Marriage made in Germany
The Book of Marriage. Arranged and edited by Count Hermann Keyserling. (Cape. 21s.) COUNT HERMANN KEYSERLING'S symposium on the theory and practice of this difficult art is designed fundamentally to be of use" both to the practitioners of marriage and to those young people who have still their choice of partners to make. It may be said at once that Count Keyserling's own contributions, marked as they are by that profundity and mental tension that characterized his Travel Diary of a Philosopher, are infinitely the best papers in the book. In the space available, we can only consider them : the other articles are interesting—notably Mr. Havelock Ellis's "Love as an Art," Herr Boeck's "Marriage as Mystery and Command" and Miss Hinckle's "Marriage in the New World," and a contribution by Dr. Jung ; but these would each require a separate review.
With German thoroughness, the Editor begins by defining what marriage is not, namely the generally-valid solution of all problems dealing with love, " nor yet the natural fulfilment of every human craving; because man is complex and too little integrated to permit of all his impulses being brought under one head without coercion."
Love-at-first-sight is roughly handled, as usual. Wise men have warned us of the traps of impulse, yet the world continues to fall in love as suddenly as it slips on an orange peel. "No form of marriage is wrecked so easily as that which is based solely on personal attraction," says our author, following here the French convention but adding acutely that personal attraction has the best chance of survival if love does not turn to marriage." Marriage, he says, is not a blending or fusion of two personalities but rather an intenser individual. ism which is creative by reason of a mutual magnetism.
We now come to what marriage is, in Count Keyserling's opinion, and this is the crux of the book. He describes it as a state of electrical tension between the poles of two personalities. This field of force is an entity distinct from man and wife : the whole is greater than the part, the household of more importance to Life than its components. It follows from this that a wise reserve is an essential of marriage. The two individual foci are fixed and should never be merged in one another on all planes : inter-polar tension must be maintained if the field of force is to remain intact. - The introduction in which this arresting theory is expounded may be rather stiff reading to those who know little of electricity, but it is the motif of the book and must be mastered if the remainder is to be understood.
That marriage is the solution of the problem of happiness is stoutly denied. "A happy marriage in an egotistical sense, such as infatuated lovers expect, is just as rare as love- children who turn out well, in spite of all existing prejudices. The essential difficulties of life do not end but rather begin with marriage." Marriage, in short, is an adventure on the seas of the Life-force, a building up of a more than mortal Ark of refuge. It is a system of eternal validity. More, it is superior to personal desires, "because it brings these together, as exponents of a higher order of integration." Just as no one may predict what the results of physical union may be, so also the magnetic field of force which is marriage has an existence of its own corresponding to the duality inherent in nature. The dawn would not be beautiful save for the night which precedes it Woman is a born ruler (have not the Queens of history been great Queens ?) because "one does not really govern others by coercion but by suggestion which is based on instinctive consideration for others, and this presupposes a maternal feeling." Man on the contrary has no natural capacity for marriage, and the state is more dangerous for him than for the woman. It is she who is the artist arid the predestined regent of the house. Yet there must be an absolute equality of rights. Mail and woman are profoundly different. They must not try to approximate and adapt The two poles of the magnetic-field must remain separated. "In the case ofhighly, differentiated people, conjugal happiness wholely depends on fflis sound principle of keeping one's' distance." "Marriage is a tragic state of tension,- Count Keyserling sums up rather gloomily, but he only means tension in the electrical sense and " tragic " in the sense that all life is tragic. Marriage embraces all life and, therefore, "all the specialized forms of tension."
After marriage has been defined and the problem stated, the book seeks—ambitious project--to provide a solution every individual problem arising in married life. Count Keyserling has a long chapter on the proper choice of partners, which in spite of all his real humanity and desire to serve his fellow-creatures does appear inclined to represent "a soulless ethic of duty." Marriages arranged by parents may suit the French and Germans ; they would never be possible on a large scale in England. Everyone, however, who cares to read and digest The Book of Marriage will be well equipped for marriage, for he or she will have the know- ledge, will, attitude of mind and the requisite ecncentra-• tion to make a success of the most delicate of human relationships.
Mr. Bernard Shaw was asked to contribute and sent a characteristic reply : "No man dare write the truth about marriage as long as his wife lives. Unless, that is, he hates her, like Strindberg ; and I don't. I shall read the volume with interest, knowing that it will consist chiefly of evasions ; but I will not contribute to it." However, the book has no evasions and the Editor's own opinion of it—which does not err on the side of modesty—may be fully endorsed "courage and purity are the twin sources of its inspira- tion."
In buying a horse, the wise purchaser thinks carefully of points and breeding and soundness, he considers his own aptitudes and requirements and the price he is asked to pay ; some veterinary knowledge may be won from books, more perhaps by experience. Instinct plays its part also, but who would choose a hunter on instinct alone ? Analogies are dangerous, but we need not be afraid of arguing from the particular to the general in this matter.
Choosing a husband is a matter for expert advice, like choosing a horse ; and the subsequent happiness of the choke depends on its initial wisdom. These twenty-five essays on marriage are each one of them wise, and their cumulative effect will have important and far-reaching consequences on many minds. To those whose lives are already happy this book may suggest, perhaps, new beauties in a landscape* that Was already fair ; to others it will be a guide out of the thickets of mal-adjustment and a source of inspiration and strength. It is curious that such a book has not been written before ; the Vedic sages had a whole literature on the subject thousands of years ago ; their advice is extant to-day and good in parts, but not easily assimilated by Western minds. Here, on the contrary, is a book of the West for modern men and women, compiled by one who knows the East with feeling-realization, and who knows also our ways, not from libraries, but from living ; a sane, safe book, which can be warmly recommended to everyone who is not too wise to
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