He Gave Me a Good Mother…

A grateful daughter had this to say concerning her once famous father: “He transmitted to me a sound heredity on his own side, and he gave me a good mother.”¹ And then she added: “A young man was once asked… why he did not… marry a certain very beautiful but rather frivolous girl… ‘Is she a person whom you would pick out to entrust with the bringing up of your children?'” he said. When his questioners conceded this was not so, he added, “‘Well, I do not choose to entrust her with the bringing up of mine.'”¹ There are many good gifts that fathers give: their experience, their advice, their love and loyalty, their providing, their companionship, their character, their patience, their strength, their good name, even their discipline when needed, and their example. But scarcely could they give a greater gift than these two that affect so fully the family — so fully the everlasting future: “…a sound heredity on his own side, and… a good mother.”¹ Now to you who are moving toward marriage, and its sobering decisions: In marriage we do choose the parents of our children, and this in itself without any other consideration, is an an awesome and sobering decision: the name, the heritage of our children, now and ever after. Surely this is not something that should be decided on the fullness of the moon, or on the mood of the moment. To quote the phrases of a lovely and long-living song, it is “not for just an hour, not for just a day, not for just a year, but always—”² — not for just an evening, not for just a summer season, but day after day, month after month, year after year, into the farthest reaches of the future. Marriage means the making of a living, providing a home, keeping a house, cooking tens of thousands of times, doing tens of thousands of routine daily duties, in sickness, in sorrow, in health and happiness, in discouragement and success. And because fathers and mothers and family and home are so everlastingly important, we cannot in wisdom make such decisions superficially and shortsightedly, nor in good conscience fail to take into account the parents we choose for our children, and the character and companionship of those we love and live with, “not for just an hour, nor for just a day, not for just a year, but always.”² “He transmitted to me a sound heredity of his own side, and he gave me a good mother.”¹