The Camden chronicle. (Camden, Tenn.) 1890-current, 1895-04-05
REV. DIR. TALMAGE.
TIVE NOTED DIvINgs SUNDAY
DISCOURSE.
subjects owhOiesalo Divorce. -

ANaA NHNIN MNN MNNNNHi. anu ANNNHNNN N OF
nfclieltoua homes in America no one wil
ioubl. II there were only ono akeioton in
iho closet that might DO locked up and
abandoned, but In many home there a. a
keleton IN the hallway and a skeleton Ia all
ho apartments.
"Unhappily married" are two words de-
Iorpliyo Of many a homestead II needs no
orthodox minister 90 prove 30 a badly mated
pair that there IS hell. They are there now.
Sometimes a grand and gracious woman win
DO thus incarcornted, and her life viii be
srucihxion, as was the case with Mrs. Sigour-
ney, the great pOelese and the great soul.
Sometimes o coneccratod man win bo united
20 a fury, as was John Wesley or united 10
vixen, as was John Milton. Sometimes. and
generally both parties are 20 blame, and
Thomas Carlyle was an intolerable seOld and
bis wife smoked and swore, and Froude. the
historian, pulled aside the curtain from the
lifelong squabbleat Craigenputtock and Five
Cheyno Row.
Some say that for the alienation Of all
these domestic disorders Of which We hear
easy divorce IL q good prescription. God
sometimes authorizes divorce as certainly as
He authorizes marriage Ihaye Just az much
regard for oSe lawfully divorced as i have
Tor one lawfully married. But You know
and know that wholesale divorce s. one Of
our National scOurges / am not surprised
At this when / think OF the influences which
have been abroad initiating against the mar
rage relation.
For many years the platforms Of the eoun-
try rang with talk about free love millen-
/ num- 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 promi-
nent in that movement have since been dis
| tinguished for great promiscuosity Of aflec-
| hon. Popular thems for such occasions were
/ the tyranny of man. the oppression of the
marriage relation. wOmen's rights and the
ainnittes. Prominent speakers were women
/ with short curls and short dress, and very
| long tongue, eyerlastingly at war with God
because they We're created women, while on
| the platform sat meek men with soft accent
/ and cowed demeanor, apologize for mascu-
/ Unity, and holding the parasols while the
/ termagant orators went on preaching the
/ doctrine Of free love.
That campaign Of about twenty years set
| more devils into the marriage relation than
/ will be exercised In she next fifty. Men and
/ women went home from such meetings 50
! permanently confused as 10 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 "uiad"
of woes, and this one got alimony, and that
one got limited divorce, and this mother
Z 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 mightiest war ever
made against the marriage institution was
that free love campaign, sometimes under
one name and sometimes under another
Another influence that has Warred upor
] the mnrriQOp relation has bnnu rao1sroor,.v q
Utah. That was a stereotyped caricature oil
the marriage relation and has poisoned the
whole land. You might as we'll think that
you can have an arm in q state of mortifca.
ton and yet the whole body not be sickened
as to have these Territories polygamized and
yet the body of the Nation not feel the putre
faction. Hear it, good men and women Of
America, that so long ago as 1862 a law was
passed by Congress forbidding polygamy il
the Territories and in all the places wher,
they had Jurisdiction. TWenty-four YEAR
passed along and five administrations before
the first brick was knocked from that for
tress of libertinism.
Every new President in his Inaugural
ttckled that monster with the straw of con
domination, and every Congress stultihed it
self in proposing some plan that would no
work. Polygany stood more intrenched
and more brazen, and more puissant, ant
moro braggart, and more Internal. Jane
Buchanan, much abused man Of his day
did more for the extirpation of this villain
than most Of the subsequent administra
TONS Mr.. Buchanan sent out an army, an
although 1t was halted in its work still h
accomplished more than some of the admin
istrations which did nothing but talk, talk
talk. At last but not until 1t had poisone
generations, polygamy hasreceived its death
blow.
Polygamy in Utah warred against the
riage relation throughout the land. 1t wa
impossible to have such an awful sewer
intquity sending up its miasma, which wa
waited by the winds North, South, East aa
West, without the whole land being affecte
by it.
Another influence that has warred again!
the marriage relation in this country hg
been pustulous literature with its million
, of sheets every week choked with stories {
I domestic wrongs and inidelities and mass:
ores and outrages, until 1t is a wonder to N
l that there are any decencies or any commo
sense left on the subject Of marriage On
half OF the newsstands of all our cities reel
Z ing with the filth.
"Now," say some, 1--WE admit all thei
evils, and the only way to clear them out
: correct them Is by easy divorce" Well, b
fore we yield to that cry let us find out no
q easy it is now.
have looked overthe laws of all the State
and find that, while in some States it
: easier than in others, in every State 1t
> easy. The State of Illinois, through its lie
J islature, rectes long list of proper caus
= for divorce and then closes up by giving
! the courts the right to make the decree
divorce in any case where they deem it g
8 pedient. After that you are not surpris
at the announcement that in one county
Q the State Of Illinois, in one year, there we
a 1873 divorces, If you want to know how ca
1t is YOU have only to look over the records
It the States. In the city of San Francisco 8
7 divorces in one year, and in twenty yea
ia New England 10000 Is that not ca
If enough
If the same ratio continue-the ratio
q multiplied divorce and multiplied causes
u divorce-we are not far from the time VIII
our courts will have to set apart whole da
y for applieation. and all YOU will have