The San Francisco call., 1910-12-10

} Miss Lu Eta Smith, according to
, the theory of the prosecution at the
Burke trial at Santa Rosa. There
has been offered in evidence a re-
markable paper which the aged
keeper of the sanitarium near Santa
Rosa prepared for the young woman.
She read this essay and indorsed it.
; 1t is an elaborate exposition of the
doctrine of free love-" although in
) the paper Burke decries the free
lover" as a viper Miss Smith is the
mother of child whose father, she
claims. is Doctor Burke.
In beginning his paper Doctor
Burke took up the scientific and
philosophical aspect of marriage and
the relation of the sexes He said:
I'VE are too apt to discuss mar
riage and the family and divorce
from the standpoint of ancient his
tory-that is, from history antedat-
ing Darwin's The Origin of the
Species Darwins revolutionary
work was the conversion of alert
minds to the philosophy of evolution
The Spencerian philosophy of evo-
luton could never have taken strong
hold of the human mind had not
Darwin and Wallace wrought out
the concrete demonstration that
) mans origin was not a miraculous
creation. This was the first con-
sequence of Darwin's work.
And so, also. of our moral pre-
cepts. It has become impossible to
think of them longer as absolute
truths. divine sparks or as a code
of revealed commands imposed upon
us by supernatural authority. They
. are, rather, the products of an evo-
lutionary experience. Like institu-
; tions and laws they are imperfect,
and they will undergo modification
as we learn more than we know now
about the conditions upon which the
survival of the better and the best
} depend. They are not final, and to
bow down to them and worship them
is again to give ourselves over to
a superstition more refined, possibly,
than any other superstition, but a
superstition nevertheless"
Evolution, the venerable teacher"
argued, brought about the highest
development of the individual. HUI
man society, he contended, was ere
ated for the perpetuation and i'm
. provement of the race. Today the
individual is beginning to reap the
reward of ages of sacrifice and sub
ordination. OF social groups Burke
; said:
Some stand ready to instruct US.
They never tire telling US that the
family is the social unit, and that to
destruction we go the moment the
family begins to disintegrate. AS
a matter of fact, the family in the
role of social unit has been a tran
sitional phenomenon in the evolu
, tion of human society.
Look at the earliest grouping.
It was in the horde, or camp, of
20 to so individuals, and the rela-
tions of the sexes were those of a
temporary mating. Out of the horde
, group society developed a double
process. Hordes combined to form
tribes and these subdivided into
households, each of which was q
; group of relatives, wherein all the
women were actually wives to all
} the men, and all the men were hus-
, bands to all the women.
Tribes. in the course of time.
banded together in considerations,
group underwent changes which
converted it into the patriarchaI
household or compound family.
Later on federations of tribes
became political states and the COM
pound or patriarchal family broke
. up into single families. each con-
sisting of father and mother and
their immediate children. but no
longer including, as in the patri-
e. s,I .a1,s \
grandchildren.
Had this been the final stage in
social evolution, we might with
some truth have said that the fam
lily, though not originally the So
cial unit, had at length become
such. But we have already entered
upon another stage of social evolu-
ton, and the single family, like all
previous household groupings, is
disintegrating. Human society is
becoming humanity. and its unit is
not the family but the individual
At some length Doctor Burke
eruditely traced the functions of the
family in its social, legal and eco
nomic aspects. Once, he argued, the
prime duty Of the family was to
educate and develop the children.
Now that function is given over to
schools and institutions, and in law
the property of wife may be sep
arate from that of the husband
Doctor Burke exclaimed:
IF any one supposes that the
family thus shorn of attributes and
functions can continue to be the
unit of society. his thought pro-
! cesses are peculiar.
What, then, must come? The
individual as the unit of society
can not live apart from the race.
The perpetuation of the race in
wolves the mating of men and
women (this can be done only
through affinity, and the perpetual
tion of an improving race involves
sentiments and affections that have
been evolved through ages of en-
larging life, Of widening and deep
ening consciousness. Love, mating
and parenthood viii not become ex-
tinct. And the family in some
sense will survive. 1t will be
adapted or rather readapted to new
and larger conditions.
Look at the facts. The family
Of expediency is fast disappearing
because the household has ceased to
be a necessary economic group. The
only family that can take the place
is the voluntary family, held to-
gether not by expediency but by
choice. This family, already the
, basis of this twentieth century
home and destined to be the basis
of yet happier and more beautiful
homes, will be founded sincerely
and fearlessly on those instincts and
affections of attractions and affinity
, that both perpetuate the race and
- Ill.