The herald and news. [volume] (Newberry S.C.) 1903-1937, 1913-08-22


her and love her; and when our good
women are no longer to be found, and
we have lost the breed, the doom Of
the republic is near.
1t may be contonded that informa
ton such as l have described would
&c partial and frag gnentary, and that
any conclusions, based on it would
therefore contain a large factor of
Uncertainty. That may or may not be
true. But there is at least one sub
ject about which mathematically ex-
act knowledge can be obtained. TIL!
number Of divorces granted in State
with woman suffrage and the birth
rate may be compared with the nun
Der in the same State before equal
suffrage was adopted, and the relation
between the two phenomena inferred.
l thank God that my lot was east
in a State where there is no such
thing as divorce. To get married in
South Carolina is the easiest thing
Imaginable To get unmarried is
impossible. "Once married, always
married, is the rule. Literally and
exactly we believe that for better OF
for worse, in poverty and in wealth.
in sickness and in health, till death
do then part they twain are one.
1t is true that, if life together be-
comes unbearable, a man and wife
MAY separate and live apart; but
even then the bonds that bind
them are only stretched, not legal
ly broken. In South Carolina we tie
matrimonial knot tnat battles alike
the skill of legal nimble fingers of a
false evpediency and the brute
strength of a statute. The knot we
tie hold sfaster than the tabled Cor
don Knot of antiquity. Ingenuity
cannot unfasten nor force destroy it.
The skeleton fingers of death alone
can loose it.
Not the South Carolina Way.
We in South Carolina do not believe
in the modern idea so prevalent in this
day and time of permitting a man to
marry woman in her youth and
beauty, and then, when her neck be-
gins to grow skinny and shrunken,
her face sallow and splotched, and
her eyes dim, to search out among his
women acquaintances some. young
and buxom girl who suits his lustful
eyes better and straightway get to
work Systematically to treat his old
wife so that she in self-defense and to
maintain self-respect, seeks a divorce
to get rid of him. There have been
elaring cases of this kind of world
wide notoriety wherever the divorce
evil fourishes.
When we contrast this type of man
and woman with the glorious picture
drawn by Burns those men who have
souls are bound to recoil from the
one type and bow down and worship
the other. Lest you have forgotten
the verses 1 will recite them for
you:
John Anderson, my jo, John,
When we were first acquent,
Your locks were like the raven,
Your bonie brow was brent;
"But now your brow is beld, John,
Your locks are like tne snaw,
But blessings on your frosty pow
John Anderson, my jo.
John Anderson, my 10, John,
We clamb the hill thegither,
And monte a cantie day, John,
We've had wi'ane anither;
Now we maun totter down, John.
And hand III hand we'll go,
And sleep thegither at tne foot
John Anderson, my jo!
This song, one of Robert Burns
best, is the very apothesis of married
life among the virtuous and good peo-
ple of the world.
In thinking about the widespread,
progressive character of the divorce
evil like all thoughtful men, l have
been led to consider the cause of it
and the great Generalization which
has followed it. The law of seXuallty
is the most powerful law in nature,
and it is the wise provision Of the good
God who created us with it to COM
pei reproduction, the perpetuation OF
the race. Wherever the marriage
bond is regarded as a sacred one, Wo-
mon ora ucuo1Iv virtuOIlS aud Virtu-