Testimonies for the Church, Volume 2 - Ellen G. White

advances to familiarity from them. If you have
words of kindness and acts of courtesy to give, it is
always safe to give them to your wife. It will be a
great blessing to her, and will bring happiness to
her heart, to be reflected upon you again.
I have been shown also that the wife has let her
sympathies and interest and affection go out to
other men, who may be members of the family.
She makes these her confidants, shows a
preference for their society, and relates to them her
troubles and perhaps her private family matters.
This is all wrong. Satan is at the bottom of it;
and unless you are alarmed and stop just where you
are, he will lead you to ruin. You cannot observe
too great caution and encourage too much reserve
in this matter. If you have tender, loving words and
kindly attentions to bestow, let them be given to
him whom you have promised before God and
angels to love, respect, and honor while you both
shall live. Oh, how many lives are made bitter by
the breaking down of the walls which enclose the
privacies of every family and which are calculated
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