Evening Republican, Volume 20, Number 190, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 9 August 1916 — NEED OF SYMPATHY [ARTICLE]

NEED OF SYMPATHY

MATTER THAT MAKES FOR HAPPINESS IN THE HOME. Wife Who Is Able to Make Her Husband Talk on Favorite Topic Can Always Be Sure of Holding , His Interest * One of the greatest causes of unhappiness in married life is the lack of Interest in each other's doings after the irrevocable step has been taken and the newness of being always together has worn off, remarks the Detroit News-Tribune.

Then It is that unless the wife makes the efforts to please that she did in the courting days the husband will go elsewhere for amusement. Yet he is only following the natural instinct of humanity in seeking for sympathetic companionship; the fault is partly hers. A man to be won and kept must first be attracted and then made to feel that he has a sympathy which draws him out and makes him talk about what interests him most. It Is not enough to make him listen w’hile he is being talked to. For a time that will hold him, but he will tire of always being a listener, of always giving his sympathy and receiving none. To hold a man, a woman must understand and study him, she must not: be exacting, for to expect too much only makes him feel that he wants to give less.

A man usually goes out into the world young; he leads a separate existence at an age when his sister is still surrounded by her home circle. When his work is done he has only to think, “What shall I do today that will give me the most pleasure?” Can anyone wonder that many years of Indulgence in this, coupled with a larger command of money than their sisters, should make men more selfish —should end by fixing the habit of thinking of their own pleasure so firmly in their minds that it is practically ineradicable? It may be overpowered for a time by a strong affection and all the counter influences of courtship and early 1 matrimony; but later, when these have ceased to be novelties and a m,an settles down to married life, the old habit reasserts itself. A woman, on the contrary, is trained in a different school. When her brother is out in the world earning his living, or, at any rate, living a separate existence, she is usually at home with other members of the household, when she has always to consider when any plans or engagements, however trivial, have to be made. Having thus to defer to the .wishes of her relations, she is duly trained In habits of yielding to others and of unselfishly giving up her will , and pleasure to them. So he In his bachelor days is duly trained to selfishness; she in her spinsterhood is equally brought up to unselfishness.