The Husband

"Life's Stages: Their Duties and Opportunities." By James Stark; Minister of Belmont Congregational Church. Aberdeen: 1889.

(1.)  THE HUSBAND

(1a.) The Bible has much to say on what a man owes to woman and woman to man in the sacred relationship of marriage. That was to be expected, seeing that the Bible deals with life; the closest and most binding tie that can be made on earth was bound to receive its attention. The minister who touches on such a subject is doing no more than the text book which he professes to follow requires. He surely cannot pretend to be wiser than what he finds Scripture to be, and if he ignores such a topic on the ground of its delicacy, safely and timidly contenting himself with vague generalities and doctrinal abstractions, he is avoiding a duty because of its difficulty. The utility and safety of the pulpit are assured if it keep as close to life as the Bible does, not shunning to declare the whole counsel of God. The pulpit often removes itself too much from the “business and bosoms” of men, to its own great detriment as well as that of the world. The topics from which it should studiously hold aloof are the lighter and more superficial things of life. All that is of deepest moment to man belongs to its sphere. The whole moral basis of life is its domain. Where human duty lies the pulpit should take its stand.

(1b.) All things being equal, and all conditions favourable, is the married state best for man? No: Paul says, or seems to say. What does he say? “For I would that all men were even as myself. I say, therefore, to the unmarried and widows, it is good for them if they abide as I.” (Paul evidently was unmarried, or, as some think, a widower.) But before pronouncing the Apostle Paul to be an ascetic, an advocate of celibacy, notice what he says further on in the same chapter. “I suppose, therefore, that this is good for the present distress,” or as you have it in marginal note, “necessity.” The Apostle is grounding his advice upon expediency. The discouragement he offers to marriage is not absolute, but relative. At the time and in the circumstances, when persecution was raging and persons were liable to be torn from their homes, when society was in a state of upheaval and confusion, and the urgency of Gospel preachers who were free to go from place to place, untrammeled, undistracted by domestic ties, was clamant, marriage was not the best possible state for those who wished to occupy the high places of the field. And while Christian monks of all ages have utterly distorted the teaching of Paul by exalting celibacy above marriage as a more holy and glorious state, yet there can be no doubt that even monasteries, in certain stages of the world’s history, were helpful, at least in their early days, to the progress of Christianity.

(1c.) Exceptional reasons still hold their sway, pointing to a conclusion in certain cases such as Paul urged. There are instances known to most of us when a man’s life lies outside of marriage for reasons which do him honour. Like Paul whose towering nature lifted him above those supports and solaces which most natures crave and need, there are some who have consecrated their time and energies to some public object which puts the conditions of home life beyond reach. Such self-denying and heroic lives have their reward. Missionaries and other beneficent pioneers, like William Chalmers Burns of China, make a path for themselves which they must tread alone; though, speaking generally, even of missionaries, the presentation of pure Christian family life is a very important part of their testimony and teaching.

(1d.) Aged and dependent parents, obligations incurred by earlier and equally strong ties, sometimes render marriage impossible. There are sacrifices placed upon the altar of duty, the flame and smoke of which are not visible to any eye save the Divine one. There are tragedies enacted in private life, the report of which never reaches the newspapers. Feeling are stifled, innocent desires and legitimate hopes and fond visions which would, when realized, make them as most other men are, are thrust aside, because such persons are at the expense of keeping a sensitive and scrupulous conscience. Also, and those are not always the natures least worthy of esteem, there are those whose wounded sentiment at an early period of life gave a recoil which lapse of years cannot overcome, the wound healing but a scar remaining.

(1e.) Prudence restrains many. No one has any right to enter upon the married state until he sees his way clear to be the breads-winner of more than one. Pride, however, it must be owned, is occasionally a restraining factor, as well as prudence. In the middle-class society this often operates most injuriously. Certainly, premature marriages are mischievous. It is generally admitted by those who have a right to give judgment, that a man is better to be nearer thirty than twenty years of age before taking this step. But the man who has as his only reason for not being married, his desire to begin domestic life in a style such as the parents on both sides are living in, is the victim of a pride and worldliness and vain ambition most contemptible to behold. The woman who is not willing to begin married life in a humbler way than her father is able to afford to keep her after years of toil and progress, is not worthy to be the wife of a young man of any self-respect. What folly that those who are beginning life should expect to be as those who have earned a little comfort and splendor of life by years of steady industry. Youth with its abounding energy, freshness, and buoyancy, should not be so dependent upon such things, and should not be such a devoted worshiper of mammon and fashion. It is critical to begin at the top of the ladder, for every step must be a step downwards.

(1f.) Marriage that is prevented or unduly delayed by pride does almost as much harm to society in one way that marriage precipitated by rash thoughtlessness and imprudence does in another. Improvidence that foolishly hastens, and worldly ambition or tyrannous fashion which stands in the way of a divine ordinance, are both bad.

(1g.) Is marriage a failure? is a subject that has recently been discussed in the public prints. You might well ask, Is human nature a failure? Marriage, of course, participates in the limitations, frailties, and defects which adhere to human nature. Marriage does not transform weak erring creatures into paragons of excellency. Patience, forbearance, generosity, Christian principle and love, are virtues as much needed in the home as in the world. And if men will rush into the married state, driven by mere blind impulse or passing fancy, without true confidence or deep affection, without also considering the question of compatibility of disposition and taste, how can there be anything but jarring discord? The thought must come some time. If not before the marriage, it will come after, when it is too late, making the yoke nothing better than an irksome and repulsive load. He that enters into the closest and most solemn of earthly unions without duly considering what he is about, has but himself to blame if marriage in his case is a failure. It cannot be a success unless ordinary discretion is brought into use. How true and worthy of quotation in this connection are Dr. A Mackennal’s words: “Because love is so holy, as well as so strong a passion, don’t love or think you love too soon. Not every passing fancy or stirring of the blood, not every mood of admiration or impulse of devotedness is to be revered. It takes a wise man to love wisely. One needs a disciplined, an experienced soul to trust one’s affection.

(1h.) Let us protect this institution of heaven from abuse and ridicule. He that does anything to lower or disparage marriage, by substituting some of those feather-brained schemes of which we hear now and again, or advocating that divorce should be made easy, is a traitor to the order and purity of society. Family life is the nucleus of all that is best in the world. How Scripture honours this institution. It makes it plain that marriage is not a mere human device or expedient, an artificial arrangement. It tells us that it comes to us with the weight of a divine appointment, and the sacredness of a divine sanction. Christianity, too, has adopted and hallowed the relationship. Our Lord, as you know, performed His first miracle at a marriage feast. The mystical spiritual union subsisting between Him and the believer is compared to that which exists between husband and wife. The constitution of man and the teaching of the Bible are never far apart. They understand and fit into each other. They bear marks of being the product of the same mind. There are certain great native ineffaceable instincts belonging to the very basis and structure of human nature that may overborne or keep in abeyance by other feelings or considerations of exceptional strength, but just as the law of self-preservation and other primitive parts of man’s being are sure, as a general rule, to take care of themselves and hold their own against all comers, so this ancient ordinance that began to take effect in Eden is still a power, and is likely to continue to be that till the end of the world. It runs its course with heaven’s smile upon it.

(1i.) A craving for companionship is as natural as a desire for light and food. It is not good for man to be alone. There are parts of man’s own nature that are passed over and locked up, life so many disused apartments of a house, as long as he is held aloof from others of his kind. For some of the higher purposes of life man would rather be about as useless by himself as a pillar without the rest of the cathedral of which is meant to be a support, as an arch in the middle of a stream without the other parts of bridge connecting with the land on either side. In certain important respects man is only the part of the whole, the limb of a body. He finds his complement in another. “Therefore shall a man leave is father and mother and shall cleave unto his wife, and they shall be one flesh.” It is as Longfellow says:-

“Even as rivulets twain, from distant and separate sources; Seeing each other afar, as they leap from rocks, and pursuing; Each one its devious path, but drawing nearer and nearer; Rush together at last to their trysting place in the forest; So those lives that had run thus far in separate channels; Coming in sight of each other, then swerving and flowing asunder; Part by barriers strong, but drawing nearer and nearer; Rushed together at last, and one was lost in the other.”

There are three things expected from a husband – Headship, Support, Companionship, all having their ground in love.

(2.)  HEADSHIP.

(2a.) A wit once remarked that the rite which makes two people one does not settle which one. It is well for the concord of the family life when the question is never formally settled. Authority should be felt, not seen or heard, as between husband and wife. Both, if the union is well-assorted one, should act upon and mould each other, so that there is a growing mutual assimilation.

(2b.) If it should happen that preponderating force of brain and character lies with the wife, and she is a wise woman, she will not make the fact too apparent. Certainly, things human as well as otherwise find their natural level, and the husband is embraced within the scope of that general law. But the teaching of Scriptures makes it plain that the natural order of things requires that the husband should assume the responsibilities of the headship. It is a loss to the wife as well as the husband when this order is reversed, and she cannot look up to her husband. Woman’s function is influence, man’s prerogative is authority; but in certain respects influence is greater than authority, and it certainly becomes a woman better than the other. There is a lowering of self-respect all round, and a disturbance of what is meet and fitting when it is otherwise. Man takes the initiative to bring about wedlock. The woman’s choice lies in giving or withholding consent. So should it be all through. “For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is Head of the Church.”

(3.) SUPPORT

(3a.) The husband is literally the house-band. He keeps it together and keeps it up by his strength and industry. He goes out into the world and brings in the bread that is needed. Paul uses strong language in enforcing this duty: “But if any provide not for his own, and specifically for those of his own house, he hath denied the faith and he is worse than an infidel.”

(3b.) One of the most helpful uses of marriage is shown in this, that is provides a most excellent stimulus to continued application of muscle and brain. Man needs something to steady and settle him, to call out his energies. Left to himself, without ties and obligations of social and domestic life, he is apt to be at once lazy and restless. An excellent antidote to a roving disposition is the responsibility and weight of family life. The boiler that is to be a source of motive power to the steamship has to be bolted down. So before a man can be of much use in this world it is necessary that he should be tied down to a certain routine of duty. There are men who from the mere love of work will, in any circumstances, without any pressure, spent time and strength to the day of their death in useful activity. But those men are examples of what ought to be, not what generally is.

(3c.) Most of us need that the necessity should be laid upon us from without. The clamant occasion has to rouse us. The latent power has to be evoked. The man has to be shaken and stirred. Appeals have to be made to conscience and heart. The man has to be drawn out. He that is married, if he is truly a man, has given a pledge to society of continuous and patient labour. He has put himself into a position which is the best possible for the world getting out of him what is in him.

(4.) COMPANIONSHIP.

(4a.) Marriage ought to be the highest kind of companionship known upon earth. In order to that husband and wife must of course have something in common. Hence the importance of intelligent choice to begin with. A mistake here is fatal. To be tied for life to a person with whom you have few ideas in common, especially on that highest of all subjects-your relationship to God-is purgatory upon earth, and not always with those salutary moral effects that the Roman Catholic expects from purgatory in the future. The great secret of a happy married life is to have made such a choice that you can have a sustained interest in each other, each finding a helpmeet in the other in the higher concerns of life. Do not-those of you who are young-do not disregard the counsel, or it may be, the warning of father and mother or long-tried friend in such a connection. If the advice given is founded solely upon social and worldly considerations, it may be deemed superfluous. It is a pity that parents should lose influence over son or daughter by attaching too much importance to differences-real or supposed-in station, though these are so far worthy of consideration. But let the decisive question be: Is the person of good character, respectable intelligence, refined taste, pure aspiration, well trained, and practically useful-a fit companion for life?

(4b.) Do husbands always realize that it is their duty to be the companions of their wives? Is it considerate or kind to spend all the day in business and then devote the whole evening to your club or other society, or in summer, to the bowling green? Even public work is not an excuse for neglect of wife and children. A man’s duty begins at home. The family stands before all other institutions upon the earth. There may be a kind of refined and exalted selfishness even on the part of philanthropic workers.

(4c.) As for want of time to devote to home duties owing to pressure of business-it is a question whether any man has a right to make a sacrifice of home-life for the sake of business. What though trade were to suffer a little and home to gain, would not a right balance be struck in the light of the supreme ends and interests of life? Merchants, shopkeepers, and others ought to combine in entreating and urging the public to make their purchases at an earlier hour that men who serve them may be the servants but not the slaves of their customers. I put in a plea for more home life. Make home bright, attractive. Remember that from the necessity of her position a wife is thrown upon the society of her husband. The society of wives would perhaps be more improving if it were more largely cultivated. The heart has its claim and rights. It is not enough to provide food and clothing for the body. There are higher and finer requirements.

(4d.) Love is the fulfilling of the marriage as of every other law. The husband whose life is rooted in God is likely to be dutiful and kind. Piety helps the natural disposition, whatever it is. If the man be affectionate, religion has a heightening and hallowing effect. If he be deficient in that respect, true piety is invaluable. A man will be all the better a husband who has one that stands higher in his heart than even a wife-and that is his Lord. “In order to love a woman well, truth and honour must be loved still better.”

(4e.) Here the true woman speaks to one who would be her husband:-
“Before I trust my fate to thee; Or place my hand in thine; Before I let thy future give; Colour and form to mine; Before I peril ail for thee, question thy soul to-night for me.
“I break all slighter bonds, nor feel; A shadow of regret; Is there one link within the past; That holds thy spirit yet? Or is thy faith as clear and free as that which I can pledge to thee?
“Does there within thy dimmest dreams; A possible future shine; Wherein thy life would henceforth breathe; Untouched, unshared by mine? If so, at any pain or cost, oh tell me before all is lost.
“Look deeper still, if thou canst feel; Within thy inmost soul; That thou hast kept a portion back; While I have staked the whole; Let no false pity spare the blow, but in true mercy tell me so.
“Is there within thy heart a need; That mine cannot fulfil? One chord that any other hand; Could better wake or still? Speak now, lest at some future day my whole life wither and decay.”

(5.) THE HUSBAND - POEMS

(5a.) “Measure your cloth ten times, you can only cut it once.” – Russian Proverb.

(5b.) “Great riches are not required for the habit of magnificence; it is enough that a man should dispose of such as he possesses greatly.”- Aquinas.

(5c.) “It is always a feast when one breaks bread with those whom he loves.”

(5d.) “Husbands, love your wives.”