Chapter 2: How the Home Can Succeed 3. Courtesy at Home

Courtesy gives an agreeable tone to the home and makes cooperation pleasant. It means most to those who mean most to each other. If people are courteous to friends and strangers, is there any less reason for being so to those who are closest ? Not formality, of course, but considerateness in word and action. Countess Clarita de Forceville has well said, "If love is the foundation of happy marriage good manners are the walls and roof."

Husbands and wives are known by the manners they use. This is true not only out in the world but also at home. It is a mark of a gentleman for the husband to show his wife as much courtesy as he could show to any woman. She, of course, will want always to be a lady.

The courteous husband will let his wife go through doorways first, will help her with her rubbers and coat, will pull out her chair, perhaps, and carry her book or package when they are together on the street. Both at home and in company the wife will want to make it evident that she appreciates his attention, just as she would if they were not yet married. Uniting two lives in courtesy is a help in keeping them united in love.

It is a part of courtesy to be more aware of virtues than of faults. Some persons wear blinders for virtues and use a microscope for faults. To them nothing looks well. Criticisms must be made at times, but they should be made in private and with the utmost of consideration for the other as a person. Marriage is more than friendship, but certainly it cannot thrive if it is less. It is a friendship of the most intense and satisfying sort, and like other friendships it needs the touches of exquisite care, as we grow in the art of living together.