We see them on every side starting on the sea of married life with gaiety of heart because the chosen one is obtained for company and with no conception of the difficulties that may make the voyage tempestuous.

But they often make safe harbor of comfortable comradeship for middle life and old age, and if they have had a harder time than they need have had at least prove that "love is the greatest thing in the world." =The Need for Full and Mutual Understanding Before Marriage.=--The rising tide of divorce, however, gives point to the plea of this chapter for a more careful charting of the sailing course in advance.
The fact that so many get their discipline of knowledge and direction as they go along and do not make shipwreck even if matrimonial storms grow frequent or heavy, is a very good testimony to the native goodness of men and women and to their ability to make good their mistakes and work out success even from failure provided the indispensable north star of unselfish affection leads them on.

It would be well, however, to lessen the failures if that can be done.
When men and women show what marriage can become for the wise, the idealistic, and the loving, it gives a picture of satisfaction and mutual service that makes most other human associations seem trivial and short-lived.

Only parenthood is equal or superior to marriage in its possibilities of moral discipline and personal development.

To make it successful is worth striving for.
Literature, science, and art have many great marriages to their credit--men and women brought together by identical tastes and similar capacities, working together in high pursuits through a long life of achievement.