THE MARRIAGE GIFT BOOK AND BRIDAL TOKEN. The very first Of human life must spring from woman's breast; Your first small words are taught you from her lips; Your first tears quench'd by her, and your last sighs Full often breathed out in a woman's hearing, When men have shrunk from the ignoble care, Of watching the last hour of him who led them. Byron. THE MARRIAGE GIFT BOOK. CHAPTER I. muse. POETICAL VIEWS OF MARRIAGE. AN institution so divine, so ancient, and so momentous as marriage, could not fail to enlist the poetic This theme has been sung in all ages and languages, and will be so to the end of the world. It is ours to present brief selections from the noble and the good; and who so fit to herald his fellows as our own immortal Milton. As monarch, among his brethren, his sublime strains, shall introduce his inspired compeers. "Hail! wedded love, mysterious law, true source Of human offspring, sole propriety In paradise of all things common else By thee adult'rous lust was driv'n from men " B |