One good husband is worth two good wives, for
the scarcer things are, the more they are
valued.
-- Benjamin
Franklin
1706-1790,
American Scientist, Publisher, Diplomat
Keep your eyes wide open before marriage, and
half-shut afterwards.
-- Benjamin
Franklin
1706-1790,
American Scientist, Publisher, Diplomat
An
undutiful daughter will prove an unmanageable
wife.
-- Benjamin
Franklin
1706-1790,
American Scientist, Publisher, Diplomat
Marriage accustomed one to the good things, so
one came to take them for granted, but magnified
the bad things, so they came to feel as painful
as a grain in one's eye. An open window, a
forgotten quart of milk, a TV set left blaring,
socks on the bathroom floor could become
occasions for incredible rage. And something
happened sexually in marriage --the swearing to
forsake all others, despite its slight
observance, had a profound effect. Some people
felt trapped by it, impelled to assert what they
called freedom. Some accepted it like a rein,
and in the effort to avoid pain in the form of
hopeless desire, cut off occasions of desire,
avoided having long talks at parties with
attractive members of the opposite sex. In time,
all feeling for the opposite sex was cut off,
and intercourse limited to the barest
politesses. But something happened to you when
you did that, a kind of death seeped up from the
genitals to the rest of the body, till it showed
in the eyes, the gestures, in a certain
lifelessness.
-- Marilyn French
1929-, American
Author, Critic
