Plato had said that
the familiarity of young persons before marriage prevented enmity and
disappointment in later years, that it was useful to know the
peculiarities of temperament beforehand, and so, being accustomed to
them, to discount them. But Ibsen was not of this opinion, or rather,
perhaps, he did not choose to be. The extremely slow and public method
of betrothal in the North gave him his first opportunity.
It is with a song, in the original one of the most delicious of his
lyrics, that he opens the campaign. To a miscellaneous party of
Philistines circled around the tea table, "all sober and all ----" the
rebellious hero sings:--
In the sunny orchard-closes,
While the warblers sing and swing,
Care not whether blustering Autumn
Break the promises of Spring;
Rose and white the apple-blossom
Hides you from the sultry sky;
Let it flutter, blown and scattered,
On the meadow by and by.
In the sexual struggle, that is to say, the lovers should not pause to
consider the worldly advantages of their match, but should fly in secret
to each other's arms.
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