measure a girl by her surroundings, but to judge her for herself. True worth lasts longer and wears to the end. The loving heart of a good girl is better than all the wealth and social accomplishments which she can bring to a man. It is something that comes back to a man three hundred and sixty-five times in a year. We can get along with a little money in this world if we will; but love is a quality of which we can scarce have too much.
And when the conditions are reversed, and the young man's income or financial possessions are taken into account, the same general principle is true. There is not a more cruel standard by which to measure a young man than the position he is able to offer the girl of his choice. I am not an advocate of the "love-in-a-cottage" theory by any means; but I do believe in the good old-fashioned theory of a young couple starting out in the world with a moderate income, and then climbing upward together. I know this sounds visionary, and like the sort of reading we find in stories; but the truth is there just the same. I give it as my earnest conviction that a young girl will be far safer in the hands of a young man born of parents in moderate circumstances, honest in his principles, energetic and industrious, than she would with a young man who has known only the luxuries of life, and to whom work is an incidental matter rather than the aim and purpose of life. I do not care how poor a young man may be; if he has good health, sound principles, is respectful of sacred things, is temperate in his habits, and is not afraid to work, and work hard, and face the world with a determination to succeed, that young man can be trusted with the best and sweetest girl ever reared in an American home.