Marriage has become very much an optional undertaking. In How Jane Austen Understood the Purpose of Marriage, philosopher James Bryson takes us back to a time when marriage was very much held in high regard.

When Jane Austen wrote her masterpiece Pride and Prejudice, marriage was placed at the very heart of the culture. Consider the novel’s famous opening line: “It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.”

A quaint sentiment, perhaps, but one that bore fruit.