The Londonderry sifter. (South Londonderry, Vt.) 1883-19??, 1895-03-22
A FAMILY SKELETON.
REV, DR.. TAlMAGE breaches ON
UNHAPPY MARRIAGES.

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sd Matches Arc Becoming Too Numerous
NEW YORK. March i7.-Rsv DR.;
Talmage chose as the subject Of his aft
ernoon sermon in tho Academy of Music
today topic OF national intercst-viz.
Wholesale Divorce" The great audi.
cnco repeatedly showed Its appreciation
Of the sentiments Expressed by the rev.
erond speaker, and his sturdy blows in
behalf Of tho protection Of the house:
hold and against the disturbances Of
modern society were received with
marked appreciation The text selected
was Matthew xix, 0, what, therefore,
God hath Joined together let not man
put asunder.
That thore ara hundreds and thou
sands of infclioitous homes in America
no ono will doubt II thore wero only
ono skeleton in the closet. that might
be locked up and abandoned, but III
many a homo there Is q skeleton In the
hallway and skeleton In all the apart;
ments
"Unhappily married" are two words
descriptive of many a homestead 1t
needs no orthodox minister 20 prove to
badly mated pair that there is a hell
They are there now. Sometimes grand
and gracious woman will be thus inoar.
eerated, and hor life will be d crueifx.
lon, as was the case with Mrs. Sigouri
hey, the great poetess and the great soul.
Somatimes q cohsecfated man will be
united to a fury, as was John Wesley,
or united to vixen, as was John Mil
ton. Sometimes and generally, both
parties nre to blame. and Thomas Car
lyle was an intolerable acold, and his
wife smoked and swore, and Froude,
the historian, pulled aside the curtain
from the lifelong squabble at Craigen.
puttook and Five, Cheyns Row.
Soiie say that for the alienation Of
all these domestic disorders of which we
hear easy divorce is a good prescrip:
ton. God sometimes authorizes divorce
as certainly as be authorizes marriage.
/ have Just as much regard for one law
fully divorced as have for one lawful
y married But you know and know
that wholesale divorce Is one of olr ma
tional scourges. am not surprised at
this when l think of the Influences
which have bsen abroad initiating
against the marriage relation.
A psrnioious Doctrine.
For many years the platforms Of the
country rang with talk about free love
millennium There were meetings Of this
kind held in the Cooper institute. New
York; fremont temple, Boston; and all
over the land. Some of the women who
were most prominent in that movement
have since been distinguished for great
promiscuosity of affection. Popular
themes for such occasions were the tyr.
amy Of man, the oppression Of the
marriage relation, women's rights and
the affinities. Prominent speakers were
women with short our1s and short dress,
and very long tongte, everlastihgly Of
war with God because they were Gre
ated women, while on the platform sat
meek men with soft accent and cowed
demeanor, apologetio for masculinity,
and holding the parasols while the ter
inagant orators won't on preaching the
doctrine of free love.
That campaign Of about 20 years set
more devils into the marriage relation
than will be exercised in the next 80.
Men and women went home from such
meetings 80 permanently confused as to
Who were their wives and husbands that
they never got out Of their perplexity.
and the criminal and the civil courts
tried to disentangle the 'Iliad' Of woes,
and this one got alimony, and that one
got limited divorce, and this mother
kept the children on condition that the
father could sometimes come and look
at them, and these went into poorhouses,
and those went into an insane asylum,
and those went into dissolute public
life, and all went to destruction. The
tiiightiest war ever made against the
marriage institution was that free love
campaign, sometimes under one name
and sometimes under another.
Brazen Polygamy.
Another influence that has warred
upon the marriage relation has been po-
lygamy in Utah That was a stereotyped
caricature Of the marriage relation and
has poisoned the whole land. You might
as we'll think that you can have an arm
IN state Of modification and yet the
whole body not be sickened as to have
these territories polygamized and yet the
body of the nation not feel the putrefac.
ton. Hear 1t, good men and women OF
America, that so long ago as 1869 law
was passed by congress forbidding pos
lyga1ny In the territories and In all the
places where they had Jurisdiction.
Twenty four years passed along and FIVE
administrations before the first brick
was knocked from that fortress of liber-
tinlsm.
Every new presidents In his inaugural
tickled that monster with the straw OF
condemnation, and every congress stul.
titled itself Ii proposing some plan that
would not work. Polygamy stood more
lntrenohed, and more brazen, and more
puissant, and moro braggart, and more
internal. James Buchanan, a much
abused man Of his day, did mora for the
extirpation of this yillainy than most
OF the subsequent administrations Mr..
Buchanan sent out an army. and al
though II was halted in its work still
he accomplished moro than some OF the
administrations which did nothing but
talk, talk. talk. At last, but not until
it had poisoned generations. polygamy
has received Its deathblow.
Polygany In Utah warrsd against the
marriage relation throughout tho land.
1t was impossible to have such an awfui
sewer Of iniquity sending up its miasma.
which was waited by the winds north.
south, east and west, without the whole
land boing affected by it.
Another influence that has warred
against the marriage relation In e1is
country has been pustulous literature,
For we