Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1908-05-10

acters may have been selected from what is termed by many novelists, 'the better class of society. These characters might he so handled by the novelist as to influence the weak minded reader toward following an unclean example. but such books should not affect people with minds Of their own.
 The novelists. however. have no in- tention of abandoning their present position At least, Mr. Phillips for one has none and he does not hesi- tate to say so. He asserts that those who try 10 cover up the facts of di- vorce and the causes leading up to it are doing more to encourage the evil than are writers who frankly tell tho truth abou; it.
 As to whether divorce is an evil or not, or rather as 10 whether it's sup lpreSsion might not lead to greater evils | l have no opinion" says MT Phillips If it is an evil no good can come from covering it up. The only hope of n,- provement is to get right down to the foundation facts of it's cause and to face those facts. Apparently there are great many people including some of those of high authority in our churches who believe that divorce is a greater sin than the infraction of the seventh commandment and who are vent the former. At least they hold that there is no forgiveness for divorce while there may be forsiveness for adultery.
 Anyhow. do not write novels with q purpose. try 10 record facts as see them. Divorce is a fact of Ameri- can life i; might almost be called an American institution. Therefore,
 feel free to deal with it as it exists and as l see it. As to the legal treat ment of divorce and the grounds for which il should be granted it is i'm, possible to say at least 1 should net think of attempting it. IL is conceiv able. however, that to d person of delicate sensibilities some of the things referred to in my book to which a number of worthy persons seem to have taken exception might be more unbearable than some of the causes more frequently adduced in courts of law.
 Those who discuss the relations of life ill their spiritual or romantic as poets might as well recognize that all human institutions are founded on he earth and that it is necessary to dig down to the foundations to understand the problems involved in human af fairs. Physical causes, physical at fecling marriage and divorce which We may recognize or not as We see fit. But do not quarrel with others for refusing to recognize it they shoull not quarrel with me because prefer 10 do SO.
 \ number of women support this view of the case and have ranged them selves with the playwrights and novel; ists. One of these, Mrs. Lucy M, Saunders, writing in Appleton's Masa- zine. says that in the majority of cases wives are really responsible for di vorces through failure to live up to the ideal that men have applied to them Viewed in this light novels like the interdicted Phillips book do not encourage divorce but act as an object lesson to wives to give attention to their mental development and their physical appearance and to strive as earnestly to attract after marriage as 1 before.
 Another woman who has come to 1 the defense of the popular novel and play is Miss Rose Staal the actress.
 II dont see how they are going to throw the blame for the divorce evil on the popular novel; she says in her breezy Chorus Lady" style. T can conceive of no circumstances un- der which you can assume that it is responsible. When a stately, raven haired, brunette Wife wakes up from a dream of domestic bliss and discovers that her husbands zeal affinity is a Large. blue@ey@ blonde, say, she doesn't have fnfh 70 a hnok shop for one of L K best sellers to
 know that it T over for her but the alimony. Wy, she can find the
 answer in the little arithmetic she
 used to carry 10 school every day. One from two leaves one and she is that one. But the real American, our genuine men and true, loyal women, are not getting divorces. They marry for love and they live together in love, in happiness and in mutual respect till death doth them part.
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