Marriage

"You've got to go into the thing with your eyes shut, lowering your head, kissing the ground, and—for the rest—putting your trust in God, as long as you've decided to do it."

"Il s’y convient mettre à l'aventure, les yeux bandés, baissant la tête, baisant la terre, et se recommandant à Dieu au demeurant, puisqu’une fois l’on s’y veut mettre.  Autre assurance ne vous en saurais-je donner.”

     Pantagruel to Panurge, Gargantua and Pantagruel III.10, trans. Burton Raffel ((New York:  W. W. Norton & Co., 1990), 269).  That at the head of some 30 chapters on the theme (chaps. 9-48 at least).  Trans. Urquhart and Motteux:

It is therefore expedient, seeing you are resolved for once to take a trial of the state of marriage, that, with shut eyes, bowing your head, and kissing the ground, you put the business to a venture, and give it a fair hazard, in recommending the success of the residue to the disposure of Almighty God.