The Truth about Marriage/Chapter18
CHAPTER XVIII
LONG ENGAGEMENTS
The next question is along the same line as the one we have been talking about. It reads: "Do you believe in long engagements?"
I believe in engagements long enough to enable one to know the other person thoroughly. A long engagement sometimes occurs because of various things: for example, the man may be waiting to get enough money to marry on. One can wait too long sometimes for comfort or luxury; and sometimes people do not wait long enough to be prepared for the expenses of married life.
It is wise to have enough for an emergency, such as sickness, or accident, or the first baby; but it is not always necessary. Do not make the engagement too long.
There is the case of waiting for a man or a woman to be free from family obligations, especially to parents. Some of the greatest instances of selfishness I have ever known have occurred to my knowledge in New England where a daughter has waited year after year for an invalid mother to live out her life, the mother desiring the daughter to give her whole life to her as long as she lived.
Cases that I have known have been pitiful. Youth and happiness have gone often long before the mother went, (sometimes the father), and lovers as well. Do not wait too long, but wait long enough to be sure of yourself and the other person.