250. (14) Of these external reasons, a fifth is inequality of station and condition in the partners' outward circumstances. Many inequalities in station and condition occur which during a couple's life together sunder the initial conjugial love they felt before their wedding. However, these can all be assigned to inequalities in their ages, in their positions in society, and in their possessions of wealth. With respect to age, it requires no argument to show that age differences induce coldness in marriages, as in the marriage of a boy with an old woman, or of an adolescent girl with a decrepit old man. With respect to position in society, it is also acknowledged without need for confirmation that class differences likewise induce coldness in marriages, as in the marriage of an upper-class man with a maidservant, or of a prominent lady with a manservant. With respect to possessions of wealth, it is apparent that differences in these induce coldness as well - unless the partners are kept together by a similarity in dispositions and manners and by an adaptation of each to the inclinations and native desires of the other. In any event, however, in none of these circumstances does meek submission in deference to the superior station or condition of the other serve to unite the partners, except in the manner of a servant with its master. Yet a union like that is a cold one; for the conjugial bond in such cases is not a matter of the spirit and heart, but only of the mouth and name, of which the inferior boasts and which causes the superior to blush with shame. In contrast, in heaven one does not find a difference in partners' ages, positions in society, or possessions of wealth. With respect to age, all there are in the flower of their youth, and they remain in it to eternity. With respect to position in society, all there regard others in accordance with the useful services they render, with the more eminent in position viewing those lower as comrades. Nor do they put status before the value of service, but the value of service before status. Besides, when girls there get married, they do not know from what family they have descended; for no one in heaven knows who his father was on earth, but the Lord is the father of all. It is similar with respect to possessions of wealth. Riches there are their gifts for becoming wise. In accordance with these gifts they are given a sufficiency of wealth. (For the way marriages have their start in heaven, see no. 229 above.)