 question whether it is foolish or good, wise or
otherwise, depends upon the point of view from which you regard it. If it means
a snug house in Belgravia, and pretty little dinner-parties, and a pretty little
brougham to drive in the Park, and a decent provision not only for the young
people, but for the little Belgravians to come; and if these are the necessaries
of life (and they are with many honest people), to talk of any other arrangement
is an absurdity: of love in lodgings - a babyish folly of affection: that can't
pay coach-hire or afford a decent milliner - as mere wicked balderdash and
childish romance. If, on the other hand, your opinion is that people not with an
assured subsistence, but with a fair chance to obtain it, and with the stimulus
of hope, health, and strong affection, may take the chance of Fortune for better
or worse, and share its good or its evil together, the polite theory then
becomes an absurdity in its turn - worse than an absurdity, a blasphemy almost,
and doubt of Providence; and a man who waits to make his chosen woman happy,
until he can drive her to church in a neat little carriage with a pair of
horses, is no better than a coward or a trifler, who is neither worthy of love
nor of fortune.
    I don't say that the town folks are not right, but Helen Pendennis was a
country-bred woman, and the book of life, as she interpreted it, told her a
different story to that page which is read in cities. Like most soft and
sentimental women, match-making, in general, formed a great part of her
thoughts, and I daresay she had begun to speculate about her son's falling in
love and marrying long before the subject had ever entered into the brains of
the young gentleman. It pleased her (with that dismal pleasure which the idea of
sacrificing themselves gives to certain women) to think of the day when she
would give up all to Pen, and he should bring his wife home, and she would
surrender the keys and the best bedroom, and go and sit at the side of the
table, and see him happy. What did she want in life, but to see the lad prosper?
As an empress certainly was not too good for him, and would be honoured by
becoming Mrs. Pen; so if he selected humble Esther instead of Queen Vashti, she
would be content with his lordship's choice. Never mind how lowly or poor
