Royal marriage

“ The old Prince your father and mother’s both well;
And your royal parents this thing have design’d,
In the bond of wedlock: we both shall be join’d.
Perhaps noble Lady, you would not agree
To marry a poor man, especially me. ”

“ Being a King, you know how sacred are the rights of the throne; any step of an hereditary Prince towards a foreign Sovereign is criminal. I consider the marriage of a French Princess with Your Royal Highness would be conformable to the interests of my people, and, above all, as a circumstance which will unite me by fresh bonds to a house which I have had every wish to honour ever since I ascended the throne. ”

“ Now in countries where the royal blood was traced through women only, and where consequently the king held office merely in virtue of his marriage with an hereditary princess, who was the real sovereign, it appears to have often happened that a prince married his own sister, the princess royal, in order to obtain with her hand the crown which otherwise would have gone to another man, perhaps to a stranger. ”

“ Just now, when the royal marriage is so much the topic of the day, a little gossip, gathered in the byways of history, concerning some other “auspicious events” of the same kind, may not be out of place. These events, however, have been by no means so frequent as one might naturally suppose. The Registrar-General, whose matter-of-fact eye looks upon matrimony as one of the exact sciences, tells us that, when a man is in receipt of a comfortable income, he is pretty sure to marry. ”

“ Marriages such as he contemplated are made every year in Europe. Do you suppose that the royal marriages you read about in the newspapers are made with the consent of the poor little princes and princesses? ”

“ Princes and princesses may also marry persons who are not royalty, but in that case the marriage is morganatic—a perfectly good and legal form of marriage both from an ecclesiastical and civil point of view, only that the children of such marriages, though perfectly legitimate, cannot succeed to the throne: in many cases no great loss to them. It has been my good fortune to see a good deal of royalty during the whole of my life. I say 206good fortune on purpose, for, with all the drawbacks inherent in Court life, royal persons enjoy some great advantages. ”

“ Then the marriage, whereby in very truth two become one — two natures so closely united in one person that, unlike other marriages, not even death itself could separate them. Thenceforward, too, the Royal Prince and His lowly peasant spouse shared all things in common ”

“ The voluptuous Courtier, who had not yet forgot what the Presence of an amiable Queen is capable of doing, began to form Vows, that the King might make a Choice as good as the first: nay, the matter was carried farther; it was mention'd to his Majesty, who was told withal, that nothing was more necessary, than to think immediately of a second Marriage; and that the Prince Royal having no Children, there was Danger of his Majesty's leaving no Issue. In short, every body voted so heartily for a Marriage, that the King, who also was desirous of it, declar'd he wou'd marry again. ”

“ The political inconvenience which might arise from the circumstance of the reigning sovereign being connected by near and intimate relationship with a family of his British subjects will, probably, always be thought to render it desirable that some restriction should be placed on the marriage of the heir-apparent; but where the sovereign is blessed with a numerous offspring, there seems no sufficient reason for sending the younger branches of the royal house to seek wives or husbands in foreign countries. ”

“ As a husband the King can demand this right, and he is bound to assert it for the honour of his royal house, and the welfare of his nation. As a husband the King can demand this right given him by the marriage vow; as the head of his royal house he is bound to guard the supremacy, antiquity, honour and purity of the Danish royal family. ”

“ II. Provided always, and be it enacted by the authority aforesaid, That in case any such descendant of the body of his late majesty King George the Second, being above the age of twenty-five years, shall persist in his or her resolution to contract a marriage disapproved of or dissented from, by the King, his heirs, or successors ”

“ From the reign of Elizabeth to the Restoration of Charles II., the Presbyterian form of church government, with its rigorous discipline, prevailed in the Island, and the betrothal—“fiançailles” [42] of persons intending to take upon themselves the holy state of matrimony was a solemn act, performed in the presence of the ministers and elders of the church, and which by an ordinance of the Royal Court of the year 1572, was to be followed by marriage within six months at the latest. ”

“ In the case of the sovereign it is his or her actual tenure of the office of king or queen which regulates the rank and place of the various members of the royal family, and in the case of peeresses by marriage, although their rank and place are derivative in origin, yet they are substantive in continuance, since during overture and widowhood peeresses by marriage are as much peeresses as peeresses in their own right, and their legal and political status is precisely the same as if they had acquired it by creation or inheritance. ”

“ Most royal marriages are made either to secure the succession to a throne by a legitimate line of heirs or else to unite adjoining states and make a powerful kingdom out of two that are less powerful. ”

“ The lady I have married is worthy of all homage, and my very confidential friends, with some of my wife’s relations only, witnessed our marriage. Have you not always taught me to consider myself heir to the first sovereignty in the world? ”

“ But I suppose it is always the case in England that, when a marriage is being arranged, one ought to follow the direction of one's family, as, for instance, a prince, called to rule a hereditary kingdom, ought to hear his parliament. ”

“ For the King has an only daughter and now he is going to give her to a husband in marriage. This festival, then, which thou seest to-day, is the rejoicing and public assembly for the marriage. And the King has sent forth heralds to proclaim everywhere that all are to come to the marriage, rich and poor, bond and free, strangers and citizens. But if anyone should refuse and. not come to the marriage, he is answerable to the King. And Abban, having heard, said to the apostle, "Let us also go, that we give no offense to the King, and especially as we are strangers." ”

“ The Lords of the land have stood up against the King in the matter of marriage, and in the absence of espousals we fear for his deposition. Now maidens be many and their relations long to see each damsel wedded to my son and become a Queen in virtue of her husband's degree: but he wanteth none other and loveth naught save thyself. Accordingly, an thou wouldst take compassion on him and protect him by thy consent from the insistence of the Grandees, deign accept him to mate. ”

“ Now when the King heard his words, he was confounded with awe and bodily fear of him and rejoined, "If thou indeed be of the sons of the Kings, as thou pretendest, how cometh it that thou enterest my palace without my permission, and smirchest mine honour, making thy way to my daughter and feigning that thou art her husband and claiming that I have given her to thee to wife, I that have slain Kings and Kings' sons, who sought her of me in marriage? ”

“ Increase of years and the good counsel of a wise husband were to teach the queen to exercise with greater tact that habit of command which was natural to her, and to bring under firmer control the impatience and quickness of her temper. Absorption in the sovereign's work, the elation of spirit which accompanied the Unreadiness to marry. major part of her new experiences, the change from dependence to independence in her private affairs, put marriage out of her mind during the first two years of her reign. ”

“ All we can do to repair the evil, you may rest assured shall be done. But you must thoroughly understand that the Crown Prince, as heir to the Throne, cannot marry out of his own station. If he should presume to do so, through some mad and hot-headed impulse, such a marriage is not admitted or agreed to by the nation. Thus you will see plainly that, though you have gone through the marriage ceremony with him, that counts as nothing in your case,—for, according to the law of the realm, and in the sight of the world, you are not, and cannot be his wife! ”

“ And on the word of a queen, I promise you, that if it shall not probably appear to all the nobility and commons, in the high court of parliament, that this marriage shall be for the high benefit and commodity of the whole realm, then will I abstain from marriage while I live. And now good subjects, pluck up your hearts, and like true men, stand fast against these rebels, both our enemies and yours, and fear them not, for I assure you I fear them nothing at all. ”

“ You, O King, have a lovely daughter to give in marriage. I have a son—a wooer—as clever a youth and as good a son-in-law as you will find in your whole kingdom. There is nothing that he cannot do. Now tell me, O King, plump and plain, will you give your daughter to my son as wife?’ The King listened to the end of the old woman’s strange request, but every moment his face grew blacker, and his features sterner ”

“ He received a reward for this, and set out for the kingdom of which the jackal had spoken. He arrived, and enquired of the king: ‘What wilt thou give me if I cure thy daughter?’ The king replied: ‘If thou canst do this I will give thee my daughter to wife.’ The youth prepared the remedy, made the princess bathe in it, and she was cured. The king rejoiced greatly, gave him the maiden in marriage, and appointed him heir to the kingdom. ”

“ Now there was among the nobles of the King's Court one who had married twice, and by the first marriage he had but one daughter, and as she was growing up her father thought that she ought to have some one to look after her. ”

“ When the Flower Queen heard that her daughter wanted to marry the Prince, she said to him: ‘I will give my consent to your marriage gladly, but my daughter can only stay with you in summer. In winter, when everything is dead and the ground covered with snow, she must come and live with me in my palace underground.’ The Prince consented to this, and led his beautiful bride home, where the wedding was held with great pomp and magnificence. The young couple lived happily together till winter came, when the Flower Queen’s daughter departed and went home to her mother. ”

“ Great indeed must it have been to have prevailed against all the seducing allurements of a beautiful and fascinating young bride, whose amiableness, vivacity, and wit became the universal admiration, and whose graceful manner of address few ever equalled and none ever surpassed; nay, even so to have prevailed as to form one of the great sources of his aversion to consummate the marriage! Since the death of the late Queen, their mother, these four Princesses (who, it was said, if old maids, were not so from choice) had received and performed the exclusive honours of the Court. ”

“ The old manus-marriage certainly supposes great confidence of the wife and her parents in the fidelity of the husband, while the marriage law of the time of the emperors relating to estates never lost sight of the possibility of divorce. ”

“ Never did greater events hinge upon a woman's caprice against marriage than those which were poised on the will of Elizabeth, Queen of England, in the long years that lay between the time when, as a young queen, it was proposed to marry her to the Duke of Anjou, and the sere and yellow leaf of her womanhood, when her potential maternity was past. ”

“ Indeed, she owned to us, that about last Lent, the King her father had tried to convince her that your Imperial Majesty proceeded in the affair with the utmost dissimulation, and without any wish whatsoever to treat of it, so much so that it seemed as if the whole thing had been planned, in order to bring discredit upon him (the King) . She, the Princess, had before and after her father’s representations, experienced that the contrary was the case, and therefore she was now ready to act one way or the other, whichever your Imperial Majesty decided, respecting the marriage proposal. ”

“ I have already six kingdoms, permit me to bestow one upon you, and upon each of your sons. I ask nothing but your friendship, and your consent to my marriage with your youngest son; we shall still have three kingdoms left for ourselves.”
The King and all the courtiers could not conceal their joy and astonishment, and the marriage of the three Princes was celebrated at once. The festivities lasted several months, and then each king and queen departed to their own kingdom and lived happily ever after. ”

“ With marriage, comes changes to the system. The married person demands order, security and peace—to live as a family in a family—in a regulated household—he seeks a true monarchy.
51. A prince without family spirit is not a monarch. ”

“ We are happy to feel assured that it is not as a political match that this marriage is to be contracted by the son of our beloved Queen, and that the bride-elect possesses in an eminent degree those advantages of person, charms of manner, and piety and amiability of character which captivate affection and secure domestic happiness. ”

“ By Servia her young Princess was received with open arms of welcome. "Her reception," we are told, "was beyond description. The festivities lasted three days, and during that time the love of the people for their Prince, and their admiration of the beauty and charm of his bride, were beyond words to describe." Never did Royal wedded life open more full of bright promise, and never did consort make more immediate conquest of the affections of her husband's subjects. ”