Since Word War Ⅱ, there has been a clearly noticeable trend, especially among the growing

group of college students, toward early marriage. Many youths begin dating in the first stages of adolescence, "go steady" through high school, and map before their formal education has been completed. In some quarters, there is much clucking (咯咯叫) of middle-aged tongues over the ways of "wayward youth". However, emotional maturity is no respecter of birthdays; it does not arrive automatically at twenty-one or twenty-five. Some achieve it surprisingly early, while others never do even in three-score years and ten.

Many students are marrying as an escape, not only from an unsatisfying home life, but also from their own personal problems of isolation and loneliness. And it can almost be put down as a dictum (格言) that any marriage entered into as an escape cannot prove entirely successful. The sad fact is that marriage seldom solves one's problems; more often, it merely accentuates them. Furthermore, it is doubtful whether the home as an institution is capable of carrying all that the young are seeking to put into it; one might say in theological terms, that they are forsaking one idol only to worship another. Young people correctly understand that their parents are wrong in believing that "success" is the ultimate good, but they wrongly believe that they themselves have found the true centre of life's meaning. Their expectations of marriage are essentially utopian (乌托邦的) and therefore incapable of fulfillment. They want too much, and tragic disillusionment is often bound to follow.

Shall we, then, join the chorus of "Miseries" over early marriage？ One cannot generalize: All early marriages are not bad any more than all the later ones are good. Satisfactory marriages are determined not by age but by the emotional maturity of the partners. Therefore, each case must be judged on its own merits (优点). If the early marriage is not an escape, if it is entered into with relatively few illusions or false expectations, and if it is economically feasible, why not？ Good marriages can be made from sixteen to sixty, and so can bad ones.

Middle-aged people seem to view the trend toward early marriage as ______.

A．a healthy sign

B．an indication of growing responsibility on the part of youth

C．perfectly natural by today's standards

D．an indication of immaturity of today's youth