New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1860-03-17
MdRRIAGE-DIVORCE.


DEAR SIR: In my former letter, l asserted and
q think) proved that
/. The established, express uDequivocal dIctlon-
airy meaning of Marriage is xnion for life. Whether
any other sort of union of man and woman he
or be not more rational, more benefcent, more
moral, more Christian, than this, it is certain that
this is Marriage, and that other is something else.
III. That this is what we who are legally married
at all events, if married by the ministers of any
Christian denomination uniformly covenant to do.
l distinctly remember that my marriage covenant
was " for better for worse" and "untl death do
"part" presume yours was the same.
Ill That Jesus of Nazareth, in opposition to the
ideas and usages current in his time, alike among
Jews and Gentiles, expressly declared Adultery to
be the only valid reason for dissolviDg Marriage
w. That the nature and inbering reason OF
Marriage inexorsbly demand that it be indissouble
except for that one crime which destroys its essen
| tial condition. In other words, no marriage can
be innocently dissolved but the husband or wife
may be released from the engagement upon proof
of the utter and fragrant violation of its essential
condition by the other party.
that your second letter successfully assails any OF
these positions. You do not and cannot, deny that
our standard dictionaries define Marriage as do
and deny the name 10 any temporary arrangement;
you do not deny that have truly stated Chrlsts
doctrine on the subject whereof the Christian cere-
monial of Marriage, whether in the Catholic or
Protestant Churches, is a standing evidence); and
r 30 ot
ment pass without comment. So with regard to
Moses: / am content to leave Mosess law OF
divorce to the brief but pungent commentary of
Jesus and his PROFESSIONALLY correct ayermeDt
that "irOm the beginning it was net So"
But you say that, if my position is sound, make
ga sweeping assertion against the validity OF the
marriages now existing in Indiana and other d.
vorcing States. o no, Sir Nine-tenths OF the
people in those States-I trust niRety-nine humid
redths-were married by Christian ministers, under
the law of Christ. They solemnly covenanted to
remain faithful until DEATH and they are fulfilling
that promise. Your easy Divorce laws are nothing
to them; their consciences and their lives have no
part in those laws. Your State might decree that
any couple may divorce themselves at pleasure and
still those who regard Jesus as their Divine Master
and Teacher would hold fast to His Word, and live
according to "higher law" than that revised and
relaxed by you.
/ dissent entirely from your dictum that the
words of Jesus relative to Marriage and Divorce
may have been intended to have local and tempo
raIy application. On the contrary believe he,
unlike Noses, promulgated the eternal and univer-
sal law founded not in accommodation to special
circumstances, but in the essential nature of God
and Man. admit that he may sometimes have
withheld truth that he deemed His auditors unable
to comprehend and accept, but insist that what
He did set forth was the absolute, unchangng fact.
But did not cite him to overbear reason by au-
thority butbecause you referred first to Christianity
and the will of God and because believe what He
said respecting Marriage to be the very truth. Can
you seriously imagine that your personal exegesis on
His words should outweigh the uniform tradition
and practice of all ChristendOm1
You understand, presume, that hold to sepa-
ratiOns "from bed and board"-as the laws of this
State allow them-Only in cases where the party
thus separated is in danger of bodily harm from the
brutality of an insane, Incorporate, or otherwise
brutalzed, infuriated husband or wife. / do not
admit that even such peril can release one from the
VOW of confluence which is the vital condition of
marriage. 1t may possibly be that there is temp
taton" involved in the position of one thus legally
separated, but Judge this evil far less than that
which must result from the easy dissolution Of mar
rage.
For here is the vital truth that your theory
oyerlooks: The Divine end of Marriage spa
rentage or the perpetuation and increase of the
Human Race To this end, it is indispensable-at
least eminenty desirable-that each child should
enjoy protection nurture sustenance, at the hands
of mother not only but of father also. In other
words the parents should be SO attached, so de-
voted to each other, that they shall be practically
separable but by death. Creatures of appetite,
fools of temptation, lovers Of change, as men are,
there is but one talisman potent to distinguish be-
tween genuine Affection and its meretricious coun-
terfet; and that is the solemn searching question
"Do you know this woman so thoroughly and
"love her 80 profoundly that you can assuredly
"promise that you will forsake all others and cleave
" to her only till deathi" Ifyou can, your union
is one that God has hallowed and Man may honor
and approve; but, if not, wait till you can thus
pledge yourself to some one irrevocably, invoking
Heaven and earth to witness your truth. If you
rush into union with one whom you do not thus
know and love, and who does not thus know and
lote you, yours is the crime, the shame; yours be
the lifelong penalty. j do not think, as men and
women actually are, this law can be improved;
when we reach the spirit world, presume we shall