Marriage--and the Simple Doing of Duty

Duty isn’t a word that is always quite comfortable or convenient. But the free and easy making of marriages, and the free and easy undoing of them by divorce, suggest, for the sake of all concerned — for children, country, community, for family and friends — for ourselves and for our eternal future (and for self-respect as well as for a quiet conscience) — that we should say some things concerning the simple doing of duty. Contracts aren’t always convenient. Commitments of any kind aren’t always convenient, including covenants, debts, obligations of honor. But if easily we were to shed our obligations and contracts and commitments, it would seem that nothing much could be counted on. Marriage is a commitment of all that we are, of ourselves, our family, our future — a commitment wonderfully well worth it when there are understanding and kindness and character and consideration, and oneness of purpose and harmony of background and belief. But when it becomes a tug-of-war, a cold war, a thing of pulling apart, all concerned had better sincerely examine themselves and look to see what will save it — for the commitment of marriage includes sacred covenants and solemn obligations to ourselves, to society, to children, to family, and to the everlasting future. And any shallow or insubstantial reason for failure to keep sacred covenants when we face the Judge and Father of us all. Happiness is not a thing of self, or of self-willed selfishness, or of mere pleasure, or personal convenience, or passing preference, but is a by-product of doing what we ought to do — and of being what we ought to be. And aside from all the other essentials, every marriage needs the simple, sincere doing of duty, for stability, for respect, and for happiness at home.